General: Brazil

Advantages: Fasinating experience
Disadvantages: Not for the Niave

\"Mister\" I look down, and there is a young boy, no older than 6 or 7, with big brown eyes, and messy hair, dressed in blue shorts, a ripped Bucks Fizz T Shirt, barefooted, arms outstretched, hands cupped, begging for money. Accross the street, a business man smokes his Cigar and laughs with a colleague, both dressed in suits, better placed in saville row, rather than this dusty street. This is Brazil, a land of culture, experience, scars, and ...
...in my life. Rich in aesthetics and adventure, the would be James Bond will have a field day slipping in and out of decadance and modern lux, to extreme poverty and crime. Flying in to Aeroporto Galeão in Rio de Janeiro with Varig, Brazil\'s international airline from New York, I knew what to expect. Rio is great, but, I dont like the nice and great, I like the rough and traditional, I like like to be away from it all, where I can only access the ... Read review

Advantages: breathtaking scenery, beautiful people, lots of fun....
Disadvantages: long, long bus journeys, quite expensive for a backpacker

We spent six weeks travelling around Brazil which was not nearly long enough, six months would have been more like it! We travelled there from Argentina and our first stop was the world famous Iguazu Falls which were an amazing sight, as was the surrounding forest, although the Argentinian side of the falls has more wildlife and more places to explore. From here we travelled overnight to Sao Paulo by bus and arrived at 3am. We were quite apprehensive ...
...about crime, muggings and so on and being in such a huge city was quite daunting, especailly as our Portuguese was pretty appalling at that stage. However, we found people in the bus station were extremely friendly and helpful and were able to direct us to Chinatown via the subway system which was where we had chosen to stay, as it had the cheapest accomodation. We only stayed one night in Sao Paulo and then we flew to Manaus in the Amazon, another ... Read review

Advantages: Breathtaking nature, cheap, multi-cultural
Disadvantages: high criminality, bad health institutions (hospital etc.),

Now I live since nearly two years in Brasil and my opinion about this country is still conflicting: on one side its for sure one of the most impressing countries concerning the nature, on the other side also one of the countries with enormous social differences, and this always means: criminality and violence. I don’t want to talk here about attractions like Ouro Preto, an Unesco-city, the spectaculous waterfalls of iguacu, the cities Salvador de ...
...every travel guide, and this is good so, they are worth the visit. And yes, the people in Brasil are really amazingly friendly, the country itself,a quasi-continente, shows so many different sides from the black-african north to the european south like only few others. As a conclusion I would say: YES, you should visit Brasil, and visit besides the mentioned travel-guide attractions especially the amazing wonders of nature this country has, and NO, ... Read review

Advantages: food, beaches, exchange rate, friendly people, sights
Disadvantages: internal flights are expensive, internal coach travel is very long!

Leaving UK soil at 6am on the 30th of June, I was prepared to arrive in Porto Alegre, Brazil 22 hours later. However, a delayed flight meant I missed the last connecting flight of the day from Rio de Janeiro. Fortunately, I was put up in a very posh hotel in the airport, where the waiter was convinced I was prince William! My first impression when finally arriving in Porto Alegre, the south's capital city at 12am local time, was of a rundown America. ...
...- from the traffic lights and overhead electricity transformers to the drive through banks (and of course McDonalds). The City’s infrastructure was much more developed than I had expected – many of the buildings were small skyscrapers – a majority of the people living in apartment blocks of 15 stories high, all with security personnel in little ‘guard towers’ behind high fences. The Brazilian’s appeared paranoid regarding their security; many shops ... Read review

Advantages: Everything you dream of
Disadvantages: hard to get to

I was lucky and arrived just for the carnival where every ones is hyped up and exited, but this is Brazil for you. The weather is hot and every one is in a good mood, you put on your shades and you party day and night. I loved Brazil; I loved the food, beaches, city and the women. We got meet very nice people there and they were even nice enough to show us places where your average tourist will never find. Beautiful waterfalls, rainforest and exotic ... Read review