Our last hope; The Romantic Route

08 Mar 2015
4,515 - 4,650 km
Porto Alegre


We were excited to leave civilization and everything big behind to nourish our torn spirits after the trip so far. But today was not going to be that day...!

I would still say that on this day blew the winds of change, if only very subtly. 
























The next few cities after Porto Alegre that I had imagined being fairly small sized were in fact pretty enormous, still we cruised effortlessly by on the highway and soon found ourselves surrounded by trees instead!

 The road started to snake its way upward and deeper into the mountains, but we were still waiting to leave the billboards behind and find the villages with German architecture and beautiful views of the tree covered green mountains.



But we just wouldn't have it our way. 

At midday we stopped to eat something. It was a very nice and small town, but very touristy and with little German architecture.









I think this broke by spirit pretty bad.

As we were sitting and waiting for our food in a restaurant, I found myself looking at the map. I didn't know how much more I could take. I was exhausted and despaired. Brasil had been nothing of what I had hoped nor expected. I kept looking as if the answer were to appear to me. To continue on the current route, or take off into the countryside and head directly to Iguazu across the province instead of along the coast.

We ate. Had some coffee, and then Caro asked me again: "What are we going to do?" I still had no answer. I didn't say anything. We paid and walked outside. It was as if I couldn't even think straight. "Let's go to the gas station and refill the tank". Surely someone will point us in the right direction.

But no, still without answer and direction.

Eventually, without really deciding I took off and chose the road leaving the Romantic, commercially capitalized route behind, and we were heading into the countryside. It was decided.

On this route we passed by the "Eagles Nest", and we decided to take a moment to enjoy the view from up there. It turned out that the road was at times extremely steep so Caro had to walk part of the way... but we also needed some space from each other, move our legs and relax.





The view was beautiful, and we could see Caxias do Sul from there on the horizon, which would be where we would rest.We got back on the road, carefully navigated the steep, curvy dirt road with many loose small rocks, which had my heart pumping, although Caro seemed to miss the excitement..







In the afternoon we arrived to Caxias do Sul hoping it would be something less busy and hectic. It wasn't. We tried - as many times before to take out money using our credit cards. We couldn't. "...Lets find a hotel".

..."Complicated unless you head down town" the young man answered.

We kept on looking but couldn't find anything worth the while. It had been a long day, and we were desperate to find a place to lodge for the night. With a last breath, ...

... I remembered that someone had mentioned a motel up the hill. As a last resort we headed that way, and not before long did we find the motel, with a white bunny on a sign outside the building.

We were offered various room options but decided to go all exclusive with jakutzee in the room. This was almost half the price as a hotel room. We ordered pizza and had a much needed bath. - I was very temped to open the bottle of champagne in the fridge, but decided against it as I had to drive some few hours later!

Two hopeless and burned out motorbikers finally laying down to sleep in the queen size bed, with mirror all around.
We said goodnight to ourselves in the roof mirror.

At six in the morning we had to leave the room, which couldn't have been a more perfect start!