FOR THE MOMENT INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM THESE BUREAUCRATS

' . . . the planet is becoming supersaturated with displaced humanity. The romance, so powerful a motivation not long ago, has as a result long been entirely stripped from the process of today's travel'

-Simon Winchester, Worlds to Explore

I did not choose to begin with a lament from Simon Winchester because our trip to Rio Grande do Sul ever promised a truly romantic adventure. It did not. We travelled by rented Hyundai HB20, not by donkey or camel or canoe. We even, by generous definition, stayed in a hotel in Torres. But, in reflection, this trip had many of the makings of what great travel is constructed of.

I struggled, on returning to Sao Paulo, to explain what exactly the trip was. What did you see? What did you do? These basics were challenging to answer, without simply (and unsatisfactorily) responding "we travelled". That, as it turns out, is precisely what we did. We had a blast. And we did it despite having the primary event we were aiming for (the Torres Hot-Air Balloon Festival) being something of a bust.

It was a great trip because we saw the place as it really is. We saw Gramado, a mountain tourist town of German extraction, in something of an off-season on an off weekend. The Santa-Land amusement park was nearly empty, and we had the chocolate museum to ourselves. There were no tour buses on the roads through the wine-country, and we ate risotto overlooking a vineyard without hearing ceaseless, buzzword-laced descriptions of the wine. The carnival rides at the balloon festival were populated by four American diplomats and dozens of local Torresian adolescents. In short, it was seeing the place as the people there know it. And it was great.

Of course, Gramado is gimmicky. It's most comparable to Park City (both even have film festivals), but to compare the two is to remove the careful "snobbery meets a real mining town" gravitas of Park City and replace it with a sort of "Disney presents Park City" replica. For those of us who are essentially 8 years olds, it was full of marvelously low-budget amusements: Dino-land, Santa-land, giant statues of fondue pots, car museums with 6 cars, and a trip around a world entirely composed of chocolate, to name a few. 

Permanently Frosty

In Santa Land Alison and Ariel finally found a house their size

100 pounds of chocolate elephant

The main goal of the trip, if there was one, was the balloon festival at Torres. Contrary to hopeful speculation, the balloons were too professional to allow rides, or to even fly on Sunday. So we saw only two balloons airborne, and a few others who inflated at night as part of a gimmicky spectacle with multiple countdowns but no actual flying. Thankfully there was a carnival. And, as those of you who have been to the Ute Stampede or Heber Rodeo with me know, I find carnivals delightful. So we hit the rides. I'm sure all of them were fully inspected and maintained by professionals.

If you look closely on the left, you'll see a blur of Chris and Alison in the air above their seats

In short, good people and pleasant surroundings made for something unexpected . . . and unforgettable. But I couldn't tell you why.

Alison finally finds the perfect home

Even the banana is chocolate

Rockin' Santa on vacation in Gramado.

You guessed it . . . chocolate

LITTLE BIG WORLD

Itu is, to quote the immortal Richard Norris, "regionally prominent". It should be regionally prominent for its moderate role in Sao Paulo politics during the period of the young republic. As a coffee and dairy farming town, it was the location of several high-powered meetings between the plantation owners who became the aristocracy of the crownless post-1889 Brazil. Its museum, which recounts the many periods of Itu's historical significance by means of painted tile walls, tries its best to lend some credibility to Itu's fame.

No, Itu's fame stems from a drive by the late Simplicio, a Ituan humorist who, after installing himself as the Tourism Secretary for the city, determined to truly put Itu on the map. The name "Itu" comes from a tupi word which means "big", and Secretary Simplicio determined that the world needed Itu to be the "capital of big things".

O Secretario was tremendously successful, erasing Itu's history in favor of whimsical leviathans. Every Paulistano knows Itu as the "place where everything's big", and indeed, many things are big. Popsicles sold there must be over 1 foot in size. The traffic light can be seen from 5 blocks away. The phone booth in the central park is taller than the trees which surround it. My hat goes off to the hero Simplicio, for he has truly put his charming town on the map.

Not sure what this was . . . on the way to a farm we found a floating glacier of what is either the hardiest ice within 1000 miles or industrial runoff.

This llama was 23 feet tall. Or not. He was just a normal llama.

THE DEVIL'S THROAT

"Then abruptly, we reach the edge of a terrific mile-wide abyss, and stand before what seems, at the moment, to be all the beauty in the world changed into mist and moonlight, floating out from among the stars, and falling and fading into a bottomless fissure in the earth." 

- Richard Halliburton, Book of Marvels: The Occident

Much has been said of Iguazu Falls, so I won't add too much. It's enormous. It's overwhelming. It's 10000 feet wide. It may simply be water adjusting height, but that fails to capture the immensity of the thing. At times it is an exploding cataract, and from other angles a placid lake with a hole in it. It is, on all counts, a sight worth seeing.

THE PARIS OF THE EAST

"Harbin has been called the Paris of the Far East, but not, I think, by anyone who has stayed there for any length of time" - Peter Fleming, 'One's Company'

This is obviously much delayed, as I've been back in Brazil for some time now, but I'm finally getting around to Harbin. Much can be said about Harbin, a fact which in itself is remarkable. China is life on an immense scale, and its cities have often grown a lot faster than their characters have. World cities like Shanghai and Hong Kong certainly have a feel and a history, but the more than 160 cities with a million inhabitants are, on average, gray, square, and without history or feel.

Except Harbin. Harbin is an average Chinese city (or the second largest city, were it to be in America). And unlike its Chinese comrades, it's fascinating. In 1898 it was nothing but a tiny village, until two railroad lines crossed through it. Despite the frigid winter and boiling summer, it swiftly became one of the largest and most sought after cities in China. From 1900 to 1950 the city was controlled by Manchus, Chinese, Tzarist Russians, exiled Russian Jews, a puppet regime led by the deposed former emperor of China, the Japanese, the Nationalist Chinese, and the Communists. Each group has left its mark, and the city is a sea of European shopping streets, onion domes, and that same modern Chinese architecture that is mostly reflective glass. It makes for a city that feels like a city, a unique attribute for a medium sized Chinese city. As the always brilliant Peter Fleming put it, "it is a place with a great deal of not easily definable character."

             

Mascots on their way to work . . .

The cold was brutal. I landed on a warm weekend and it was 7 Fahrenheit, at noon, on a sunny day. But more striking is how the city embraces it. The Songha freezes over, and immediately a carnival springs up on the thick ice sheet. Ice sculptures line the main streets of town, and blocks of the river are cut out, stacked on the island, and turned in the Harbin Ice Festival, a frozen but no less merry Disneyland. I've never seen so many people in China so obviously and openly happy. It was a giant party, taking place entirely in castles made of ice. It was one of the most fun things I've done in years. And all I had to wear was 7 layers, and two hats.

On the River

  

   

Sliding Down the River

IN A SHOCKING AND REMARKABLE VALLEY

 

Owing to China's hilarious spat with Google, updating this blog proved a challenge during the month I just spent in China. You must forgive me for posting about a few items several weeks after they happened.

On Friday, January 16th I woke up to the most classic of winter days in Beijing. It was foggy, polluted, freezing cold. Also, it was very polluted. Despite 14 floors of vantage point I couldn't see the next building over. It was time to escape. That night I boarded a flight to the city once known as Dayong, in Hunan province. I say "once" because it's now known as Zhangjiajie City. As will be discussed in the next post, there is a terrible boringness to mid-size Chinese cities. Some have chosen to ignore this problem, others have chosen to advertise their often-disputable merits with ads that reduce your desire to actually go there (the 1980s-like Powerpoint based commercial for a city in Guangdong comes to mind, as a city of sea, of business, and of bad graphics), and the brain trust of Dayong chose to rename the city after a famous neighbor, creating an enormous amount of confusion for the dim-witted (like me) who are trying to book a hotel that's not in their city, but in their famous neighbor.

 

Zhangjiajie City is named after the first national park in China, Zhangjiajie, which is about 30 minutes north of the city. Now part of the Wulingyuan National Scenic Area, it is certainly worthy of its heritage status. The park is endlessly breathtaking. I took 300 photos while there, all of them of rocks. I found I couldn't stop. But none of them do it justice. It is simply astounding. At times it is like Yosemite, but more dramatic.

I started (after a very frigid evening) with a cable car up to HuangShi, a town at the top of a karst formation. The view was shocking, but I found that my afternoon along the streams of the park, through sudden canyons and cliffs, was where the true nature of the park came alive. A second day, going up an elevator to the top of a hill and coming down Tianji Mountain on a 5 mile staircase down led to another lovely walk along the streams of the park. The third day I stopped being lazy and hiked on a little used path to the top of a mountain only accessible by stairs (a rarity at a Chinese tourist destination). It was delightful. January is the low season, it was a Monday, and I had the park to myself. That is how the park should be enjoyed. It's majesty declines as the number of loud tour groups increases. It was one of the best weekends I've ever spent. I'm afraid the photos will never deliver the same rude shock and peaceful refuge that the park gave to me.

Promptly Disregarding the Signs Not to Tease the Monkeys

The delightful students from Nanjing with home I descended Tianji

The next post will be about Harbin, another mid-sized Chinese city which actually has a soul . . . stay tuned.