The only problem was that we could not get Brazilian Reals from the ATMs in Foz de Iguazu, after the border, but luckily all the petrol stations on the way accepted credit cards.
The ruta 277 is a toll road and even though bikes pay a fairly little amount each time, cash is still eventually required.
Therefore we exchanged what was left of our Argentinean pesos at one of the petrol stations for an excellent rate........for them!
On a stretch of 500 kms we counted probably 10 toll stations and we were bleeding our little cash fast.
150 kms from Curitiba we were left with only few Reals in our pocket, wondering if they would be enough to make it to town.
In the meantime dark clouds were looming ahead of us in the sky.
It appears that all the rain that we didn’t get during our trip in South America was waiting for us on Ruta 277.
As we reached Irati the skies opened and we found ourselves in the middle of a huge hail storm.
Branches from the trees were falling in the middle of the road and the visibility got close to zero while we were hit by marbles of ice.
I asked Elena if she was happy to carry on and she said yes.
We tried. One km later we spotted a nice hotel looking like a castle and we pulled over.
Unfortunately the hotel was full but they said that 500 meters further there was another “establishment”.
What they were referring to was in fact one of those “sex motels” where you pay for a room by the hour.
At that point nothing really mattered and to be fair the establishment didn’t look that bad: as we were completely soaked and since our bones were aching from the hail, we rung the bell.
However it wasn’t written in our destiny to spend a night in a sex motel. Unfortunately for us they only accepted payment in cash!
The owner however pointed us to the hotel at the other side of the road called the Rotta 277.
This is where eventually we found shelter for the night.
Since the hotel didn’t have a credit card facility, the following morning I was escorted to the petrol station nearby where I was able, not only to pay for the night but also to get some cash back for a reasonable fee of 5%.
Everyone was happy: the owner of the hotel got her payment, we finally got some cash and the owner of the petrol station charged us a fee for the service. We will go down in history as the people who introduced the concept of cash back in Brazil.
We left very early as we wanted to reach Florianopolis by 1pm and we still had to cover 500 kms.
The sun was out and the level of humidity probably at 300%, and yet the good weather wasn’t meant to last.
After Curitiba the sky got darker again and another monumental storm hit us.
For the Italian bikers out there I can say that the road resembled exactly as the “Serravalle” from Milano to Genova, only with tropical plants at the side of the road.
As the drainage system of the motorway was overwhelmed by the quantity of water, big ponds were forming in the middle of the road.
Often the incoming lorries at the other side of the road would lift big waves of water that would suddenly hit us in the face making it fairly dangerous to stay on the fast lane.
For this reason I decided to drive on the slow lane for awhile.
This strategy was certainly safer but probably wetter.
Big lorries at our side of the road were now overtaking us lifting once again waves of water as tall as 2M that would hit us like tsunamis.
Water was coming down on us even through the vents of the helmets.
Eventually even this storm passed and we reached Florianopolis as scheduled at around 1pm.
At the Rotta 277 the night before there was no internet facility which meant we were not able to study the road to get to our hotel.
On top of that I wasn’t able to access mapdroyd as my mobile too was no longer working, probably due to the amount of water that soaked our clothes.
This is also the reason why we do not have any pictures to upload for this leg of the trip
To reach our destination all we could remembered was Santinho hotel at Santinho beach.
Florianopolis is a very modern city split in 2 parts.
Half of the town is on the continent facing the sea, the other half is on Santa Caterina Island.
The 2 parts of the town are linked by a long bridge.
Most importantly SC island is 50 kms long with plenty of beautiful beaches scattered around its perimeter.
Santinho beach is one of those, in the northern side of the island, 35 kms from Floripa town.
A Brazilian biker flanked us asking if we needed any help and pointed us in the right direction.
As we reached Santinho village we learnt immediately that anything in Santinho’s beach is called Santinho: Santinho market, Santinho petrol station, Santinho pharmacy and of course at least 3 Santinho hotels.
We almost checked in at the wrong establishment. (posada do Santinho)
As they could not find us in their list of clients we checked our reservation on the net and discovered our true destination: the solar do Santinho.
There is no much to say about this place except that we have a beautiful apartment over 2 floors, big garden, swimming pool, lounge room with pool table overlooking the sea.
A spectacular 2 km beach is only 100 meters away where mostly Brazilian tourists practice all sort of sports, including running, Yoga and surf.
No need to say that they are all mega fit.
Enchanted by this place we immediately extended our stay by an extra 4 days to top up our “builder’s tan” and get back into shape.
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