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Wednesday, 20.02.2002: Petrol station - Bonito
Darrell must have been absolutely knackered and he missed a sign for a sleeping policeman and we drove over it at about 40km/h - we all got some serious bruises at the back! That certainly woke us up! We put our clocks forward one hour and arrived at Bonito (meaning pretty, but I think someone was being very sarcastic when they named the town) and stayed at a very good YHA - with swimming pool, restaurant, laundry and very clean rooms for 3 days.
Then Paul told us that we should have put our clocks back and not forward so we could´ve had a few extra hours sleep as we had now arrived at 3pm!
We shared a room with Val and Anne-Marie. The 4 of us went on a laundry hunt - we borrowed YHA bikes as the YHA is quite a way out of the town - quite a sight the 4 of us on bikes with washing bags! The one laundry was empty - no washing machines or anything! Then a man on a motorbike pulled up and told us where a laundry was. We didn´t really trust him but he was actually pointing the same way as the sign for a laundry. So we ended up at some woman´s house. It was very empty and the washing machine looked like a wine barrel with an electric wire coming out of it! Val used her Spanish to find out the prices and that the washing would be ready at 6pm tomorrow.
We got back a 4pm. Paul was telling us about activities and showed us the town afterwards. We had a drink at a bar and went back for the BBQ at the YHA at 8pm.
Thursday, 21.02.2002: Bonito
We went snorkelling in the cleanest river in the world - you´re not allowed to have sun cream or mozzie cream on! There were some really big fish in the river with us! And we hired an under-water camera to take some photos. We had quite a long walk through the rain forest in our wet suits in the overpowering heat so we were grateful to get into the water. We had a superb lunch there and played with all the hammocks in the patio area afterwards.
Great lunch and rest after the snorkelling
That night it was the first birthday party on the truck and we all went out for a meal and Paul had organised balloons and a birthday cake for Amy´s 23rd birthday! By the way, the shorts are more like quadruples! Helen tried a caipirinha (Brazilian drink), which nearly blew her head off after one sip and was undrinkable! Mind you some people obviously liked them!!
Friday, 22.02.2002: Bonito
We and the famous 4 decided to do our own lunch at the YHA and did baked potatoes (we´re fed up of rice and pasta off the truck or at the truckers cafes) with cheese and salad and fruit and in the afternoon we went tubing. Going down a river over some rapids in large rubber tubes, tipping each other over and having water fights - really good fun but too short. The drive back standing on the back of a flat back lorry towing the tubes on a trailer was even better than the tubing - getting taken out by trees and the feeling that the whole truck was going to tip over every time we went round a bend (there were quite a few of them!)
We were back at the YHA 1.5 hours later! So we sorted out our washing and turned our room (4 share) into a Chinese laundry!
Chinese laundry in Bonito
Later we had a meeting about our next stop - the Pantanal - Brazil´s famous wildlife area where we would be staying in hammocks. Then there was a lot of excitement about a big tarantula in the toilets!!! (Yes a real one!).
