Now that I am back in my home country, Canada, I am really getting behind on posts about my trip to Brazil! However, I do not want to forget any bit of my trip many years from now, so here I am throwing it back to August and continuing my stories about my journey in Minas Gerais, Brazil!
On August 12th, my second day in Minas Gerais, my boyfriend, Elder, and his uncle took me up to a farm which had a beautiful waterfall on the property called Cachoeira Maria Augusta. It was quite a bumpy and dusty ride to drive up to the farm, but the drive had some beautiful views! The people at the farm were very friendly and offered us food and drinks from their mini restaurant.
There were two ways to get to the waterfall: You could drive there, but you had to pay around R$100 (if I remember correctly), or you could hike it and just pay R$40. Of course, we decided that we could all use the workout and we walked up to the waterfall. Personally, I do not regret taking the hike. I do love hiking, and although there were some steep parts, it didn’t actually take us very long to get up there. However, if you are not in good health, I would recommend spending the extra money to drive up. I wasn’t timing the hike, but I would guess that we made it up in about 35 minutes. It was very dusty (Minas Gerais, I found, was very dusty) so make sure you bring lots of water if you plan to take the hike!
The waterfall was definitely worth the hike! Basically you enter into a sort of half circle shape and it is mostly in the shade, despite the fact that you were hiking in the direct sunlight. It is a very refreshing reward for your long hike!
The water there was freezing! Elder and I thought about braving the cold, but in the end we just cooled off sitting on rocks in the shade. In the summer, though, I’m sure it would be a wonderful place to swim, as the water was very clean with a sand floor. Apparently there are lots of fish in there as well, but we didn’t see any in the time that we were there.
Walking back down to the farm would have been a breeze, but we ended up meeting some people there that had driven up. After taking some photos for them, we batted our eyes at them and asked for a ride back down. They happily agreed, and even happened to know a little bit of English (although they were insistent on me practicing my Portuguese). We later found out that the lady was from Salvador and lived close to where I stayed when I visited. Small world!
When we got back to the farm, we saw a very cute little calf and an adorable little puppy! Of course, I was overjoyed to see the puppy and the man let Elder and I hold him! I was pretty sure I was going to be coming home with a puppy!
And that’s the end of my Cachoeira Maria Augusta journey! Come back soon to hear all about my most touristy day in Minas Gerais (and see more beautiful waterfall photos)!