Iris takes part in a barbecue in Brazil.
We went to a little town called Ouro Preto, in Brazil,
which is in the centre of a mining area, which produced gem
stones. We visited the museum which shows all the different
metals and minerals mined and they have an impressive
display of what they produce, including polished stones,
although I am convinced the diamonds on display must be
paste because they are so big and there are only teenage
boys guarding them!!!
After Ouro Preto we did a bit of travelling with a one
night stand at a place called Jacaraipe, which was by the
coast and was the first of many camp sites which, although
not on the beach, were full of sand. (How I have got to
hate sand since I’ve been on this last stretch of the trip!
It gets everywhere and one seems totally unable to get rid
of it entirely and it turns up afterwards in my day sack,
in my socks, in my shoes, in my hair, for days on end!)
Then we headed for Itaunas where we spent a couple of
nights, arriving at about mid-afternoon and immediately
arranging for a barbecue for the evening . We’d
bought some pork and beef, and lots of potatoes so that we
could roast them in the oven. We had been assured by our
leaders that the Brazilians were a barbecue nation, they
knew all about barbecuing, so when the owner of the camp
site told our revered leader, Heather, that it would be
better done on the beach as there weren’t the facilities at
the camp site, she readily agreed and at the appointed
hour, we packed up the food and also the ingredients for
what was going to be a rather lethal vodka punch and headed
for the beach.
Itaunas is an unspoilt little village at the edge of the
sea, there is no real tourism there and it made me laugh to
see those little village shops with their “Visa” and
“Mastercard” signs in the window as they weren’t selling
anything that would cost more than the odd pound or two! We
trekked all the way down the main street, which is really a
mud track, over the bridge, and along the track for some
500 metres, and then we had to turn off and start climbing
– yes some really big sand dunes with sand that literally
could come up to your neck if you trod in the wrong place!
The path was marked by the odd rubbish bin and it was quite
free of trees (this is important for later) but it was
still at least another 300 metres from the beach and the
bar we were heading for, but eventually after a half hour
walk we were there.
The beach was very narrow and the sea was in. It was
also getting dusk by the time we arrived and then Heather
had the news – the owner had not yet located the barbecue!
Still, we lived in hope. I was part of the cook team for
the evening, our actual cook being Alex, a really tall
well-built Chinese gentleman who was born in Hong Kong but
arrived in England in 1967 to take up a nursing career and
now at the age of 55 has retired from nursing (he ended up
in an important administrative post in the hospital
equivalent to the old matrons) and he is an accomplished
chef who thoroughly enjoys cooking and turns out some
really tasty meals. He has also a wicked sense of humour
and keeps us all amused with his wry remarks.
Anyway, we got on with making the vodka punch (I didn’t
participate because I’m not a spirits drinker and so stuck
to beer and the odd soft drink) but just about everything
was going into the punch. Then came the news, the barbecue
had arrived. There were 22 hungry mouths waiting for that
food and so you can imagine how many steaks, pork chops and
fish steaks we had to cook. The bad news was that our
barbecuing host provide us with a little grill which would
take 2 steaks at a time!
Out the back of the bar there was a bonfire (burning
rubbish) and so it was decided to improvise (it was quite
dark by now) and see if the bonfire could be utilised, but
the problem was we had no grills to put across it. So our
host got his workers to dig a pit and transfer some of the
bonfire into it and plus our barbecue coals it seemed that
was the way to go, except the only grill they could come up
with was the grill which would normally go across the top
of a 4-ring gas cooker! Of course it was totally inadequate
as well as being totally unsuitable and in the end we had
to abandon the idea of a barbecue altogether.
We just used the small barbecue to cook the fish steaks
(four) and then Alex set to in the kitchen and with the aid
of two big frying pans cooked the pork chops first (which
were delicious and so tender – I’ve never tasted such
succulent pork chops in my life before), but unfortunately
when the beef was cooked it turned out to have died of old
age and the cooking just made it tougher and no-one ate the
beef!
So what did most people do? They got drunk on the vodka
punch! Judith and I decided to leave quite early (around
2200) and so set out with three of the men who were also
fed up with the barbecue and just wanted to get back into
town and do a bit of drinking there, so we headed off up
the sand dunes – but it is surprising how different they
looked at night in the pitch dark with no lights to guide
us except the odd torch!
We were first of all walking, then scrambling almost on
hands and knees up and down steep sand dunes, and
continually ending up at dead ends because the other side
of the sand dunes there was scrubland and water, lots of
it! Judith and I were often left far behind by the men,
would lose sight of them and start yelling and then see
their lights heading back our way because they’d had to do
a U-turn! Eventually we found the right path, more by luck
than judgement, and found we had walked a considerable way
in the wrong direction which put at least twenty minutes on
our journey back to town. On the way we encountered the odd
car and van luckily displaying headlights, but then we
found we were among a whole crowd of cyclists with no
lights at all! It was pretty hairy trying to see and avoid
them! All those people in Itaunas must have cats’ eyes!
When we arrived in town, we thanked our men friends for
looking after us so well – it was sarcasm really as they
had left us way behind once we were on the right path and
we only saw them again when we got into town and found them
sitting at a bar and one of them, a Korean gentleman we
call Young, and who speaks very little English, insisted we
join them and have a beer before retiring.
But although we thought we had had an adventure it was
nothing that happened to all our friends who had stayed
behind to finish off the Vodka punch and other spirits and
beer. They all got plastered and every single one of them
got lost on the way back with varying effects. One of our
leaders, a chap called Martin, got himself steaming drunk,
convinced Alex he knew the way home, and promptly led him a
merry dance in the pitch dark without torches through
scrubland and bushes, so that Alex ended up losing his
shoes, his T-shirt and his truck keys, and getting his back
and arms and legs scratched by every conceivable thorn and
twig. Next day, Heather asked what on earth made them head
that way when they knew there were no trees on the path we
had originally taken! There was no answer except to admit
they were too drunk to know what they were doing! Another
of our number lost his trousers and his T-shirt and his
camera, and another of us, a lady called Alison, got a
badly grazed knee and bruised hip falling about in an
unladylike manner!
So in one way it was good we’d had the barbecue on the
day of our arrival because we only planned to stay two
nights before moving on so everyone had a day to recover
from their excesses and attempt to find their lost
possessions, but all searches were fruitless as all those
possessions were gone the next day (although it is more
than probable they were lost on the way home and therefore
extremely difficult to find) The most serious loss was of
Alex’s truck keys because they open all the padlocks on the
truck and we each are issued with a set at the start of the
trip and are told to guard them with our lives!
Unfortunately also, just prior to Itaunas we had all been
issued with new keys as the old padlocks were at the end of
their life and so all new padlocks had recently been
fitted! I dare say Alex had to pay a fine for losing his
and extra to get a new set!
My immediate thoughts
after landing flat on my face (not very Bond like I’m
afraid!) was that I really had proved how idiotic a race we
Brits are! I assumed everyone had watched and would laugh
on my cowering return. But it would appear that fate was
with me that night and I will never doubt my instincts
again. For as I stood and turned to look round the bus was
continuing to move backwards, rapidly gathering speed as it
headed back down the hill and very obviously out of
control. It all happened incredibly quickly and in the dark
I still am not certain of the chain of events, I just
remember hearing the crunching of the sand under the wheels
as they squeaked backwards and watched in amazement as the
bus bowled backwards gathering speed veering towards the
verge and onto the bank below. It was in that moment that I
knew there was nothing we could do but hope and pray as I
stood paralysed and helpless and watched as it creaked and
wobbled off the road, turned over onto its side and banged
to a halt as it slid down the bank, the brakes screeching
and flying up sparks as it finally came to rest.