Hikes, Hurricanes and Hiding out in Florianopolis
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Florianopolis or Floripa as the locals like to call it is a town on the island of Santa Catarina about 12 hours from São Paolo, arriving off a night bus to Florianopolis town I caught the two local buses needed to get to my hostel in Barra de Lagoa on the islands east coast. Famed for its beaches and water sports I was looking forward to a few days on the beach whilst surfing, SUP’ing and hiking the local area. My hostel The Search House, was perfectly located to help with all these plans with a back door that opened straight onto Mocambique beach one of the local surf spots.
With the surf looking messy and clouds overhead I opted to spend my first day hiking Lagoinha do Leste in the south of the island with some people I met at the hostel. Hoping the clouds overheard wouldn’t change to rain we set off for the bus station to catch the three buses needed to get us to the south of the island and the start of the trail.
There were two different routes to the beach, we opted for the long one on the way there and the shorter on the way back. The first hour or so took us through fairly dense Atlantic forest, up and down rocks using tree roots or shoots for anchors we clambered our way around the headland; stopping momentarily from time to time when the vegetation opened up and made way for breathtaking views out to sea. Finally we seemed to have climbed above the tree line and scenery turned to rocky scrub plants. From here we carried on upwards before finally reaching the top and another amazing view, this time down to Lagoinha do Leste. With weather coming in we wasted no time at the top and began the scramble down to the beach which unsurprisingly given the hike and the weather, was deserted.
My fellow hikers laughed when I asked if we had time for a swim — apparently that wasn’t the plan and given the weather neither fancied it. Must be an English thing… Moving on from no swimming we walked the length of the beach and eventually found the opening that was indeed the path back to civilisation. As we crossed the beach the rain that had been threatening throughout the day finally broke through and we soon found we were soaked. The so called rainforest provided little shelter and we were soon following a stream rather than path as we navigated away from the beach. With puddles in our shoes and smiles on our faces we found the bus stop only to have the bus drive straight past us and through a massive puddle in the process. Thankfully it wouldn’t have been possible for us to be any wetter and this only made us laugh more. Deciding we wanted to be dry sooner than the two hours it had us to get there we booked an uber to whisk us back to the hostel.
I’ve been astounded that Uber exists here if I’m honest and have used it a few times, alike home, it’s cheap, fast and in the cities you can even order ‘Uber English’ which means the driver will speak English. Our driver that day was less an impressed with our soggy status but grudgingly got us home. It seemed once we got back the rain only got heavier and soon winds picked up too. Deciding to stay indoors rather had join the hostels party plans we tucked into bed ready to sleep off the days activities. However, I was soon woken by wind and worried the roof might come off or windows blow through. Assuring myself I was paranoid I dug out my ear plugs and tried to sleep. The following morning my fears were confirmed when I saw several trees in the hostel garden had fallen along with many throughout the town, several taking power lines and parts of buildings with them. The island had been hit with the worst weather experienced in 30 years and a cyclone had passed through wreaking havoc between Barra de Lagoa and the main town, Lagoa.
That day there were no buses and the rain persisted. With no one knowing when power would return we were stranded and took playing cards and by nightfall, singing songs amongst the candles dotted around the hostel living space. The following day the sun finally broke through and it seemed like the island had returned to paradise, although we still had no power or running water. Knowing this could take days to fix and that my next stop was forecast to receive rain by the end of the week, I decided to leave earlier than planned and for go my hopes of surfing and SUP’ing in exchange for suncast rainbows at Iguazu.
Originally published at lucy.cbthbn.com & cbthbn.com
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