Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
W
vagaobeer.com.
A lively bar, with a big choice of beers,
food, and even providing a kids' play area, with a jazz and
blues night on the first Thursday of the month from 9pm,
and true to its name (“wagon”), you can eat and drink in a
genuine old train carriage.
Wed & Thurs 6pm-midnight,
Fri & Sat noon-midnight.
1
Parque Nacional do Itatiaia
Between the borders of São Paulo and Minas Gerais • Daily 8am-5pm • R$25 •
W
www.icmbio.gov.br/parnaitatiaia
Nestling in the northwest corner of the state, 165km from Rio, the
Parque Nacional do
Itatiaia
is the oldest national park in Brazil, founded in 1937 and covering 120 square
kilometres of the Mantigueira mountain range. People come here to climb - favourites
are the
Pico das Agulhas Negras
(2787m) and the
Pico de Prateleira
(2540m) - and it is
also an important nature reserve.
he park
has waterfalls, primary forest, wildlife and orchids. A 1988 fire ravaged
some twenty percent of its total area, which is still recovering, but of course there are
still plenty of unaffected parts to be seen. Natural springs and streams here combine
to form the Bonito, Preto, Pirapitinga and Palmital rivers, supplying the massive
hydrographic basin of the Paraíba plate, and giving much-needed oxygenation to
the Paraíba watercourse in one of its most polluted stretches.
Itatiaia
The town of
ITATIAIA
, on the BR-116, is surrounded by beautiful scenery and
makes a good base: it has plenty of
hotels
, mainly found along the Estrada do
Parque Nacional, the 2km-long road that links the town and park, plied by local
buses from the rodoviária.
Penedo
The small town of
PENEDO
is 14km away from Itatiaia, to which it is connected by
regular buses, and is also a good base for visiting the Parque Nacional do Itatiaia.
Penedo was settled in 1929 by immigrants from Finland, one of numerous Finnish
utopian communities established in Latin America at that time. With vegetarianism
and agricultural self-su
ciency among their founding tenets, the Finnish community
struggled to survive as they discovered that the land they occupied was unsuitable for
cultivation. Those who opted to remain turned to tourism and the area gradually
became popular with weekenders from São Paulo and Rio, who come for the horse
riding and to buy the chocolates, jams, preserves and liquors produced here. Much is
made of this Nordic heritage, despite the fact that today only a very small minority of
the population are of Finnish origin, but one handy spin-off of the Finnish legacy for
visitors is that most of the town's hotels have a sauna.
Clube Finlãndia
Museum: Av das Mangueiras 2601 • Sun 9am-5pm • R$8 •
T
24 3351 1374
An association dedicated to preserving Penedo's Finnish heritage, the
Clube Finlândia
puts on evenings of
Finnish folk dances
every Saturday (9pm-1am). It also runs the
Museu Finlandês da Dona Eva
, which displays documents and photos illustrating the
history of Finnish immigration in the region, along with works by local Finnish-
Brazilian artists, and costumes, textiles and crafts; it usually only opens on Sundays,
although it has been known to open on other days too occasionally.
ARRIVAL AND INFORMATION
PARQUE NACIONAL DO ITATIAIA
By bus
Itatiaia is served by buses from Rio (6 daily; 2hr
30min) and São Paulo (5 daily; 3hr 30min). Local buses
serve Penedo (roughly hourly; 20min) and the park
entrance (11 daily; 15min).
