Exploring Brazil by Car
After several months of quarantine in our São Paulo apartment, we were dreaming of escape. International travel is complicated these days so we decided to explore something closer to home. We started talking about all the places we wanted to see in this big, beautiful country and realized Brazil was begging to be explored by car. From these dreams, the Great Brazilian Road Trip was born.
Natal to Porto Alegre… and Beyond
Welcome to the Great Brazilian Road Trip!
Route Overview: Natal to Porto Alegre (via Belo Horizonte), primarily following the coast of the South Atlantic Ocean.
Distance: Around 3,100 miles (the equivalent of driving coast-to-coast in the United States, from San Francisco, California to Boston, Massachusetts).
Timing: 50 days (approximately), Mid-January to early March, 2021.
Rationale
Leading up to this adventure, we talked to friends and family to get a sense of the “must see” places along the way. We also spent some time reading blogs about other “Brazilian Road Trips” and scrolling Instagram to see which of the suggested stops were the most interesting and/or unique. From there, we pieced together a Brazilian Road Trip Bucket List but agreed we would plan as little as possible in advance so we would have the flexibility to add or change stops if somewhere seemed especially interesting. The map above represents a rough outline of our plan, minus a few of our bucket list places since Google Maps has a limit of 10 stops per map. However, given our limited advanced planning, even this rough outline is subject to change.
We chose Natal as our starting point simply because it’s a large city in the Northeast and, on the map, it sits almost perfectly on a “point” of the South American continent. A few of the blogs we found discussed starting even further North in Fortaleza but we decided the additional distance (~275 miles) would be too much to cover on this trip.
We chose Porto Alegre as our ending point simply because it’s the last large city in the South before you come to the Brazil-Uruguay border. And, of course, driving this route means we start in the state of Rio Grande do Norte and end in the state of Rio Grande do Sul which lends this somewhat haphazard adventure a nice, neat “bookend” feeling. We’re planning to detour from our coastal route in-land to Belo Horizonte as we have family and friends there that we’ve promised to visit. Detouring to Belo Horizonte also allows us to partially incorporate the Estrada Real (Royal Road) which has historical significance and offers a change from weeks of idyllic beaches. More on this later.
Our timeline is loose but we do have a few restrictions. Perhaps the most obvious restrictions are related to COVID-19. At the time of writing, travel between states is permitted although this may change which is part of the motivation behind our flexible approach to planning. Beyond pandemic restrictions, I’ve had some issues securing a residency visa here in Brazil and will need to be back in Sao Paulo for my next visa appointment mid-February. After my visa appointment, we will continue South. If my visa has been approved, and if the international border is open, we may end our trip by crossing into Uruguay. Fingers crossed!
Pre-Trip Road Tripping
Even before starting “the Great Brazilian Road Trip,” we covered many miles of Brazilian roads.
My mother and sister-in-law live in Goiania in the interior state of Goias. To celebrate Christmas as a family, we drove from São Paulo to Goiania to pick them up and then, together, we drove to the sweet little town of Pirenopolis.
For New Year’s Eve, we planned to spend a week with friends in the resort town of Praia dos Carneiros in the Northeastern state of Pernambuco. To get there, we drove for 3 straight days from Goiania which was exhausting and required us to do battle with 35+ hours of trucks and rough roads. Although it was worth it in the end, I wouldn’t recommend repeating the experience unless you have a good reason to do so.
After New Years’ Eve, we spent a few days in Recife before flying back to São Paulo for a weekend wedding. During this side trip, we left REX, our crucial roadtripping partner, at long term parking at the Recife Airport.
If this sounds like a lot of time on the road, IT IS! The mileage from this part of the trip is also equivalent to driving coast-to-coast in the US, from San Diego, California, to Charleston, South Carolina.
But!....
Now that we’ve celebrated Christmas, New Years’ Eve, and our friends’ marriage, we are ready to begin the Great Brazilian Road Trip!
