On the Road in Brazil!!

The lovely scenery in the hills above Caxias

Yo yo!

Big ups from Caxias do Sul, Brazil! I’m blessed to be in the loving care of my new Brazilian sisters Sheila and Renata. I met them through www.couchsurfing.com which, if you have not done so already, you MUST check out and get involved. It’s just an amazing project. I arrived via bus from my former Brazilian home of Florianopolis where I was fortunate enough to have lived for 2.5 months in total paradise. The roads are horribly under construction on the 101 south and the rains heavy so the bus turned out to be the best option to get me to the dry and less populated state of Rio Grande does Sul.

My Brazilian Sisters Renata and Sheila enjoying some LOVELY Colonial food


The South of Brazil has tons of Italian roots

My last week in Florianopolis, or Floripa for short, was amazing. For some reason Mother Nature decided to rain on most of my plans to go out riding with all my crew and the island was buried in inches of water. But I went with the flow and had some lovely intimate final moments with my amazing crew Gil, Serg, Ulrike, Ben, Victor, Natalia, Irmaooooo (Victor 2), Vincent, Anna, Lulu, Leonardo and Kristina. Caught some epic last waves and finally donated my board to a charity that teaches kids to surf from the favelas. I did some nice rides, caught some live Samba and Capoeira on tape, got my new tattoo of a dolphin on my foot and had a farewell BBQ with everyone. It was a sad goodbye with tears flowing by several folks but the overall feeling at the time of writing is one of total gratitude and awe.

My two best Brazilan buddies Gil and Natalia on my last night in Floripa


Catching some Capoeira on film


My new tatoo :)


My bro Leo enjoying some of Serg's amazing cooking


I did an amazing filmed ride in S. Floripa with Natalia and Vincent

So just a few days before heading out of Floripa on my trip two big things started to happen with Peace Pedalers. One was a call from a well known agent in San Francisco who is interested and optimistic about my book being published. The second is communication with a experienced producer working with MTV in Europe who is now coaching me on my next series of TV and hoping to get me on the map. All good stuff, but the book proposals needed to be dialed in more so I did a 60+ hour computer session in 4 days back to the computer. At 3AM last night I pressed send and it’s now in the hands of my agent who is off to New York on May 2 to hopefully find me a publisher. Say some prayers for it!

Sheila cookin' up the grub for my welcome meal. Yummy!

The book is currently entitled Live Big, Give Big: A 37 Country Karmic Adventure to Balance Pleasure and Contribution. It is the first book of two I plan to write. This book covers my travels in Asia, Oceania and Africa. The sequel book Love Big will cover Europe and the Americas. If all goes as planned I’ll have my book in print by next April in time to share it with folks in North America when I arrive and finish my ride in Canada and USA.

My buddy Gatino Led Zepplin kept my company as I wrote for 4 days non-stop

So its Friday here in Brazil and it’s another holiday, so a three-day weekend is in store. My hosts and I are planning to escape the city and chare into the lovely mountain towns near Cambara. Info on this region is at http://www.cambaraonline.com.br/. From here I will officially be “on the road”—no more major stops to write, learn languages or surf (although I’ve heard Uruguay has some nuggets) until I reach Chile in July. I’m very, very excited about this. My body and mind are dying to get out riding again!

It will be interesting to ride in S. Brazil now since I was just featured in a big article by one of the state’s more respected journalists Carlos. Turns out that Carlos is a fellow Couchsurfer and he was stoked to do a piece on the Peace Pedalers. Check out this video here and see if you can follow my Portuguese.






Over and out from Brazil!

Live Big. Give Big. Love Big ;)

Jamie