Chocolate, Cars and Rail-Yachts!

We hope to be in Ushuaia (the southern tip of Argentina) for Christmas. This means we have only about a month to cover 4500kms.

Even so we have found time to visit a chocolate factory (free, but expensive and no photographs) and an unexpected Hollywood Car Museum (good value for money) in Gramado. The bottom left car belonged to Elvis.

During our drive south in Brazil we have stopped on the coast three times since Paraty.

Barra Velha and Mo. dos Conventos were both unpleasant, run-down, high-rise, out-of-season resorts with little to recommend them other than the sound of the sea. On the other hand Sao Lourenco do Sul was a delightful, neat, tidy, lived-in little town with kilometers of fine beaches. Definitely worth a visit if you are nearby. Get a map from the tourist information office and head for Schulz's bar and restaurant. Park opposite (at S31.382945 W51.969068) and eat at Schulz's!

About 15kms south of Rio Grande at S32.164196 W52.103736 you can try your hand at rail-yachting! (This is possibly the only place in South America to offer this experience.) The rail tracks originally used to help build a 4km breakwater have been converted into a tourist attraction by adding sails to small flatcars and whisking passengers to the end of the breakwater (where you might just see dolphins as we did).

If the wind isn't blowing they just push you on the flatcar!