northward bound!!

phew a flipping lot has happened since my last blog and i have been trying to post, but havent been anywhere near a computer in ages!!!
so after our stupidly long wait in rio bus station we finally got our sleeper bus to ouro preto, except i didnt manage to sleep, partially because my seat was really uncomfortable and partly because at 3 in the morning some woman decided to give her baby son a language lesson, which consisted of here say `oi meu filhop, e meu filho, que foi meu filho´to anyt babble he aid. at any other time of day this may have been endearing but at that point i just wanted her and her sone to become mute!
we finally arrived in ouro preto at 6 in the morning and as we were walking off to find our pousada a man (who i swear was dressed like a pim or a drug lord) came and asked us if we had a place to say. to which i said to john ´ignore him, letsd keep going´only to find that not only was the man fluent in english, he was also the owner of the pousada we were seeking! (i am an idiot sometimes!) so once that little embarrassment was sorted and we´d had some sleep john and i set of and wandered the towns gorgeous colonial streets before catching a bus to go find some gold!
the gold mine tour itself was pretty commical and there wasnt much to see, but it was well worth the money for the comedy factor and because at the bottom of the mine was a crystal clear warm lake in which you could swim!! it was amazing!!
our next destination was parque national de caracas (or something) where we stayed in a really peaceful ex monastry in the middle of a national park in the mountains! the food was cooked over a wood stove, they had mass in the evenings in a beautiful little chapel, you could go for walks in the evening and watch the sunset and at night wolves would come to the porch and you could watch them being fed!! was amazing!
after this john and i kind of got lost (hence my lack of communication) well we decided to head to a state calle espirito de santos, but once on the bus we looked at the guide book only to realise there was absoloutely nothing there!! so we ended up spending a few days waiting around bus stationsd and traveling, our new destination being corumbau!
corumbau is a tiny little hamlet on a beach in the middle of now where and it is absoloutely stunning! we spent a day or two chilling out on the beach swimming in the calm sea (at night the stars are amazing!) then after that we travelled by canoe, dune buggy, boat and bus and are now in salvador!
so its been quite an adventure and we´ve met lots of people; from tramps who have threatened us at bus stations, to strangers who have asked for our autographs (i never thought that would happen) to christians randomly inviting us to there houses for lunch (we were looking lost in a bus station) to just now where a catholic priest used his ´get into cathedral free card´to take us on a tour of all the churches in the area!
amazing!
so thats where i am now. sorry that was so long ill try to update this more regularly! we are now in salvadore for a couple of days (about to go to a capoeira lesson) then going to catch a bus up to recife!
hope everything back home is just lovely!
God bless!!
andrew