. The large historic down town was a massive cobblestone area blocked off to traffic and filled with shoppers. Like most of the shops in touristy sections, they are turn of the century buildings painted in the bright almost day-glo colors. Of more interest to me was the majestic giant eye of the Oscar Niemeyer Museum. Walking through the ground level area was like walking through an optical illusion of a rolling white wave of ceiling. Through it all, the giant eye stares at you from its perch in the water.As usual, I got lost wandering around the city and the local people could not have been kinder.
Unique to the city is the unusual local transit system (upper left photo). You pay for your bus ticket to get into the glass tube that protects you from the elements as you wait for your bus. It also has an elevator part for handicapped riders.
As I wrote earlier, the hardest part of leaving Curitiba was leaving the Slaviera Full Jazz, my favorite hotel of the trip. The bottom 2 pics show the lobby and some of the great (and gorgeous) staff. In the final analysis, the hotel was my number one favorite reason for visiting Curitiba.
Next stop - the spectacular Iguassu Falls at the meeting of Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil.
Hppt Trails until then.
