Lewis set sail on a catamaran from Angra dos Reis to the island of Ilha Grande (or Il-ya Gran-chee as they pronounce it in Portuguese!).
As he felt the wind whip through his mane as he sat on the top deck, he absorbed the passing scene around him and wanted to pinch himself to tell himself that it was really real and that he was really here!
The stunning scenery comprised of mountainous, green and luscious islands interspersed with palm trees and purple flourishes, all encircled within a deep, navy sea.
After an hour and a half he had reached the most idyllic island he had ever set his eyes upon. As the black seagulls swirled above the boat, Lewis breathed in a deep breath of the clean sea air.
This island of Ilha Grande is far from polluted: after all, it only has three engined vehicles on the island apart from tractors: a police car, an ambulance and a fire-engine! Everything is wheeled around in metal carts, usually by two people. All the luggage was loaded into one such cart and followed Lewis and Helen up to their hotel.
The Maranativa Hotel was found up a dusty track but gave a beautiful welcome with banana trees growing in the garden and a children’s wooden playground: swings, a slide, a see-saw and a play house.
Lewis the Lion was impressed to see the same playground equipment that he would see back in the UK and wondered if this would be replicated during his world journey?
The next day, Lewis enjoyed one of his favourite kind of a day: he was off on an adventure and an exploration of this incredible island. He set out early in the morning with his friends to trek across the island. They set off early so they could hopefully rest by the time the sun got too high in the sky at midday.
He was saddened to see, as he wandered through the town and onto the beach, that there appeared to be a lot of stray, skinny dogs wandering around. He wondered what the local community did to help those animals? He wondered if he would see more of this problem on his journey?
Do you know who helps stray animals in your country?
The majority of Lewis the Lion’s trek was through the forest and uphill and Lewis felt relieved to be travelling in Helen’s daypack! She scrambled through the undergrowth over rocks and branches and was glad to be protected from the sun by the forest leaves above her head.
Suddenly there was the strangest animal cry close hand. It was deep and booming and seemed to be getting closer and closer. Lewis the Lion wanted Helen to run for her life! It sounded like it was a great, big grizzly bear and Lewis didn’t want it gobbling up Helen or himself! Helen quickened her step away from the noise but later learnt that it was in fact the cry of a deep-throated monkey. What a noisy animal!
After an hour and a half, Helen and her friends arrived on a beach that looked like it had been a setting for a James Bond film! It had crystal clear water, white sand that squeaked under your feet as you walked, palm trees and various coloured wooden huts. All of this was set against a backdrop of the green forest and mountainside. Lewis thought it was simply dreamlike and couldn’t imagine that a postcard would ever do it justice!
Along the sand were dotted deep holes as if they had been scooped out with a small spade. Just as Lewis the Lion was wondering about why they were there, a almost luminous, white crab, with beady black eyes poked his head out of the sand and scurried out of its hole. If Lewis hadn’t looked at that precise moment in time, he would have missed it as it had the perfect camouflage for the beach and blended in precisely into its environment.
After Helen an her friends had had a quick dip, they set off again through the forest. Eventually they arrived Lopes Mendez beach were the sand was even whiter and squeaker!
Unlike the beaches of Copacabana or Ipanema in Rio de Janeiro, there was no need to hire a parasol here as the trees lining the beach gave a natural shade in the heat of the day.
This beach was the best beach that Lewis had ever seen for surfing as the tide threw up enormous waves and surfers rode on their surf boards towards the shore. Lewis smiled on as Helen laughed her head off as she jumped the waves. Maybe at some other time she would try surfing too?
A happy day was spent in he sun, interspersed with Helen jumping more waves, until eventually it was time to head back to the hotel.
But one last treat still awaited Lewis the Lion as he walked back through he hinterland. Some small monkeys with stripey backs and tails, probably as curious as Lewis was himself, had come to the forest path and were looking at the walkers passing by. They swung sprightly through the trees and Lewis was happy to have caught a photo of himself with one of them before it moved quickly on.
Lewis the Lion and Helen then caught the ferry back to the main port on the island as the walk getting to Lopes Mendez beach had been long and arduous and they were now tired after their adventure-packed day.
As Lewis the Lion left Ilha Grande, he met one last friend: Gustavo who was 6 years old.
Lewis couldn’t believe that Gustavo also liked Ben 10 and Spiderman, just like the children back home in England. The more that Lewis the Lion was seeing of the world, the more he was starting to think that children were the same the whole world over!
Lewis the Lion wonders if you could dream up your perfect desert island, what would it look like? Do you think that it’s possible that such a place exists on this earth?
