Day 12 - 17 Dec.2011 - Alto Paraíso de Goiás

Today we set off as usual at about 9:30am. On our way we stopped at the petrol station in Luis Eduardo Magalhaes to ask for the best route to go to Alto Paraíso de Goiás. We were advised not to go via Taguatinga but instead head for São Domingos. Driving down the BR-020 was quite a pleasure as the road conditions were very good.
Once we left the main road, to our disappointment potholes appeared again. However, at this point we had no idea what was still to come… After Divinópolis do Goiás the road turned into an earth track. Who would have thought? Even our map showed GO-447 as a tarmac road. At the beginning it did not seem to be a problem but as we drove further the rain got heavier. The road became more muddy with occasional puddles but still passable. At least so we thought. After all we saw a couple of heavy trucks coming from the opposite direction and we thought ‘if they can make it, surely we can as well’.
As we drove on the rain intensified and at this stage our road virtually disappeared and turned into a river. We switched to 4x4 and continued through the water. And then it happened what you most fear. We got totally stuck in the mud with water nearly pouring into the car. So just imagine that: just the two of us in the middle of nowhere with our car not moving an inch! OK, the adrenaline kicked in as we did not have much time to waste. Over here, even in summer, it gets dark fairly quickly and the last thing you would like to do is to spend a night in the ‘Brazilian sticks’. There were of course other issues such as water potentially pouring into the car and, which would be deadly for the car, getting into the engine. Utilising what we had at hand we managed to place a wooden log under the front tyre to give it a better grip. It is really difficult to judge how much time it took us to get the car out of the mud but it certainly felt like an eternity! And yes, we made it. In fact we only reversed to where we were before getting stuck. At this point we had to make a decision whether to turn all the way back or to continue. However, it was really likely that the road behind us got only worse with the continuous rain. We decided to go ahead. From now on before crossing big stretches of water on of us was always walking through it bare feet to find the best way, that shallowest path ideally with some gravel. It is actually amazing to feel for yourself how slippery mud can be.
This way we finally made it to the end. Overall it was only 60km but it took us almost 3hrs! And there we were, both of us wet and dirty and our car with water in the headlights, broken skid plate and without the front number plate.
But never have we been so happy to see tarmac again! Not to mention that it was a really crap one with hundreds of potholes but as you can imagine we were really chuffed…and so did probably our car.