After the fun of getting Peggy into the port to await her ship and waving her goodbye we had decided to bite the bullet with regards to accommodation while we were in Sao Paulo, I have already told you how HUGE the place is and without Peggy we were very much more likely to get lost. We booked into a hotel with a free shuttle to the airport and got the bus from Santos straight there.

We said some sad farewells to Cintya, I had to hide in the bathroom to cry when we said goodbye to the girls and when I came back out Alex told me Lorena had cried too. Its amazing how much we had bonded without even being able to speak the same language. We waved and I cried as we said goodbye again to Cintya at the station. The whole family had welcomed us with open arms and done so much for us. Its always so hard leaving!

We hauled all of our stuff onto the bus. We had packed all of the precious things and as little practical stuff as we could physically carry. We had 3 extremely heavy bags and 2 day packs. It was quite nice on the bus, comfy seats, curtains drawn and dark so you could sleep, sadly there were two EXTREMELY loud women on it who refused to shut up the whole way so no-one got any sleep!

We arrived at our hotel, checked in and tried to make the most of the facilities. The hotel advertised a pool ( a semi circular puddle of water), a steam room (a wooden panelled warm room) and a hot tub ( a cold, bubble-less tub) and wifi…luckily the wifi worked and so did we.

Here is where I fill you in on all that had been going on while we were arranging Peggy’s shipping…this trip is often multifaceted as you know and one blog could go one for a million years if we let it.

AJ had been working with us to get us a good deal to go on one of the many shows that had been in touch with us about appearing. We had been told by several people that we WOULD give them exclusives and we were getting flustered and railroaded into things we didn’t want to do so AJ stepped in to help. The result of this was that we were being flown from Brazil to New York, put up in a hotel and collected from said hotel to appear on The Today show! We couldn’t believe it! We would have happily gone and appeared on a show for nothing if we had been in the area but AJ told us we should be re-compensated for our time! We were over the moon!

We were due at the airport early in the morning for our free flights out of Brazil. As we sat on the plane it was a strange feeling, a real end of an era. Peggy was safely in the port waiting to be driven onto the ship (with several thousand shiny brand new VW Beetles) and we had completed our tour of South America. We felt exhausted, elated, sad and excited all at the same time! We were flying back to common ground. No more language barriers (for a while at least), camp grounds if we wanted them, all kinds of amenities we had missed but enjoyed being without. We were excited about being grateful for the simple things!

We landed in NYC and were collected at the airport in a town car! There was a man holding a board with our names on it! How exciting?! We said hi and thanked him for collecting us (firstly in Portuguese), refused to let him carry our bags (it seemed so strange) and quietly walked to the car. When we set off the driver asked us where we had come from and we realised we could speak to him! We could talk to him about more than directions or the weather or a basic explanation of our journey…we could ACTUALLY have a conversation! We chatted all the way to our hotel.

We were shown to our room at the Parker Meridian, our bags arrived before us, and then we were left alone to get excited! We had been informed that we had a daily allowance for room service and made the very most of it! We ordered enormous steak and chips from the famous restaurant Normas and a bottle of 1997 Pinot Noir for dinner and enjoyed every last mouth full. And before you point out about our ‘enjoying the simple things’ quote…ordering Steak and chips and a bottle of wine and knowing it will be good IS something we felt SUPER grateful for!!! We collapsed in bed exhausted after our day traveling, skipping a few time zones and knowing we would have an action packed few days!

Day 2 in the Parker Meridian Hotel was spent filming with one of the producers of the show. We hit Central Park, sat on a rock and filmed for a few hours and even went for a boat ride to get B-roll for the feature they were putting together to explain our story prior to our interview. We had good fun with the crew and pretty much collapsed when we got back to the hotel!

Day 3 in the Parker Meridian hotel was spent trying to make ourselves presentable to go onto the Today show! We travel light of course and have not bought new clothes at all really, certainly not clothes to go on TV in! AJ had sorted Alex out and a parcel arrived from Second Sunday containing a pair of jeans, shirts and t-shirts…that was him all ready to go! It was so exciting! Such a flip turn of events! We live in a van, yet here we were being given clothes, eating room service and in a fancy hotel! We nipped out to get Alex some shoes and a jacket to wear with his new clothes and when we got back to the hotel AJ called and told me Mill Crest Vintage would be coming by the hotel to dress me for tomorrows ‘Today show’ appearance! I spoke with them on the phone and sent my measurements and within a few hours Paula and Leilani arrived with 20 dresses, hat boxes, shoe bags and a lucky bag filled with accessories and ribbons. Mill Crest Vintage stock vintage clothes in nearly every style from the last 100 years and I LOVED their style! I tried on everything they had brought along, sadly most of it was too big (I had measured myself with a ruler and a hair dryer chord) but one of the dresses fitted perfectly and it was my favourite anyway! A simple 1950’s pencil dress with a beautifully styled neck and a fabulous bustle attached to give it absolute panache! Topped off with some fabulously delicate 1950’s drop earrings and choker and I was ready to go!

We went to the bar for drinks with Leilani and Paula to celebrate and talk to them more about our adventure, we loved them, they were a real blast and we could have stayed up all night drinking and chatting but we had an early start and had to say our goodbyes eventually!

We got to bed and laid awake most of the night excited and nervous about tomorrow!