Introduction: Curitiba Visit
Curitiba is the capital of the Parana state and its biggest city with approx. 1.9 million inhabitants. As such it is the 8th most populated city in Brazil.
We stayed 2 nights in Curitiba which gave us more than a complete day to visit the city before going to meet friends in Joinville and later going down to Uruguay.
If you have a spare day, there is an old train ride from Curitiba that will take you after 4h to Morretes. You can check out the serraverdeexpress website for the tickets in by train and clickbus for the return ticket by bus.
Table of Contents
Mapping the day
- Old town (walking)
- Flower street (walking)
- 24 hours street (walking)
- Botanical garden (walking / Uber)
- Tangua Park (Uber/walking/Uber)
Old city center
We started our day by the old town square of Order till the Flower clock which is a 5min walk if you do not stop. Then we headed toward the city center and the flower street (a main pedestrian street going east to west of the city center) and stroll around it till we find the 24 hours streets (restaurant and shop street, it is not anymore a 24/7 opened street but kept the name).
Then, we headed back to the flower street to stroll more. But quickly we realized that we had almost done all the city center and all of this in less than 2h.
The Botanical garden
As we had time, we decided to walk to the botanical garden located in the south east of the city. It took us a good 40min to reach it. The walk there wasn’t anything special as once out of the city center, there isn’t much. So an Uber would be a better option.
The botanical garden was really beautiful. It is a small park with in its center a small botanic garden within a greenhouse. The garden itself is based on French Style gardens and integrate a small forest and a small lake.
The perfect place to lay for a while under the shadow of the trees and rest.
Tangua Park
To continue with our day, we headed back (Uber) to our guesthouse to rest during a few hours. From noon to 3pm the sun is really strong.
We then went to Tangua Park in north of the city. (20min Uber ride). The park is mainly composed on two level with a lake on the lower one and a nice structure with fountain and a waterfall on the upper one. The park is opened since 1996 and offer a nice seating area near the lake with a small to enjoy a drink while looking at the waterfall.
We then headed back to our guesthouse.
Conclusion
Curitba is a cute town but one thing that was quite annoying for us was the number of homeless. Not only that there are lots of them but also, they would always come to you and ask you for something. And then follow you for a while before giving up. That happened to us in one day over 10 times being quite a hustle.
Afterward, even though the city is cute, it doesn’t have much to offer or that’s what we believe. And Half a day in it would be more than enough. It could be a transit site for the rest of your trip.
Where to Stay Curitiba
We would recommend staying at:
- Hostel: Garibaldi Hostel e Café
- Hotel: Novotel Curitiba Batel
“Work, travel, save, repeat.” – Anonymous
