South America’s giant, Brazil is a seductive country with dazzling beaches, tropical islands and picturesque
colonial towns. Its verdant
rainforests boast an astounding array of
wildlife, while its wildly
energetic cities are home to a multitude of ethnic groups.
Brazil is the world’s fifth-largest country in both size and population, and its thriving economy has made it Latin America’s powerhouse, enjoying record growth in the last five years (Brazil currently ranks among the ten largest economies in the world). This is a country revered for
its football prowess and
rich musical traditions, which include
samba,
bossa nova,
tropicalismo,
forró and numerous other distinctive styles.
Although Brazilians are a diverse bunch,
joie de vivre is a characteristic shared by most of the country’s 192 million citizens.
Carnival is the best-known manifestation of this celebratory spirit and is feted throughout Brazil. Rio de Janeiro and Salvador are the best places to join the mayhem, when samba-filled parties erupt through the streets, and revelers dance and celebrate for days on end.
Brazil’s landscape is as diverse as the people who inhabit it. Few tourists venture far from Brazil’s spectacular coastline (which spans 7400km/4598 miles), but a trip into the interior reveals a different but equally captivating Brazil. As well as the
world’s biggest rainforest in the Amazon, Brazil boasts many wilderness areas including the
wildlife-rich wetlands of the Pantanal, the
canyons and caves of the Chapada Diamantina and the colorful old gold-mining towns in the mountains of Minas Gerais.
The population of Brazil is a
melting pot of races, including indigenous people, descendants of slaves from Africa and the offspring of European immigrants. This variety is reflected in the food, architecture, music and culture of Brazil. It is this assortment of places, people and traditions that makes Brazil such an unforgettable place to visit.
GeographyBrazil covers almost half of the South American continent and it is bordered to the north, west and south by all South American countries except Chile and Ecuador; to the east is the Atlantic. The country is topographically quite flat and at no point do the highlands exceed 3,000m (10,000ft). Over 60% of the country is a plateau; the remainder consists of plains. The River Plate Basin (the confluence of the Paraná and Uruguay rivers, both of which have their sources in Brazil) in the far south is more varied, higher and less heavily forested. North of the Amazon are the Guiana Highlands, partly forested, partly stony desert. The Brazilian Highlands of the interior, between the Amazon and the rivers of the south, form a vast tableland, the Mato Grosso, from which rise mountains in the southwest that form a steep protective barrier from the coast called the Great Escarpment, breached by deeply cut river beds. The population is concentrated in the southeastern states of Minas Gerais, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. The city of São Paulo has a population of over 12 million, while over 7 million people live in the city of Rio de Janeiro.
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