After a comfortable but early bus ride from the port town of Paranagua, we arrived on the outskirts of the modern city of Curitiba. Since we were a little early to go to the train depot, our guide took us on a short tour through the downtown part of the city. As a result of some forward-looking city planners, the town has been advertised as one of the cleanest and most organized cities of its size anywhere in the world. The local bus system sounded extremely efficient and reliable. We arrived at the train depot about 15 minutes before the scheduled departure time of 09:00 sharp.

For the next 3 hours we rode comfortably down this historic narrow gauge route viewing some of the spectacular scenery of the Atlantic Coastal Mountain Range. The tracks took numerous switchbacks to keep the train on a very gradual grade and it went slowly so we could take in the beautiful series of mountain ridges stretching off to the horizon. There are 13 tunnels scattered along the route and a number of very impressive bridges. An engineering marvel at the time, this route took 5 years to complete starting in 1880. Originally Europeans said it could not be done and in the end it was completed through the skill and ingenuity of Brazilian engineers and laborers.

Halfway down the route we made a short stop at an overlook where we could get off the train and take some pictures. The day started with clear skies but toward the late morning clouds began forming over the mountains as often happens in the Southern Hemisphere summer. We ended the train trip at a small community called Morretes. Following a short bus ride during which the "summer rain" started we had a marvelous lunch with a specialty of the area, a slowly cooked beef stew. Later in the afternoon some of us made a brief stop in the port of Paranagua before returning to the ship and heading back out to the Atlantic coast of Brazil.