Brazil Travel Blog

The Brazilian government’s agency responsible for fuel, the Agência Nacional do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis better known as ANP, has a useful tool on its website where you can look up the average prices for fuel all throughout the Brazilian territory: Levantamento de preços.

[As usual on the websites of a government that calls itself champion of free software, the page does not work in Firefox]

It is quite simple to use. You need to indicate the period of time (Selecione o mês, usually the current month), the geographical area (Brasil, Regiões, Estados, Municipios) and the type of fuel (gasolina [petrol/gas], álcool [ethanol], diésel, LNG or LGP). Click on Processar to get your results.

The results page is simpler than it looks. The column that interests you is the one with the title Preço médio (average price). Happy look-ups!

I’m just back from lovely Búzios, and here is up-to-date information on current prices on the region (valid for November 2007):

• internet (1 hour): from R$2
• burguer, Coke and fries: from R$10
• crepe: from R$9
• bikini: from R$15 (each piece)
• souvenir t-shirt: from R$10
• flip-flops [thongs]: from R$10
• swimming trunks: from R$15
• large mozzarella pizza: from R$10
• Coca-Cola: from R$2,50
• beer: from R$2,50
• basic meal at a simple restaurant: from R$7 excluding drinks
• fish filet for one person: from R$13
• meal at an average restaurant: from R$15 excluding drinks
• car rental (no air-con): from R$80 per day (R$130 during the high season)
• buggy rental: from R$70 per day (R$120 during the high season)
• liter of petrol [gas]: R$2,75
• taxi just about everywhere in Búzios: R$15
• public transportation (in vans) throughout Búzios: R$2
• boat trip to beaches and islands: from R$30 (R$50 during the high season)
• 2 hours long inland trip on an open-air truck throughout 12 beaches: R$30 (R$50 during the high season)
• taxi boat from the center to neighbouring beaches: betweenb R$5 and R$10
• van transfer from Rio de Janeiro’s international airport to Búzios: R$50 (one way)
• air-con bus from Rio de Janeiro to Búzios: R$23,70 (one way)

Ariel, a reader of De Viaje a Brasil, suggested the idea of an entry with the draft of three different budgets for the traveller preparing a trip to Brazil. In spite of the difficulties inherent to a entry of this kind, I have accepted the challenge. I won’t bore you with lengthy explanations on why it is very difficult to make general statements on a country the size of Brazil or why those generalizations are made even more difficult by the simple fact that different travellers have different needs and tastes. What you will find here is just an approximate idea of costs. Yes, there are cheaper places than the ones quoted here. And yes, there are (much) more expensive places as well. And yes, within Brazil there are places where everything is quite cheap and places where everything is quite expensive.

Prices on this entry are in Brazilian reais. On the right sidebar of the blog, under the Categories section, you will find the current exchange rate of the dollar and the euro.

Before we start, a necessary clarification. Hyperinflation is a thing of the past. For the last few years inflation rates in Brazil have been kept on hold, well below 10%. However, Brazil is a much more expensive country for tourists of many countries due to the increased value of the real against other currencies. Someone who visited Brazil in 2002 might thing that prices have spiralled in Brazil - the truth is that they remain under control, it is the Brazilian real that is much more expensive now.

CHEAP BUDGET

- Food. In most cases breakfast is included in the room rate. Both for lunch and dinner you can survive on R$10 meals per person, including a drink.

- Accommodation. Between R$40 and R$60 will get you a private room with bathroom. For less than that, a room in a hostel dormitory. In places like Rio de Janeiro or Fernando de Noronha you will have a hard time finding accommodation for as little as that.

MID-RANGE BUDGET

- Food. An amount between R$10 and R$30 per person will land you on the territory of a reasonable meal - it might include a large pizza for two, baked fish at the beach or ethnic food in the large cities. For each caipirinha you drink during the meal, add a further R$8 to R$15.

- Accommodation. Pay between R$70 and R$175 for a room for two and you are thinking of a pousada with some comfort, air-conditioning and television for sure, as well as a certain taste in the décor of the place. A swimming pool as well. In Rio de Janeiro, that money will only get you into a basic hotel.

EXPENSIVE BUDGET

- Food. From R$40 onwards we are talking business: a decent meal at a churrascaria, a Japanese restaurant or a seafood restaurant. There are restaurants where a meal will set you back R$100 and R$200 (even more if you order wine), but in our opinion you don’t need to pay more than R$70 for an excellent and abundant meal.

- Accommodation. For an amount betwen R$180 and R$300 per room you might stay at some wonderful places. From R$400 onwards, you must demand luxury. We have never paid more R$300 in the most wonderful pousadas where we have stayed. They didn’t have plasma TVs, though. Many of the Rio hotels fall within this range of prices.

Up to here, the prices to cover the two main basic needs: food and lodging. The remaining expenses do not discriminate between cheap and expensive budgets. A água de coco (coconut water) costs the same for everyone). Then you have to add other expenses, a boat trip, a bottle of mineral water, a caipirinha here and there, souvernirs for friends and family…

To help you find out more about prices in Brazil, this blog offers several tools:

• prices contains the prices of a few basic items.
• fare check has an approximate idea of the cheapest fares for some of the most commonly used airports in Brazil.
• through the links explained in Link: buses in Brazil and Link: Socicam (bus routes) you can check the fares for bus rides in Brazil.

In Brazil, some hotels and pousadas charge a taxa de serviço (generally 10%), others don’t. When finding out prices for accommodation, it is advisable to ask whether that taxa de serviço is included or not in the price.

In places that have nothing to hide, their price list will show clearly whether the tax is charged on top of the price of the room (”Taxa de serviço 10%“), whether it is already included on the price (”10% Taxa de serviço já inclusa“) or whether there is no charge at all (”Não cobramos taxa de serviço“). When that information is not present, do find out what is the final price you will end up paying.

Dishonest hoteliers - and absolute minority, to be fair to them, hide that tax only for it to make an unwelcome appearance on your final bill.

Here’s a shortish listing of prices we paid for some services during our week in Arraial d’Ajuda. This info complements this blog’s Prices page.

TRANSPORTATION

• Ferryboat Porto Seguro - Arraial d’Ajuda: R$2,5 (each way, on the way to Arraial you pay a full return fare, no fare is paid on the way back)
• Bus ferryboat - Arraial d’Ajuda: R$1,30 (ida)
• Bus Arraial d’Ajuda - Trancoso: R$4 (ida)
• Van back from the Pitinga beach to Arraial d’Ajuda: R$2
• Trip to Caraíva in 4-wheel drive: R$200 (4 people, low season price)

FOOD

• crepe: from R$8 to R$15.
• ice-cream (two scoops): from R$2,50 to R$3
• coconut at the beach: R$2,50
• pizza for two at a restaurant: from R$15 to R$25
• beer at a beach bar: from R$2,5 to R$4
• caipirinha: from R$7 to R$10
• single-course meal (in Portuguese, prato feito): around R$15
• baked fish for two (with rice and a salad): from R$40 to R$60

SEE ALSO: Round-up of entries on Arraial 2007

This blog presents today a new page: Prices. There you will find a shortish list of prices of basic items of interest to the tourist. Most of the prices refer to the city of São Paulo, where I live. In a country as large as Brazil it is absolutely impossible to make general statements.

With the help of the readers of this blog and of its counterpart blog in Spanish, I hope to expand the list to the point where I can turn it into a PDF file available for download at the blog. If you’d like to make any contributions, leave a comment either here or at the Prices page.

Credit card fraud is widespread in Brazil. Duplication of credit cards has become a major problem, with hundreds of active gangs specialized on the fraud.

Can credit cards be used in Brazil? Yes, they can, taking some basic precautions. The most important thing is to understand that the duplication of the card takes places when the card is out of your sight. Think of the waiter that takes your card away, has a hidden reader, and duplicates the card on the way to and from the cash counter.

My advice is: at the time of paying, you need to be able to see where the card reader is. On a shop or supermarket, more likely than not the reader will be by the till. In cases like this, the risk of duplication is small. Just make sure before signing the value on the credit card receipt matches what you are supposed to be paying. If instead of R$100 the receipt shows R$1,000, and you sign the receipt, there will be little you can do back home to get the money back.

Quite a number of restaurants will bring a swipe machine to the table. That’s ok. If the waiter needs to take away the card, go along with him, that’s a normal practice in Brazil. If you don’t trust the place, pay with cash.

I do not advice using your credit card with manual swippers (knuckle busters).

In spite of the outrageous interest rates practised by Brazilian banks, Brazilians mostly buy on hire purchase/installment plans. Many prefer to buy a product that costs R$100 cash paying R$1 during 150 weeks.

Because of this imposed love affair with the credit institutions, the prices on the shop windows often show the value of each installment and not the total value of the product. Take, for instance:

camisa
R$40 x5

If you don’t pay attention to the small x5, you might reach the conclusion that Brazil is an incredibly cheap country. In the case I have just made up to illustrate my point, the price of a camisa (shirt) is R$200 - the result of multiplying 40 by 5 monthly installments.

Brazilian-issued credit cards allow their holders to buy on hire purchases/an installment plan. Banks from other countries don’t.

Unless it is mentioned on the price tag, hire purchase/installment plan doesn’t involve in-build interest rates.

câmera digital
R$300 x10
á vista R$2.500

If you buy the digital camera on hire purchase/installment plan, it will cost you R$3.000 (10 monthly installments of R$300). However, if you pay for it up-front (à vista), it will set you back R$2.500.

There are negotiable and non-negotiable prices in Brazil. It only makes sense to haggle (pechinchar) where there’s room for it.

With very few exceptions, prices at the following places are non-negotiable:

• supermarkets, bookstores, record shops; in general, shops that sell products with a price tag on them. However, there are exceptions to this rule that will probably surprise a few foreigners. Take big electrical appliances, for instance. If you pay cash (à vista) there is a good chance of getting a discount (anything between 5 and 10%). The bigger the value, the bigger the discount. This applies to travel agents as well.
• hairdresser, manicurist and the likes
• taxis equipped with a meter unless you negotiate the price in advance
• buses, planes
• petrol/gas stations
• cafés, restaurants, ice-cream parlours

Places where prices might be negotiable (not 100% proof):

• hotels, pousadas and other kinds of accommodation. The price list is just for reference. Even in top-class hotels, if the occupation rate is low, there is always the chance of getting a discount. The longer you plan to stay, the likelier the discount is. If a pousada where you plan to stay for five days, during the week (lower occupation rate), doesn’t give you a discount, go somewhere else.
• car rental. The longer the rental period, the higher the chances of negotiating a discount.
• all sorts of services catering for the tourist. Do you want a guide to take you around the place? The price is negotiable. Do you want a boatman to take you for a trip around the river? The price is negotiable.
• street sellers, crafstmen and the likes. If you are buying five collars, you should get a discount.

Remember:

• the more you spend, the better the discount
• paying cash should earn you a discount - discount lost if you pay with a credit card

A couple of useful sentences:

• não tem desconto? (could you give us a discount?)
• tem desconto para pagamento à vista? (is there a discount if we pay in cash?)

What is the difference between the “comercial”, the “turismo” and the “paralelo” dollar?

A technical explanation would be far too boring, plus I’m don’t have sufficient knowledge to deliver it. My approach will be more practical:

• dólar comercial: it’s the one used in trade, imports, exports, and financial operations. When you withdraw local currency from a Brazilian ATM the exchange rate that will be applied to you will be very similar to the one of the dólar comercial.
• dólar turismo: its exchange rate is applied to the purchase of dollars for tourism purposes. If you exchange money at a bank or bureau de change/currency exchange, the exchange rate that will be applied to you will also be the one of the dólar turismo. The exchange rate of the dólar turismo is also applied when a Brazilian buys a flight or a package holiday quoted in dollars.
• dólar paralelo: used in the black market. Its exchange rate appears on the press because of the importance of irregular operations carried out on a daily basis through black market operators (doleiros). The exchange rate of the dólar paralelo is of no interest to the tourist.

[Don't forget there is a list of all the questions & answers published in the blog here]

rio, brazil, ubatuba, paraty