How to get there:
The town Nova Friburgo is a good point of reference.
Proceed south towards location S22.34342, W42.58528, the last part
of this drive is a fairly narrow road tending uphill. Park on the
side of the road. A chain closed the road at this spot.
Route description:
The route follows the road uphill until it ends at the base of a staircase
with 629 steps. When you arrive on the top, turn right and follow an
easy trail a pretty short distance to the summit.
Note that there is a gate before you reach the steps. They may enforce
a policy that require hikers to be there before 1300.
Here is a quick summary of peaks climbed on this trip to Brazil.
A track is posted on Peakbagger. Comments:
We had arrived in Rio the previous day. The plan was to start early and
visit this peak on our way to the base of Bandeira.
This worked well, we left around 1015 and reached the summit after about
1:15. We first explored the lower summit
that is accessed by turning
left on the top of the stairs. A bridge conveniently crosses some
sort of ravine. It was foggy, but we were able to confirm that
that summit is indeed significantly lower.
Next, we returned to the top of the staircase and continued
to the true summit at the
end of the trail quite nearby. We had fog and no views, therefore soon headed back down.
The return took about 50 minutes. A good 2 hour break before resuming our drive to
the town of Sao Raimundo south of our next
target Pico da Bandeira.
