Hello people!
This was a trip with a surprise, a unique, original and unexpected place. While we were traveling through the interior of Brazil, and in the middle we discovered a spectacular place from the past, but this time it is not the colonial architecture that caught our attention but something different... We arrived at a gold mine named Mina de ouro da Passagem in Mariana.
Because in the past this area was known for its mines and wealth, in fact the Brazilian state is called Minas Gerais (which in Portuguese means "general mines"), and well, from what I could read that the Portuguese gold then went to pay the English people, curious that despite the black legend and that they always say the bad men were others, in the end it was the English who kept it all.
We started from Ouro Preto, which means "black gold", and that gives us many clues, there we discovered a beautiful Portuguese colonial baroque architecture, which I shared in the previous post: here Ouro Preto but later we took a very special train.
Train ride (from Ouro Preto to Mariana)
And we headed to another small town in the area, Mariana (of which I will also share more photos on a next post) but now it is the trip itself and the mine that are remarkable. The journey was wonderful, because the route was done on an old train from that time, where the staff is dressed like in the past telling stories, while looking out the window there are hills and also a lush vegetation invades us, with waterfalls and animals, which here in Brazil always surrounds everything, wherever you go, almost anywhere.
Mina de ouro da Passagem (The gold mine da Passagem)
Once there, the first stop was undoubtedly the mine. And the first thing you see is a historical museum that we would later visit, the old facilities and the surroundings, but you had to go to the mine, because the best thing was that you could go inside one of the freight cars!
Inside the Mine
Once inside, the experience is incredible, there is electric light illuminating the path that takes us deeper and deeper. There is echo and humidity and suddenly we find a small religious altar dedicated to a virgin, with flowers and a tablecloth. We would never have thought of it...
We found vestiges of other times, where unfortunately the work there in those conditions had to be very hard, now we simply walk through the cavities and read the modern signs: "Please do not throw stones into the lake" or "Dear tourist, for your safety it is forbidden to drink or swim in the waters of this lake" (because there was a lake and a team of divers in it), many unexpected things all the time.
And as far as we can go, we continue for a while on foot, also exploring this unique place, now abandoned except for the curious tourists who have gone inside, and almost traveled back in time.
An unforgettable and fun experience, especially riding in the carts that used to transport the minerals obtained, that's where the gold went, now it's for tourism. A different history now, changes in the times.
Outside the mine and the museum
Finally we went outside to visit the museum, now that we know more about the place. There we found other objects and old pieces that tell us a lot about everything that happened in this place, in this mine, one of the several in this region.
I hope you liked it and were surprised. Now the Brazilian journey into the interior continues with a final stop, the town of Mariana itself.
