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Eric Fichtl

Brazil

<p>The spectacular Véu da Noiva (Bridal Veil) waterfall in the Chapada dos Guimarães National Park. The falls drop a dramatic 86 metres into a perfect pool...</p>
<p>A breathtaking panorama from a clifftop in the Chapada dos Guimarães National Park, in western Brazil.</p>
<p>A caiman (yacare) rests in the Pantanal wetlands of western Brazil. The menacing pose is actually a way for the caiman to regulate its body temperature, although this photographer must admit it is a touch intimidating to get this close. Shot from a canoe somewhere in the Pantanal wetlands.<br /></p>
<p>A small beach on Ilhabela, a mountainous island not so distant – and yet a world away – from the urban expanse of São Paulo.</p>
<p>The momentarily forlorn faces of shoppers at a market in Rio de Janeiro.<br /></p>
<p>A helicopter whisks a VIP over the endless skyline of São Paulo during one of its whiskey-hued afternoons. There's no place quite like this city.</p>
<p>The biggest party on earth, Rio de Janeiro's Carnaval converts the sprawling city into a festival of samba, smiles, and surreal spectacle for several days. So Bacchic are the festivities, it's hard to fathom that the Carnaval is rooted in Christian tradition. Here, thousands of revelers watch the famed samba schools in their endless and enormous procession through the purpose-built Sambódromo.<br /></p>
<p>A not entirely reassuring sign in a snake pit at the Instituto Butantã, a research centre famed for its anti-venom work. The scale isn't evident, but these snakes were all more than a metre long. And for good measure, there was another pit for poisonous snakes nearby.</p>
<p>Edgar Fonceca's concrete pyramidal cathedral was part of a wave of modernism in Brazil in the 1960s and 1970s (including a whole new capital city built on the ideals, Brasilia). In the foreground corner you can see a bit of another modernist stunner, the EDISE headquarters for Petrobras.</p>
<p>An esoteric message painted on the side of a truck in São Paulo, Brazil.</p>
<p>Security forces muster while a team of workers sweep the space beneath the hulking mass of the Museu de Arte de São Paulo.</p>