Brazil travel guide: when to go, budget and itineraries

Rio covers the essentials in three nights: Corcovado early in the morning, Sugarloaf at sunset, a day between Copacabana and Ipanema. To the south, the Costa Verde strings together colonial villages and islands: Paraty is four hours by bus, Ilha Grande one more boat crossing beyond. Allow at least two nights per stop to enjoy them. High season runs December to March, peaking around Copacabana's New Year's Eve.

São Paulo has no postcard view but the best cultural and food scene in the country: MASP on Avenida Paulista, the Beco do Batman murals, restaurants from every corner of the world. Two days is enough before heading to Minas Gerais or the coast. The city is also the main air hub: most domestic flights route through it, which costs a real half-day at every connection.

The Northeast means more than 2,000 km of coastline that stays warm and dry from May to September, while the Southeast enters winter. Salvador de Bahia is its heart: the baroque Pelourinho, capoeira, palm-oil cooking. Further north, the Lençóis Maranhenses dunes fill with turquoise lagoons between July and September. Plan a domestic flight, as road distances run into days. See the Bahia region for a beach and culture stay.

Manaus is the gateway: from there, lodges on the Rio Negro are one to three hours away by boat, where the black water keeps mosquitoes down. Two to three nights allow dawn canoe trips, a guided forest walk and night-time caiman spotting. The flight from Rio takes about four hours. High-water season, December to May, opens up the flooded creeks; the dry season exposes sandy river beaches. See the Amazon region.

The Pantanal offers the best wildlife viewing in the country, well ahead of the Amazon for actually seeing animals: jaguars, tapirs, capybaras, macaws. The prime window is July to October, in the dry season, when wildlife gathers near the rivers. Access is via Cuiabá to the north or Campo Grande to the south. Nearby, Bonito has exceptionally clear rivers for snorkelling, with a daily quota system that means booking ahead.

On the Argentine border, Iguazu spreads 275 cascades across nearly three kilometres. Two days is enough: the Brazilian side first for the panorama and the Devil's Throat walkway, the Argentine side next to get up close. The park closes around 5pm and a poncho is useful year-round. Foz do Iguaçu is linked by air to Rio and São Paulo in under two hours. See the Iguazu region.

In the eighteenth century the mining state used gold from its hills to build a string of baroque towns that survive intact: Ouro Preto with its churches carved by Aleijadinho, Tiradentes, São João del-Rei. Ouro Preto is two hours by road from Belo Horizonte, itself a short flight from Rio. Two to three nights are enough for a walking circuit between two or three towns, on steep cobbles that turn slippery in the rain.