Paraty Full-Day Customizable Historical Tour

Overview

Discover the well-preserved colonial town of Paraty on a private, fully customizable day trip from Rio de Janeiro, with time for a cachaça distillery visit, waterfalls, and historic landmarks.

Discover the historic town of Paraty, without the need to self-drive, on this full-day private tour from Rio de Janeiro. Travel to the well-preserved colonial town and enjoy an itinerary based on your interests — visit a cachaça distillery, swim in nearby waterfalls, explore the historic landmarks, or go shopping along the cobblestone streets.

Highlights

• Colonial old town Wander Paraty's UNESCO-listed cobblestone streets, lined with whitewashed 18th-century buildings.
• Cachaça distillery visit Learn how Brazil's national spirit is made at a real local distillery.
• Waterfalls Cool off with a swim at a nearby waterfall, time permitting.

What Stops Does This Tour Make?

A popular starting point — every Voyzo itinerary is fully customizable, so we'll shape the order and stops around your group.

Important Information

Frequently Asked Questions

About This Tour

Discover the well-preserved colonial town of Paraty on a private, fully customizable day trip from Rio de Janeiro, with time for a cachaça distillery visit, waterfalls, and historic landmarks. Discover the historic town of Paraty, without the need to self-drive, on this full-day private tour from Rio de Janeiro. Travel to the well-preserved colonial town and enjoy an itinerary based on your interests — visit a cachaça distillery, swim in nearby waterfalls, explore the historic landmarks, or go shopping along the cobblestone streets.

Paraty's historic core survives almost entirely intact because the town's own reason for existing collapsed centuries ago. Through the 18th century, it was the final overland stop on the Caminho do Ouro — the Gold Trail — the route that carried gold mined in Minas Gerais down through the mountains to be shipped out to Portugal. Pirates preying on the gold convoys around the Bay of Angra dos Reis eventually made the route too dangerous to keep using, and once a safer road to Rio de Janeiro opened up, Paraty's port traffic dried up almost overnight. The town simply stopped growing — which is exactly why its 18th-century whitewashed buildings and colonial street grid were never demolished and replaced the way so much of urban Brazil was.

That accidental preservation was formally recognized in 2019, when Paraty's historic center — together with four surrounding stretches of Atlantic Forest — was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List under the title "Paraty and Ilha Grande." It's a mixed cultural-and-natural listing, acknowledging both the intact colonial townscape and the rainforest around it; the nomination had actually first been submitted back in 2004, so the final designation was 15 years in the making.

The town's cobblestone streets, known locally as pé-de-moleque, are themselves a piece of colonial engineering most visitors walk over without realizing. The historic center sits slightly below sea level, and its streets were deliberately built with a shallow concave curve so that the highest spring tides would wash seawater straight over the stones, flushing out refuse and cleaning the town naturally before the water receded. On the days when the tidal coefficient runs highest, the stones still disappear under water today, and locals genuinely cross on raised stepping platforms to reach their front doors — a centuries-old sanitation system still quietly doing its job.