Miguel Pereira and the coffee zone, Brazil

The coffee zone covered the valley of the Rio Paraíba do Sul and neighbouring hills and valleys. Before railways were built in the second half of the 19th century, mule trains carried the coffee from the interior to the coast on roads such as the Estrada do Comércio from Minas Gerais, through Valença and Vassouras, to the town of Iguaçu. At the end of the 19th century, the abolition of slavery, the exhaustion of the land and lower international prices for coffee caused the collapse of the coffee trade. The towns had to adapt to new economic activities or die, but many of the

remain and, although not easy to get to, are worth the effort to visit.

This town, 113 km north of Rio de Janeiro, has an excellent mountain climate. In the mid-19th century the area was entirely given over to coffee; other industries were introduced when a railway branch line reached here in the late 19th century. The town was named after a doctor who, in the 1930s, promoted the region for holidays away from the coast. About 3 km from town on the road to Rio is the

, a popular recreational spot. Mountain roads through the Serra do Mar head east to Petrópolis and Vassoura, but ask about their condition before using either of them. For tourist information, visit