The Corinthian
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Located about 100 kms from Belo Horizonte you will find the charming city of Ouro Preto (which means ‘Black Gold’), a colonial city with great churches and impressive pieces of work. Depending on traffic and construction, you should reach it in an hour.
Not that you asked, but here is some additional info:
Belo Horizonte is the 3rd largest city in Brazil coming after Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. It is the capital of Minas Gerais state. The name means Beautiful Horizon. The city of Belo Horizonte was completely built on a plan corresponding to that of Washington D.C., with a very long highway circling the whole city. It is considered to be one of the cities with the best quality of life in Latin America. Belo Horizonte was founded in 1897 and has a population of some 2.5 million inhabitants and over 5.1 million inhabitants in metropolitan area. The city is also a leading cultural center, with more than three universities, a historical museum, numerous libraries, and sports stadiums.
Belo is built on several hills and completely surrounded by mountains. The constant rising and falling of the streets sometimes makes navigation a bit tricky, but the wide avenues lined with trees are always easy guidelines. Unfortunately, the growth of the population has been bigger than anticipated 100 years ago. So there's a lot of poorly built architecture and slums, but also still some excellent colonial buildings. You should not miss the fin-de siecle buildings around the Praca da Liberdade and the market on Av. Afonso Pena, each sunday.
Shortly after its founding in 1698, Ouro Preto became the center of the greatest gold and silver rush in the Americas to that date. It still resembled a boom town when it was given city status in 1711 with the name Vila Rica. A decade later it became capital of Minas Gerais captaincy, which even today is one of the principal mineral extracting regions of Brasil. In late 1790's a group of intellectuals and professionals assembled here to plan Brazil's independence from Portugal. The movement known as Inconfidencia Mineira was promptly crushed by the Crown and its leader, a dentist, immortalized as Tiradentes (toothpooler), was executed and beheaded. His head was publicly displayed in the streets of Rio as a warning against those with similar views. In 1823, a year after Brazil's independence, Ouro Preto was named capital of Minas Gerais province. In 1897, however, because of transportation difficulties the capital was transferred to Belo Horizonte (40 miles [65 km] northwest).
Ouro Preto today lives largely in the past. In 1933 it was declared a national monument and the surrounding region a national park, so that the city's elaborate (mostly late 18th-century) public buildings, churches, and houses might be preserved or restored. The city has many extremely ornate (gold leafed) Baroque churches; religious architecture and sculpture reached its zenith during the mid 1700's under the skillful hands of Antonio Francisco Lisboa, better known as Aleijadinho ("Little Cripple"). The Church of Sao Francisco de Assis and the facade of the Church of Nossa Senhora do Carmo are his masterpieces. Its museums and churches are rich and beautiful. Most recently Ouro Preto was used for the signing of the new economic treaty linking Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay, known as Mercosul. |
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