Búzios, one of the top beach destinations in Brazil, will be crowded soon. Right now is a great time to visit; the weather is already summer-like on the beautiful Costa do Sol (Sun Coast).

If you're visiting in the high season, it's time to find a hotel. The Villa Rasa Marina, for example, has already sold out for New Year's Eve. But there's still room for your sunny vacation in one of the city's many hotels, pousadas and guest houses.

I'm listing Búzios hotels by beach, but I haven't even started João Fernandes (coming soon), a beach dotted with pousadas that's a favorite with South American travelers. For more options, search Búzios hotels on Kayak.

Photo courtesy of Le Relais La Borie, one of the best hotels in Búzios.

New Moon opened today in about 600 movie theaters in Brazil. If you're a fan of the Twilight saga headed for Brazil on vacation and you'd like to share in the local passion for Lua Nova, as the movie is called in Portuguese, find a theater showing it on UOL Cinema. Check the drop boxes for state and city to the left.

At this point, as you can imagine, there's great anticipation in Brazil around Edward and Bella's honeymoon in Breaking Dawn (Amanhecer in Portuguese). When I read the book, I immediately thought that Angra dos Reis, on the coast of Rio de Janeiro State and packed with private islands, could be a great location. But many other places would be suitable.

And it's a Búzios hotel that comes to my mind as a romantic haven in white, Cullen style. Browse some photos of the Casas Brancas ("White Houses") Boutique Hotel: not as private as Esme Cullen's island, but don't you think the look is close?

Twilight Travel:

• New Moon Tour of Volterra
• Forks, WA on a Budget

More About New Moon:

• Photo Gallery

• Interview with Taylor Lautner

Kristen and Taylor in São Paulo:

• Press conference photo gallery

Photo of Kristen Stewart (Bella) and Taylor Lautner (Jake) in New Moon © Summit Entertainment.

Thursday night in Rio, where to go? Try Braseiro da Gávea, one of the bars and restaurants in Baixo Gávea (Low Gávea) and a great one for flirting.

Pronounced BYE-shu GA-vya, this stretch of Rio's South Side near the Jockey Club racing track is at its most crowded on Thursdays and Sundays; Braseiro is also good at shaking off the Monday night blahs.

You can still get tickets to one of Rio de Janeiro's top New Year's Eve 2010 parties, Réveillon at the Jockey Club.

The Jockey Club in Rio de Janeiro, founded in 1868, has a great structure for events and beautiful views of Rio's South Side, located as it is near the Corcovado and Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas. The VIP area of the party will have privileged views of the fireworks in Copacabana and Lagoa.

São Paulo will host the final race of the next Formula 1 season on the weekend of Nov.14, 2010.

The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile has made the 2010 season a little longer than usual, with 19 races over eight months.

October, the month when the Interlagos GP usually takes place, is the busiest for São Paulo hotels, with about 57.36% of the occupancy for the year according to the São Paulo Convention & Visitors Bureau. In 2010, that trend is likely to shift to November. How long in advance should you book a hotel for the GP?

Five-star hotels where F1 teams stay, such as the Grand Hyatt, the Hilton São Paulo Morumbi or the Transamérica, have already blocked out their rooms for the F1 weekend. You can e-mail them and request to be notified in case there are vacancies once all the F1 occupancy has been defined -- "possibly in September", a Transamérica staff member told me today. The risk is having few options left elsewhere if those rooms aren't available at all.

Although many people book hotels as soon as the F1 calendar is released, a reservations representative at the Ibis Interlagos, a budget hotel near the circuit, said that six months is a reasonable timeframe. "However, that varies, and sometimes we've had rooms closer to race dates due to cancellations," she said.

Book a São Paulo hotel on Kayak

Photo: Jenson Button of Great Britain and Brawn GP drives on his way to winning the F1 World Drivers Championship at Interlagos on Oct. 18, 2009. Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images.

The Year of France in Brazil officially ends today. In São Paulo, there will be a free closing show tonight at Ibirapuera Park, featuring DJ Yuksek (France), Les Tambours de Brazza (Congo) and DJ Marky (Brazil).

Several exhibits related to the Year of France in Brazil will continue past the official closing. One example in Rio de Janeiro is "Brazil, France and the Sea" at Espaço Cultural da Marinha, through January.

Year of France in Brazil Show:

Great Marquee at Ibirapuera Park
Access through Gate 10
Tonight at 6 p.m.
Admission: Free

Photo ©Year of Brazil in France

Today is Proclamation of Republic Day in Brazil. Marshal Deodoro da Fonseca, who toppled Emperor Pedro II in 1889, is one of the national heroes honored in the Steel Book at the Nation's Pantheon in Brasília. The stars on the Brazil flag represent the sky over Rio de Janeiro on the day of the proclamation.

In Brasília, local cycling NGO Rodas da Paz (Wheels of Peace) celebrated with a bike ride this morning.

Photo: Antônio Cruz/Agência Brasil

Ricardo Kurtz, a young Brazilian entrepreneur, planned two of the best New Year's Eve beach parties in Brazil in 2008 and 2009. This year, he'll be back in Jurerê Internacional, a hip beach in Florianópolis, with a new party called Réveillon Boutique.

Like the 2008 and 2009 Réveillon Pimenta Limão, this party is going to have a dance floor in a tent built by the ocean. Featured DJs include Americans Miguel Migs and Dennis Ferrer as well as great Brazilian DJs (Mario Fischetti and Paulinho Boghosian, resident at Warung on Praia Brava, Itajaí are two of them).

The space near Villas del Sol y Mar will feature an LED panel and a laser show. Dinner will be provided by Bistrô d'Acampora, and there will be an open bar. Contact Réveillon Boutique for more information.

Have you ever thought of seeing Brazil's hills and beaches from a balloon basket? Learn about the balloon rides offered by Immaginare, a branch of Freeway Ecoturismo, in top ballooning destinations in the states of São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Rio Grande do Sul.

Dry and sunny winters are ideal for ballooning in the South and Southeast; the Brazilian Ballooning Confederation holds its annual cup in June. But rides are scheduled year round, always subject to cancellation due to weather changes.

Photo courtesy of Immaginare.

Brazil's Federal Public Ministry will investigate the causes of the Tuesday blackout which affected 18 Brazilian states and Paraguay. The Ministry of Mines and Energy has blamed the incidence of lightning around the Itaberá substation for the disaster. However, ELAT, the Atmospheric Electricity Group at the National Institute for Space Research, issued a bulletin yesterday which practically ruled out lightning as a cause, saying that possibility is "minimal".

According to ELAT, the intensity of the lightning activity, which was being precisely monitored at the time of the blackout, was at least five times lower than 100 kiloamperes, the minimum discharge which might disconnect lines of Itaipu magnitude. Distance between the lightning and the substation and lines is also a factor against the lightning theory.

If you were in São Paulo, I hope you were not affected by one of the consequences of the blackout: the water shortage. I called a few hotels in São Paulo yesterday, from five-star to budget, and they all said their water tanks were holding up fairly well. "The recommended procedure is to conserve, and not to ration, water," said a hotel staff member. Water supply should go back to normal today, according to Sabesp, the São Paulo State Basic Sanitation Company.