ShivRoy

That was with regard to Russians. And Ukrainians are really everywhere in Europe, with visible numbers in Poland and Czechia

Most abundant post-war Russian gay communities of recent exiles would be (in this order) in Berlin, Thailand, Buenos Aires, Belgrade, Dubai and possibly Yerevan (however Armenia, as well as Kazakhstan, could be less of this case now than it was in 2022 - those who moved there initially found a way to move further into the EU or elsewhere since)

When I was there a year ago, Grindr offers were not abundant. I did hook up for smth like 50e, but some offers were in the 100-200 territory that I didn't take. Be mindful it's a conservative country with a full history of recent anti-LGBT protests or outright violence (and at the same time with a fascinating underground alternative culture that skews towards decidedly queer)

Fully agree. But that Colombian guy was not budging at all - he was not even a fan of small talk or touching his impressive chest: "if you decide to go with me, come back and we'll go to the cabin when you decide", he said taking a step back . Wrapping a towel around the hips was also below him, so he was in longish jogging shorts with a towel around his neck. So I gave a hard pass - my experience shows that this attitude will be even more present in a cabin and the experience will be actually sub-par, even though he was certainly #1 in the sauna looks-wise. I had two other guys in the sauna that night, and it was a blast, so no regrets, it's a full experience what counts after all, not just the looks

Don't panic - power blackouts are only in Russia-occupied Transnistria, which is a breakaway part of Moldova since the 1990s. There have not been any blackouts in Moldova proper, they are getting electricity from Romania On gay life in Moldova - there are no gay bars or anything of that sort. Everything is online on apps and everything is possible. Russian is widely spoken, much much more so than English especially among the target audience of sex providers (i.e. no master's degrees most likely), so Google Translate is handy

I was there last week. Still there, nothing changed much - the roster of guys could be uneven, depending on the day. There was a guy from Medellin - I think his name was Wilton or smth like that - who was stunning but with plenty of attitude, and he was charging 80e, saying "it's fine if you pay 50 here, but that's not the price for me" - and he was still in great demand, I saw at least 3 clients taking him to the cabin/suite. Good for him.

Excellent reports @travguy - we overlapped on some days in Rio. My two cents: 117 on Tues (we were on the same day) was amazing and full of so many hot guys - it's been a while since I remember it this way. Other days at 117 were not that spectacular - not that bad, but Tues blew it all away. It's good they built even more more (dingy) suites downstairs so infamous waits for a suite are much shorter from what I've seen. I've been to the Junior BDay at 202 - it was the most people I've ever seen at 202 in all those years, more than I've seen on Carnaval or around New Year's - the pasta buffet was pretty weird (it was very heavy and just plain weird to have a heavy cheap pasta with a cheap sauce to stuff your face with while you are in a towel amidst some great GPs). I see they bought even more monitors to show Cher on and put them everywhere - from the clients' perspective, I could already see Cher from everywhere, so that investment going into making suites nicer would be more appreciated lol. Another interesting point from that night: there were lots and lots of people, but not many were hiring - at no point there was a queue for the suites. That was interesting, I wonder why. I was at 202 on Monday, and it was OK - by Weds I was gone already.

I agree, there are a few hot locals who are not interested in the whole GP thing - and I remember I was mistaken a few times too: one guy I presumed a GP turned out to be just a local stunner on a sex binge, and another guy whom I presumed a local cruising with friends turned out to be a GP. A key thing for me in these cases is eye contact. If you try to establish eye contact and show your interest, a GP would maintain eye contact back or even approach you or smile, whereas a non-GP local would not maintain eye contact and his body language would be he's not interested. GPs normally do not ignore your eye contact, unless they are booked by someone else already at that particular moment

Many of those travels were during that sabbatical, and I was not posting then. I did post recently though about Fortaleza, Recife and Sao Luis. In many other places everything is apps only, or otherwise very underwhelming (like a GP sauna in Belem which was a ghost-like place even those 8 or so years ago when I visited). In places like Barreirinhas and Jeri (which are both tiny) you pretty much are in the tourist central (Lencois Maranhenses are though one of the most beautiful places that I've seen not only in Brazil, but in the whole world - and that's Barreirinhas). Another good non-gay place which is awesome is Lensois in Bahia with its incredible hiking and day trips in Chapada Diamantina. Beaches in Bahia (Taipu de Fora especially) are some of the best I've seen anywhere in the world. Maceio (and vicinities) has stunning beaches too. But in terms of gay saunas or places, out of these secondary cities only Fortaleza, Recife and Sao Luis stand out, I think.

The jury is still out on Dragon though - I've been only that one time within a week, and never been back, so not sure whether it was quite active because of the special show, or whether it finally got some success after all these years - I really don't know. With the much discussed notion here that Brazilian saunas are slowly dying, Fortaleza is exhibit A. California was fantastic garoto-wise 8-10 years ago, it is a shadow of those times now. There are still some good guys, but honestly if not for that star guy from Goias my week there would have been slim pickings. And he will be gone soon - he told me he doesn't like Fortaleza (he's been for 2 months here now), and he'd been to Rio and Sao Paolo each once before and said those are too chaotic and huge for him, so he will be going back to Goiania. He's incredible though - I'm getting a programa with him every night, he's incredibly athletic with a smiley face and obviously very straight, but a job is a job is a job, and yesterday he told me in a suite: we met a few times already, and I'm very grateful, so if you want you can fuck me now (which I did - an incredible experience with a model-like straight hunk) - when afterwards I gave him 120 instead of 100, he attempted to chase me across the sauna trying discreetly to give me back 20, saying "this is too much, you didn't have to do that". So in short Xclay, enjoy these times while they still exist, because in some not too distant future they won't anymore.

This was exactly my attitude after my 1st trip to Brazil - I think in 2010. I spent one week in Rio and did not like it at all - and having traveled a lot around the world, I thought, ok seen that, goodbye, I don't think I'll return. And then told everyone that Brazil was a disappointment. Several years later, I had a sabbatical between the jobs and spent pretty much the whole northern winter in Brazil - I traveled all the country and have been almost everywhere. And I loved it then. I've been going maybe once a year since (more during covid as it was the best destination in an otherwise closed-off world). The exchange rate helped to enjoy the country too (when I came in 2010, real was 1.6 to the USD, it's 6.04 today) That said, unlike for many other forum members, for me SP is the city in Brazil I like the least. As I often travel through GRU, I used to do stopovers, but then I thought, I'd better skip it and fly on as I enjoy other places in Brazil much more than SP

I've done that!!

Okay, back in Fortaleza. So far, a few days in - California is still the garoto central, though crumbling even more as before. In one suite, I almost laughed during sex when I saw above me a ceiling that clearly fell off in two or three spots since I was in that suite last a year ago. I have to say garoto-wise, it's also slower than it was a year ago - however, there is a great defined guy from Goias who promises to save this trip for me. Initially, I thought he was arrogant as he never responded to my hinted advances - but then I found out he's just super-timid, plus I'm a foreigner. He told me he thought I'm Finnish as I look like someone from Finland - for the record, I don't look like Finnish at all, but I suspect the only foreigner he met before was from Finland. Interestingly enough, there was a very decent night at Dragon last night (on Saturday). There was a live bareback sex show with two local porn stars, but there was a decent crowd and I think there was a wider and better selection of garotos than at California. First I was at California where I hooked up with the Goias guy, then moved on to Dragon and I thought it was better. I hooked with another guy and could have done with more guys there - but then got involved in the live sex show which then continued to the cabins with the full-on orgy. The price is still 100. The guy from Dragon said, "oh you are gringo, so for gringos it's 200". I said, cut the gringo shit, it's 100 here. He said, 150. I said, maybe mais tarde. He immediately said 100 and was super-happy during the session and afterwards, and we talked more later in the bar, so 100 is the market rate. By the way, is there a member of this board currently in Fortaleza? I think I saw someone at California that I saw quite a few times before in Rio, mostly at 202? If he is on this board, well-done with the choice of the guy I saw you today with at the beach at the Orbita Blue beach club - that's a sweet guy I saw at California for a few years and thought, if he gained some muscle he would be a great looker, and I see that finally he did, so you caught him at the exactly right time lol.

Sorry, no info on that. I don't think there are saunas with working boys aside from Thermas in Barcelona - or at least I'm not aware (the Madrid one went down the drain, as I heard)

Malaga is one of Spain's hottest gay destinations, probably third after Barcelona and Madrid. The village in the suburbs - Torremolinos - has a good beach and a strong gay vibe. They have what they call "Boys Town" which is a couple of blocks of gay bars, a gay hotel or two, and a gay beach. Depending on the season, there are usually quite a few escorts both online and cruising outside the gay venues or beaches. I think it was much more lively in that sense maybe a decade ago with immigrant escorts cruising in the afternoon near a gay cafe on the beach, but I haven't seen that action in my last couple of visits. Still many escorts are available (100E) - with an interesting caveat that pretty much every one of them is on meth.

It's not as busy as say Weds, but when I visited on both Mon and Tues this September, I was still a happy client when I left

Ha, AndyUK - I was there too, and a few times before that. I concur, this is not Brazil but it's a great option in Europe. I had great fun - plenty of Brazilians, I spoke to some Colombians, there was a dyed blond Argentinian from Buenos Aires, and then there was the perennial favorite of some on this board Nicolas from Chile, a very sweet guy but sometimes too eager to please (he was still great!). I think it was that Weds this week when I met the guy (the name evades me) who looked like your average Colombian twunk, but he said he's native from Barcelona - I told him we need to put him in a museum, wow somebody from Barcelona in Thermas. Then he said (too honestly, imo) that he's 37, I was shocked he looked late 20s, I told him we need to put him into two museums now. He was incredible in sex. There was another Brazilian guy whom I remember from last year, but hadn't gone with him before as he was not too defined and what I'd call lazily soft (i.e. too lazy for enough gym) - but hey, he put great muscle in a year, and the sex was simply great. 50e is the universal rate, cabins are free. Drugs are not non-existent from what I've seen.

Everything is online - mostly apps, a bit Hunqz, etc. There are no gay clubs, and the couple of gay bars are very sad - there could be some rentboys there, but they would be druggies. I met some exceptional guys there, one Romanian for instance, but they are all online. A couple of saunas and one cruising bar are all non-escort scene. One of my favourite bars in Europe, Action Bar, has long closed - that was the Budapest highlight that I miss. It had live sex shows, interactive "oral academy" on Friday nights with bar patrons sucking off performers on the bar floor, and plenty of rentable guys. That's long gone, and nothing has emerged instead. Men's days at Rudas baths used to be a riot in the 2000s, but they are very very very tame now. A fascinating city which I try to visit every year or two - but all escort scene is online.

Hi Bert, plenty of guys on the apps (Grindr being most popular) or Hunqz. Torremolinos is the gay capital of Costa del Sol - they have gay hotels, gay bars, saunas etc. - so much that a couple of blocks are called Boyz Town. It's not really a town, just a block or two. The standard going rate is 100 Eur - and all those guys on apps also circulate around the gay bars in Boyz Town. Before covid, there was a bit of an escort cruising scene on a pedestrian sidewalk along the sea as the sidewalk curves around a big rock - there's a gay bar and a gay beach hut there. There were some Moroccan immigrants there and other guys that didn't mind a lower fee - however I did not see that anymore in my several visits since 2020. Malaga and other places along the coast have guys too, but escorts (and gays generally) congregate in Torremolinos mostly. Go online, then go to the bars - and there are lots of escorts in Torremolinos. I'd say 80% of them are on meth which is now by far the most popular party drug on that coast.

I sent them an Instagram message, never got a reply

I agree - I always check the bill both at 117 and at Pointe. There has been maybe only one or two occasions at 117 when the bill was incorrect - but I quickly got that it's a habit at Pointe. In the past few years, it got so bad that I started laughing correcting the bill every bloody time - every night at Pointe there would be extra drinks or extra items (the receptionist would bring one of the bar staff and the item/s would get removed - but it just happened almost every time). It got slightly better when Junior's son started to man the reception, and he's also very friendly - however, even with him some games continue. Once, I saw a charge for a suite on a free suite night on Weds - Junior's son told me, "oh you had a nicer suite, they are not free". Those who've ever been to any Rio sauna, be it 117 or Pointe, know that no single suite there is any nice. After a bit of an argument, that paid suite became free as it should be. On another night, there was a "cleaning fee" - again, Junior's son claimed this was added to the bill by a cleaning lady - and there was nothing untoward in the suite apart from your usual cum on the sheets. That cleaning fee stayed. I didn't get any extra drinks on the bills recently though - but even though I like Pointe and I want them to succeed, this is the only sauna in Brazil I'm constantly disputing my bills with. With their attendance clearly dropping in the past 2 years and them ceding even more ground to 117, I fear this is the very wrong strategy on their part.

Much much safer. I was initially apprehensive and prepared, like I would be in any Latin American city. But then a few days later I relaxed. Incidents could happen, and you need to be aware of surroundings, but I was walking in the night between bars, restaurants and clubs in Recoleta and Palermo without a problem - something I would never do in Brazil. It's not super-safe as say Prague or Hanoi - but it's reasonably safe, compare it to Marseille or Genoa, i.e. somewhat edgy southern European cities with some bad areas, I think that would be a fair comparison in terms of safety. So I'd say yes BA is much safer than Rio or SP

The place not mentioned often on this forum - but I've come back recently from two weeks in Buenos Aires. I want to come back already. I had a blast. This is my fourth time in Argentina, but my last visit was 9 or 10 years ago. I'd been to all the best places of this amazing country before, so this time I wanted just to have a chill city vacation in Buenos Aires, a city that I always considered one of the best in the world, and certainly the best in Latin America (for me). It's very different from the rest of Latin America, certainly different from Brazil. It does not feel Latin American, it feels more like a ramshackle Mediterranean European city instead - like Marseille or Genoa. It has that European cultured vibe, museums, theaters, leafy streets, public spaces, simply excellent food, and a great bar scene. It does not have that fire of Brazilian parties, no - it's more reserved and not that in-your-face fun, it's like a more refined sister of a loud brash half-drunk brother across the border. To put everything in the proper context from the very start: it is cheap. It is ridiculously cheap. It's cheaper than Cambodia. The economy went down the drain long ago, but the election of Milei propelled the inflation even further up. The local currency (black market rate) lost 20% just in the first three weeks of January. When I look up restaurants on Google Maps and see their menus photographed in November, I know that I need to double the prices for end-January (in pesos). Prices from a year ago do not mean anything, that was a different universe. I'm reading that just before covid, the taxi from the airport was 68 pesos, it is now 37,000 pesos (or 18,000 pesos on Uber) - you get the range. The wine is excellent - I was buying mine from a Chinese car service round the corner. They likely got the wine in stock in December before holidays and forgot to change prices - so I was buying wine from them in end-January for a price not seen anywhere else - $9 for a bottle with a Vivino rating 4.5 (normal malbecs are at around $2 per bottle). In an expensive Michelin restaurant, a huge 400g ribeye steak (dare I say the best steak in the world) and three negronis I accompanied it with rang me a bill of $20 total. In non-Michelin restaurants, steaks are between $5 and $8. In one of the top bars in the city mentioned in all sorts of awards and ratings, the happy hour sees two classic cocktails (I drink Negroni, but others may choose something else) for $3 (i.e. $1.50 each). Argentinian guys are not as defined or perfect as Brazilians - I'm a sucker for pectorals and abdominals, so I needed to dig hard. But thanks god for Venezuelans - they are plentiful in Buenos Aires, and they were more than half the guys I hired. Huge shout and huge thanks to @Latbear4blk who gave some incredibly useful advice on this forum. I was using local websites Soytuyo, Leonos, ArgentinaMasajes and Skokka to arrange all dates. The #1 piece of advice from @Latbear4blk was to check those profiles against the reviews on a local forum ForoPirata - that forum is gold, and I managed to save myself a lot of time (and trouble) by discarding quite a number of profiles who looked excellent on websites but got scathing reviews from previous customers on ForoPirata. If only such resources were available in other countries... I usually got two guys per day - one for "massage" and one for full sex. ArgentinaMasajes is an excellent resource, and I was very upfront with masseurs asking them direct questions on Whatsapp about what's possible on their side and what's not. Some were more modest and I wished them luck. Others entertained handjobs or fetishes, more daring ones were fine with BJs and cumming in my mouth, and the best allowed full-on sex. Mostly, I visited them in their places (after checking against references). This worked really well. Some, I invited to my place - and BA is a city where you can get excellent AirBnbs - mine was with a sweeping view from the 21st-floor balcony over the city, a rooftop gym on the 31st floor with panoramic windows, a swimming pool and a sundeck, and security that was ambivalent to visitors (the security guy just on one occasion recorded an ID of one of my guests who looked especially brutal, but on other occasions I met my guests downstairs at the security fence and then escorted them out afterwards bidding farewell without even talking to security- in most BA apartment blocks a guest would not be able to leave the building by himself without you escorting him out). "Massages" and other visits with full sex were all in $15-25 range, some slipping to $30, but never higher. (I got a local SIM card and conversed in Spanish over Whatsapp from a local number to make sure I'm not quoted crazy prices). One of my regulars was a well-known porn star - he's one of that Onlyfans cluster of Argentinian porn stars who have individual accounts and cross-pollinate bareback between each other with endless collabs. Well, I knew his name before, and his vids are everywhere (I'll omit the name). He was coming to my place for great sex for $25 ($20 rate + $5 Uber fare) and even spoke some English. I love Argentina. But as I said, it was mostly Venezuelans. If not for them, my picture would have not been this bright, but Venezuelans are muscular, defined, tattooed, insatiable, with a beautiful face and lots of kinky thoughts (and actions). One of the Venezuelans, I was coming to him every several days in the morning for a "massage" with some kinks and fetishes, and every time while I waited for him to come downstairs and open me the door, I saw the same beautiful girl coming out with two dogs, and one of them was usually immediately having a piss in front of me. When I saw her a second time, I thought it's such a coincidence, I'm at a different time than before but her dog-walking schedule matched. When I saw her again next time for the third time, it finally clicked for me that this was a GF of my "masseur" and their two dogs - she had to leave the apartment to walk the dogs for an hour so her guy would do various things with me disguised as a massage. Next time I saw her, I almost said hi. The guy was usually coming to let me in a minute after her leaving. With all that, I didn't go to any saunas - and as far as I know, there are no Brazil-style GP saunas anyway, they are normal non-escort saunas. I went once to Cine Ideal, an old grand cinema showing gay porn now in huge cinema halls with balconies - the entrance was something like $1 or $2, the cinema halls were pitch dark, and I probably could find someone and something there, but I saw little upside if I can have a $15-20 Venezuelan in proper comfort and lighting elsewhere. A couple of blocks from the cinema, there is another curious establishment - called MasajeClub. It's a business of massage coupled with a red wine bar. Apparently it's popular with locals at lunchtime and after work - the downside is that you can't select a masseur, he's assigned to you. The masseurs are your guys next door, not model-like, but they can go a looong way during the massage. The official line of this club is that you pay for massage ($4.50 one hour) and then whatever happens in the room is up to a masseur and you. There's nothing that the masseur is obliged to perform apart from the massage, but it usually involved sucking and even in some cases fucking. There are no minimum tips, so it is up to you if you want to leave anything to your masseur on top of $4.50. For something like $15 they have what they call a "circuit" - that's a 4-stage massage where four masseurs (again you can't pick) come to your room one after another to perform something like 20-25 min of massage - that may end up in four waves of different cum-shooting experiences. One or two of the four would usually not be averse to fucking. After that, they give you a glass of malbec. I've also been to the stripper bars. I remember there had been quite a few in my past visits, now only one remains, and it stages nightly shows rotating through three different locations in the city depending on the day of the week. Usually, it's three hunky straight strippers (usually coming in a bundle "one stunning, one ok, and one ugly") doing two routines - first stripping to a flaccid cock, and then the second one with a hardon. Then they come to the audience, and for a modest tip you can grab and fondle a hardon. I saw people leaving tips accounting for $0.1 or $0.2, so when I tipped $0.8, that gave me a really good grip of the cock and then a strong hug from a naked hard hunk and then a big thank you and usually a return trip from him to me for another $0.8. Big whisky cola is $2, beer is pretty much spare change. The show lasts for an hour and starts at 01:30. And then there are normal bars and clubs - again this is not the Brazilian level of eye candy, but it is still sexy in its own way. I really want to come back, this is such an underrated city to visit.

Well, I'm not fixated on the size per se - unlike Salvador that is a very black city, the ones in Nordeste are definitely lighter, but not as much as SP or Porto Alegre. In Fortaleza, there was one indigenous guy from the hinterlands in Amazonas who was simply outstanding. I'd say it's a healthy mix of various types there. I really liked festivals in Sao Luis - I was at the June one and it was almost Carnival-like. It's a city thriving on music, so I came back a couple of times.

Well, there are very few foreigners in that region, almost none that I've seen (Argentinians/Colombians aside). It was edgy as in every big Brazilian city, but usual precautions apply. Rio, Salvador, Fortaleza are all quite dangerous - but foreign tourists still go there and happily survive to tell the tale!