Joinville is the largest city in Santa Catarina state and one of the biggest in southern Brazil, sitting at the head of the Babitonga Bay surrounded by Atlantic Forest–covered hills. The city was founded by German, Swiss, and Norwegian immigrants in the 1850s, and traces of that heritage survive in the architecture, the local cuisine, and the Festival de Dança de Joinville, one of the largest dance festivals in the world.
The old centre has a handful of well-preserved colonial buildings and a good history museum. The Babitonga Bay mangroves are home to dolphins, and boat trips to see them depart from the São Francisco do Sul waterfront, a charming colonial port town just across the bay. Joinville is also the self-proclaimed capital of Brazilian dance — the Bolshoi Theatre School has its only branch outside Moscow here.
A second tier of attractions fills out a long weekend. The Mirante on Morro Boa Vista gives the best view over the city; the rural Estrada Bonita winds through the surviving German colonial farmland with stops for honey, sausage and stuffed duck; and the Zoobotânico preserves a serious patch of Atlantic Forest right inside the city limits.