🇧🇷 Brazil · South
Urubici is a mountain town in the Serra Catarinense, high on the southern plateau of Santa Catarina, known as one of the coldest places in Brazil and a paradise of nature: canyons, waterfalls, mountains, rock formations and high grasslands dotted with araucaria pines. In winter it records some of the lowest temperatures in the country, with hard frosts and, occasionally, snow, which has made it a magnet for anyone who wants to feel the cold in Brazil.
Its natural attractions are remarkable: the Cascata do Avencal, one of the highest falls in the region; the Morro da Igreja, with the rock known as Pedra Furada and one of the highest inhabited points in southern Brazil; the Espraiado canyon; and a landscape of grassland, ranges and clear skies made for astrotourism and stargazing. The region forms part of the great canyon country of the south, alongside neighbouring Cambará do Sul.
This guide covers the essentials of Urubici with a practical eye: how to get there and get around, which waterfalls, viewpoints and rock formations to visit, when to chase the cold and the snow, where to sleep and eat in the Santa Catarina highlands, and how to combine it with São Joaquim and the canyons of Rio Grande do Sul. Urubici is cold, waterfalls, mountains and starry skies: the great highland nature experience of Santa Catarina.
Urubici sits in the Serra Catarinense, a region of cold high plains historically settled by upland cattle ranching, the tropeiros and the gaucho culture of the grasslands, with a strong presence of araucaria pines. The area also holds archaeological traces: there are sites with rock inscriptions attributed to ancient Indigenous populations. Cattle-ranching settlement and, later, European immigration populated these high grasslands. Over time the cold climate — among the harshest in Brazil — along with the waterfalls, the canyons and the rock formations turned Urubici into a leading destination for nature and winter tourism in the Serra Catarinense. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The southern state of beaches, islands and cool highlands: settled by Azoreans, Germans and Italians, stage of Garibaldi's short-lived Juliana Republic and of the bloody Guerra do Contestado. Land of Florianópolis and its dozens of beaches, of the Blumenau Oktoberfest and of the only corner of Brazil where it regularly snows.
Read the history of Santa Catarina →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
In the world's imagination Brazil is beaches, heat and carnival. Which makes it all the more surprising that the lowest temperature ever recorded anywhere in the country was measured here, in Urubici: on the Morro da Igreja, inside the municipal boundaries, the thermometer hit -17.8°C on 29 June 1996, the coldest documented reading in Brazil (a mark not officially ratified by Inmet, but registered by the Epagri/Ciram station). Frost turns the fields white almost every winter. This town in the Serra Catarinense is proof that tropical Brazil also has its frozen corner — and that is precisely what made its tourist fortune.
Urubici sits in the Serra Catarinense, the cold plateau of southern Santa Catarina, a region of high grasslands, araucaria forests and a harsh climate that sets it apart from the rest of the country. The town lies above 900 metres, but its surroundings climb far higher: the Morro da Igreja tops 1,800 metres. With very cold winters, hard frosts and occasional snow, the area has long formed a landscape of upland pampa, cattle ranching and dense araucaria pinheirais.
The region holds traces of settlement long predating European colonization: in and around Urubici, sites have been found with rock inscriptions (petroglyphs) attributed to ancient Indigenous populations, evidence of a human presence going back thousands of years on these high grasslands. These archaeological remains, carved into the rock, are one of the most singular and least known features of the local heritage.
Later the region was crossed by the tropeiros — the drovers who led trains of mules and cattle along the southern roads, linking Rio Grande do Sul with São Paulo — and settled by upland cattle ranching, the basis of the local economy and of the gaucho and highland culture of the area. The araucaria, that majestic umbrella-shaped pine, was fundamental to local life: its timber built houses and its seed, the pinhão, fed people and animals through the hard winters, as it still does on highland tables today.
The modern settlement of Urubici took hold with cattle ranching on the high grasslands and, later, with the arrival of settlers and European immigrants who joined the population of the Serra Catarinense. Cattle raising, timber extraction — especially of the valuable araucaria — and farming adapted to the cold climate sustained the economy for a long time.
The cultural identity of the region combines the strong gaucho tradition of the grasslands (chimarrão, churrasco, country life) with what immigration brought. Cold and altitude shaped particular customs, foods and ways of living, different from those of the Santa Catarina coast and of tropical Brazil.
Urubici became a municipality in the 20th century, splitting off from neighbouring highland towns. For decades it was a small mountain community given over to farming, until its exceptional natural attractions and its cold climate began drawing tourism and reshaping its economy.
Over the past few decades Urubici has turned into one of the most sought-after nature and winter destinations in Santa Catarina. Its reputation as one of the coldest places in Brazil — where some of the country's lowest temperatures are recorded, with severe frosts and, sometimes, snow — drew travellers keen to live something uncommon in a tropical country: seeing your own breath, finding the puddles frozen and, with luck, playing in the snow. Every polar cold front that pushes up over the south of the country fills the pousadas with people waiting for the 'branco'.
To that climatic draw were added its natural wonders: the Morro da Igreja (inside the Parque Nacional de São Joaquim), one of the highest points in the south, with the emblematic Pedra Furada; imposing waterfalls such as the Avencal, with its 100-metre drop and its glass viewing platforms; canyons such as the Espraiado and the Ronda; the vertiginous pass of the Serra do Corvo Branco, blasted out with dynamite in the 1970s; and a landscape of grassland, ranges and araucarias that looks like another country. The region has also established itself as one of Brazil's great astrotourism destinations, thanks to its clear, dark skies, ideal for stargazing through a telescope.
Today Urubici combines its highland, gaucho heritage with its role as the capital of cold and nature in Santa Catarina. Country pousadas with fireplaces, trout restaurants and highland cooking, cafés coloniais with pinhão, high-altitude wineries, adventure and astrotourism agencies all serve a tourist trade that grows year on year. Together with neighbouring São Joaquim — the town of apples and high-altitude wine — and with Cambará do Sul and the great canyons of the south, Urubici is part of the great highland route of southern Brazil, one of the most singular nature circuits in the country.
Much of Urubici's natural heritage is tied to the Parque Nacional de São Joaquim, created in 1961 to protect one of the most representative stretches of araucaria forest (Mata de Araucária) and high grassland in southern Brazil. The park takes in land from several municipalities of the Serra Catarinense, Urubici among them, and includes the celebrated Morro da Igreja with the Pedra Furada within its boundaries.
The araucaria forest, dominated by the imposing pinheiro-do-paraná (Araucaria angustifolia), was historically devastated by logging across southern Brazil, to the point of being reduced to a small fraction of its original extent. That is why protected areas such as the Parque Nacional de São Joaquim play a key role in conserving this threatened ecosystem and the wildlife that goes with it, in a landscape of altitude, mist and cold.
Regulating access to sites such as the Morro da Igreja — today through prior booking and limited places managed by ICMBio — responds precisely to the need to balance growing tourism with the protection of a fragile environment. So the recent history of Urubici is woven together with that of conservation: the same highland landscape that supported tropeiros and ranchers is now protected natural heritage and the main engine of its tourist economy.