Up North, Further North and then Turning West

It has been a long time since i wrote and we did travel a fair bit since then so here comes a long one. You can always look at the photos and e-mail me pretending you read the whole thing... It´s all good !!

So we got to Recife after a flight from Salvador which turned out to be the same price but obviously 20 times faster. Recife is a quite unremarkable city, but Olinda, literally meaning beautiful, makes up for that and makes a visit worthwhile. Olinda being the old part of Recife is what Pelourinhio is to Salvador. Cobbled sleepy streets lined with bright coloured houses where you can find a church in almost every corner of the town. For lunch we found this grocery store, got to know the owner and spent a couple of hours sipping ice cold beer and having some typical snacks, priceless.

Next stop was Praia de Pipa. The journey there consisted of the longest taxi ride I will probably ever make in my life. 5 hours of it spiced up by a half an hour road block, where all the luggage was inspected up to our dirty underwear, ending in glamour by myself being strip searched. Later the taxi driver, el Baiano a very nice guy in his fourties, explained that since this German girl, who I had met in Recife and whom we shall call Joyce, was seated in front of the cab and me at the back, freshly shaved head looking dodgy ( I am always the one being offered maria or farina regularly...hehehe what to do!! ) as usual made it easier for us to highjack the cab to transport drugs... whatever...

But all our worries were over as soon as we got close to Pipa seeing the dunes welcoming us and beaches lining the cliffs. Pipa is a hippie beach town with cliffs bordering beaches stroked by dolphin filled waters.

Praia de Pipa itself is not a lovely beach itself, well depends how u look at it..hehehe, but Praia do Amor, Praia de Golfinhos and my favourite Praia do Madeiro are amazing. We tried surfing in Praia do Amor but it was too much hard work for us, our excuse being big uneven waves and a couple of caipirinhas too many the previous night. In Praia de Golfinhos we managed to swim with dolphins not more than an arm´s reach away. Praia do Madeiro you can do both things while chilling on a sunbed and sip a cold beer.

We had the best Acai at our hostel and amazing tapiocas( flower based pancake shaped brasilian food ) at Tapiocaria de Ana. Every night there is something going on in Pipa and Ana made sure to inform us every single day for the 10 nights we spent there.
So Pipa was also a lot of partying not missing the drama, especially being such a small place.

Natal less than two hours north of Pipa was just a day stop for us to get the overnight bus to Canoa Quebrada. Luckily both Julian and myself both had a good night sleep but unfortunatly woke up 2 hours too late only to find ourselves in a rainy city other than the tranquil fishing village we had planned.

Deciding not to backtrack we stayed in Fortaleza entertaining us were a couple of movie channels at our pousada. Here we also met Ligia and Simone two charming Brasilian girls who took care of us in Fortaleza.

I told you it´s a long one....

Jericoacoara is a tiny remote fishing village, heavily infuenced by tourism, yet still we could feel the laid back vibe. Before sunset everyone heads down to the main beach shouldered by a massive dune to play football or volleyball, practice Capoeira or simply to watch sunset from the dune or sipping Caipirinhas on a hammock.

First night I ended up partying till early in the morning, Hally Berry being the cause of the drama this time...
The following couple of days we spent with Ligia and Simone, We discovered a small restaurant serving the best food I ate in Brasilso far. We soon became friends with the chef, Walter an Italian guy in his fourties, and his Brasilian influenced family. Last night in Jeri we headed once again to Walter´s ( which i strongly recommend...the name of the restaurant is Jeri something or qeeju e vino and is one steet parallel to the main road ). He promised me that he will cook lobster for him and myself given Juilan doesn´t eat anything which comes out of the ocean. And he was a man of his word. An amazing dinner, perfect ending to out stay in this fishing village, but not quite.

After a couple of bottles of wine Walter got us champagne and then grappa with out coffees, a whole bottle of it. To make matters worse we also accepted his offer of caipirinhas and before we knew it it was half five in the morning and there was no way we were going to make the 8 am 4x4 truck we had booked. We did make it the next day after a whole day recovering but that story is for another time to tell...

Salvador De Bahia

Election time in Malta, Spinola to Sliema, Floriana and Birkirkara turns into one big street party and everything stops functioning for a couple of days of crazy celebrations and drinking. Now imagine all this on a much larger scale, all the streets in Salvador adapt to a week of crazy partying by catering for the 3 main circuits, viewing posts camarotes, or to host street vendors where one can buy everything from caipirinhias, beer (Skol gelada), kebabs, carnaval costumes and the list goes on. Shops shield windows as if expecting a hurricane. Then the action begins. 2 massive trucks surrounded by people holding a rope to provide "safety" for people wearing the abadas. The first truck leads the way with pumping music coming from the second truck where you have the live performnce either in typical brasilian music or live djs. This is called a bloco. Carnaval in Salvador de Bahia has 3 circuits holding more than 30 blocos on the main 5 days of partying "ending" Ash Wednesday. All this is great. The only detail I am missing is the Julian and I, after a 2 hrs flight from Rio and a good 3 hrs to get to the city from the airport got to Salvador in the middle of the party, great u might say, only that we had nowhere to sleep and were carrying at least 15kg of luggage each. After a good couple of hours looking for a place to stay the situation wasn´t getting any better until we were saved by a mexican guy who got us a hostel, Pousada Cancun, excellent location and decent price for carnaval.

Everything got better, much better actually in the 2 days we spent over there, one caipirihia too many, and lots of partying ending all this with a bloco from Fat Boy Slim which was fantastic, and I, after getting lost from Julian being we were popcorn on the streets, even got to enter and stay in the ropes for most of the 5 hrs.

Deciding to chill out after Carnaval, we headed to Morro de Sao Paolo for some tranquility, but after 2 bus rides, a ferry ride and a very rainy and dodgy boat ride we get to Morro only to find that half the people in Salvador had the same bright idea. We found out a day too late that the 5 days after Carnaval are called the resaca and Morro holding 4000 locals and some 5500 beds left us only the option of 2 hamocs on the whole island.

Great location on the main praça, excellent for people watching and 2 minutes walking distance from the first beach. Morro is a tropical paradise where wheelbarrows serve as taxis, donkeys can be found on the beach and caipirinhias taste better here. Beach number4 , a palm studded endeless beach with white sand was my favourite.

Back in Salvador we spent a couple of days in Pelourinhio, the old part of the city full of churches and museums and cobbled streets on which art, capoeira and of course beats are the never missing. Last night in Pelourinhio, being a Tuesday was a party once again with live performances in various plaças. One caipirinhia too many and it turned out to be a perfect farewell for Carnaval !!