Ponta Negra and Natal

We had booked a pousada in Ponta Negra, which was a 50-minute flight from Fernando on the recommendation of a guy who had lived close by and all was well. Again, a pretty basic place but adequate and clean and about a block off the beach. We really had no particular plan for the 4 days we planned to be there but felt we would find things to do.

Lots of new condo and apartment construction going on

Ponta Negra beach

Mobile clothing store on the beach. He even takes Visa!

My translation was "Do not piss on the grass"

We booked a city tour and a day on a dune buggy, both of which proved to be fun. The city tour took us out to a small town close by that has the largest cashew tree in the world.

All the green is one tree!

It is huge and basically covers a city block. We also visited the fort in Natal, which, again had been variously occupied, by the Dutch, French and eventually the Brazilians. We also saw a place where US Army forces had been stationed in WW2. That would certainly have been a way better gig than fighting in France or Italy or in the Far East. Like the Danish fort in St Croix the conditions for the officers were way better than for the foot soldiers who had to endure poorer water and living conditions while the officers, and particularly the Commandant lived it up. The stuff mutinies are made of.

New bridge that replaced a ferry

The afternoon was topped off with a flat tire on the way home but they sent another van and all was ok.

The next day we took a trip up to Geripabu about 25km up the coast to the sand dunes in a dune buggy. This was a fun day and a little touristy but we got to see and ride on the dunes and take a random looking ferry across a small river. 

View from the dunes

Towards the ocean

The dune buggies (there were many) were loaded one or two on a raft and hand paddled across the river. 

We also decided to do the skiboom and skyboom. Skiboom is basically where they launch you down a steep slope of the sand dune on a board and you land in a small pond and promptly fill your shorts with sand!

Skyboom is similar except that you zip line down in a sort of ski lift chair and land in the water. The skyboom operator then winches you back up on a crude little rail system using a VW engine and transmission and a single cable. There did not appear to be any sort of backup system if the cable came loose or similar!

Skyboom winch. It must have been "bring your kid to work day"

We rested up and had a good dinner quite late because we had heard from the guy on Fernando that Thursday nights were “forro” nights at a local dance club

A forro in the true sense is an informal dance primarily for poor rural people, but in recent years this has been gentrified into forro universidad. We had been told that the tickets were Rs10 but proved to be 30. Being a little cheeky and having learned that “senior discounts” were common we asked for, and got a 50% discount. The forro was in a basement that was hot, crowded and loud, but they served beer and water and lots of people were dancing. Candida said that she had never been allowed to go to a forro when she was young, so this was her first experience. She said that the music was not very good or authentic but we had a lot of fun and some inquisitive looks from the generally much younger crowd.

Street cleaners. Not sure I care for the orange socks!

Construction truck. Looks like it is designed to carry lots of people and maybe some cement and gravel as an afterthought

Friday was a quiet day and we walked down to the beach, as we had several times over the previous couple of days. We managed to avoid a rainstorm in a small (somewhat) covered café that was associated with a pousada and was serving breakfast. We had eaten but wanted a coffee. The waiter was delightful and very helpful and we sampled some of their breakfast food but he only charged us for the coffee, and then gave us a discount because they did not have change (this occurred more than once on our trips). He worked there in the mornings in exchange for a free breakfast and then sold CDs on the beach for a while and then a third job somewhere. He said he was a pharmacist, and he may be correct!