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!

Fernando de Noronha

Fernando is an island about 200 miles off the northeast coast of Brazil near Recife and Natal.

It has been intentionally preserved in it’s current state and there are limitations on the numbers of visitors and an environmental tax per day that escalates based on the number of days you stay (and presumably the environmental impact you have) We are staying 4 days and the tax is about $95 each.

There are no large hotels only small pousadas, which are basically guesthouses, and we discovered there are huge variations in what is available and what you pay. Suffice it to say that most everything is expensive and there are few bargains. Also let me say that in general it is worth it.

We flew up from Rio on a Brazilian built Embraer 175, which is a 70+-seat twin-engine airplane built in Brazil. We stopped in a couple of places and arrived in Fernando in the afternoon. There are three flights a day and there is also a ferry service. 

Rio and Sao Paulo are already 3 hours ahead of the eastern US, and that goes to one hour when we change later in the year (confused yet?)

Fernanho airport

Fernando boasts a primary road that is 7km long (about 4.5 miles) and then secondary roads that are generally dirt roads.

Our pousada was booked from Rio with little information on the location and price prior to calling. It is about $150 a night and certainly at the low end of the price range but very suitable and not in the $1500 range of some places! 

Our pousada

King size bed, air conditioning and a small bathroom will be our home for the next few days.

We did a little walking later in the afternoon and found a small rocky beach where we tested the water. 

Not quite sure why I took this!

Overall it is much cooler than Rio (which hit 42C the day before we left!) at around 30 to 32C. We ate at a good local restaurant (as in one you can walk to) and had a good dinner and a bottle of very mediocre Argentinean wine for about $80 for both.  

We had intended to rent a dune buggy the next day but discovered that a cruise ship was due in that morning for a 24+-hour stay and they were all booked. 

Dune buggies

Not to worry we started out on the local bus for about $2.50 anywhere on the island. There are bus stops but if you just signal the driver he will stop. When we got on the driver asked Candida “where do you want to go?” She said that we did not know and he promptly replied “then you have the right bus!”. We rode down to the southeast beach in about 20 minutes and got off. We walked on the beach and watched some people on an organized snorkeling trip and bathed a little although there was lots of seaweed around.

We looked at the map and decided to walk up a smaller road that eventually met back up with the main road. It is little more than a track but strangely enough has streetlights! We walked about 1.5 miles and reconnected with the road by the airport.

Beer can fence!!

Most things on Fernando are expensive and what we had not expected is that it is very difficult to access ATM machines that work with foreign cards. This was complicated by many places not taking cards or saying that their machines were broken. It looks like Internet access is sporadic at best and the phones are not hugely reliable. We arrived on Friday and it is now Sunday afternoon and I have yet to have access to email. Lots of places are closed on Sunday until 5pm so we will see.

We went again on the bus to the port and saw all the cruise ship folks coming ashore and found a little bar that served a reasonably priced lunch and a couple of cold cervejas or geladinios as they are called. Very welcome.

Kitty relaxing after lunch

In our wanderings close to the pousada we also found a small restaurant that was well hidden but served simple home cooked food and reasonably priced cervejas so we decided to try it for the evening. It was about half of what anywhere else charged and was very tasty. We were delayed in going by a huge rainstorm that lasted more than an hour and gave everything a thorough soaking. It did manage to cool things down a little.

Our room is very comfortable and we have a hammock outside. The pousada provides a typical Brazilian breakfast of fresh fruit, bread, ham, cheese, and of course excellent coffee. It can be taken black or especially in the morning with hot milk. It is very strong by American standards but very good. There are significant variations in pousadas and ours was one of the more basic at around $150 per night but there are several that can cost up to $1500 per night, particularly one owned by one of the Brazilian television personalities. Seems like a brand name extracts a significant premium everywhere!

We are off for a boat tour this afternoon, and have a dune buggy booked for tomorrow.

There is a surfing competition that starts tomorrow that attracts international competitors so we may go check that out. There is also a place called “Air France” which I understand was where AF used to land their flying boats way back. It was probably the first logical landing place after launching from west Africa when planes only had 6-8 hours endurance. I had originally thought it might be connected to the AF A330 that crashed a couple of years ago probably not far from here. 

View from Air France

We took a boat tour on Sunday down the “inner sea” i.e.The western side of the archipelago closer to the mainland. It was rainy and windy for the first part but improved later. The water is very clear and on a sunny day you can see down at least 10 meters. There were some beautiful fish and they seemed unconcerned about our presence.

I would be interested to know what the environmental tax money is spent on and I am critical that it clearly is not spent on roads and sidewalks that would benefit locals as well as visitors. The basic infrastructure is good but phones, roads, sidewalks and Internet access are all well below par and expectations.

We are meant to have been renting the dune buggy today but it has not showed up so far, but we have had showers on and off so we are not too concerned. We may not bother and just walk down to another of the beaches.  We actually ended up walking to the Southeast beach, which was probably 5km from the pousada. Rain showers on and off and some muddy roads but we had fun anyway. It has also given me some much needed time to try and get caught up with the blog, which has been difficult to do.

On our last morning we decided to walk to an old fort we had seen on the coast, and then up to Air France. We had actually walked past the entrance to the fort on the day we arrived but there was a chain across the trail and we assumed it was closed… 

View from the fort

Looking from the fort to the settlement with the church and admin office

View up the coast to the port and Air France

Candida hold up the flags

Wrong, it was and is intended to keep people from driving up to the fort. Oh well. It had a great view and is about 45m up on a headland and you can see back to the old church and the old island administration building used by whoever was in charge at the time. It seemed to have changed between Dutch, French and eventually Brazilian.

Air France was about a 2 mile walk from there on past the port. What a disappointment! It claimed to be a center for local artists and artisans but was basically a run down poorly maintained building in a beautiful setting by the ocean and a causeway to some small islands. Some of the islands look like Shetland but with sunshine and warmth!

A quick bus ride back to the pousada and we were packing for the next part of the trip.

Fernando was fun but expensive and I guess that we agreed that it did not live up to it’s billing or our expectations. We would not have known if we had not come!

Paraty

Upon reflection we would have saved some time (it is not as if we were on a tight schedule!) if we had taken the bus from Sao Paulo to Paraty and then to Rio or Niteroi, but we didn’t so we sort of backtracked to Paraty.

The original bus trip from Sao Paulo to Niteroi passed through some farmland and eventually down a long escarpment where the northbound lanes went on one side and the southbound lanes went on the other side with the river in between. At some points the roads were a couple of km apart. It was about 5 hours on the bus but on good and fast toll roads for the most part.

The road to Paraty followed the coast and was much more windy and overall speeds were much less so the trip took about 4.5 hours but with wonderful views particularly on the ocean side to the left. The right side was mountains that probably rose to 2000 ft within 3-4 miles of the coast.

View from our room towards the mountains

We just missed the 2pm bus (because it was full) so we had to wait for the 4pm bus that finally arrived around 8.30pm. Suelli had packed some fruit and cake and along with some cereal bars and water we had enough food for the trip. People who take their food on trips (padkoos in Africa) are called Farofeiros and are generally the poorer people who have no choice. We decided we were Farofeiros even if we could actually afford to buy on the way. We had better food at much lower cost! 

Mom, Dad and a fairly new baby on the family transport!

Main street in the old town. Note the cobble stones

Street scene complete with donkey cart

 We did not have a reservation for a place to stay but found the local tourist office with a very helpful lady who was on her first day at work and anxious to please.

We decided to stay in a simple hostel that is located on the main street of the old town with big windows that opened up so we could look down on the street scene below. Very basic but adequate and cheap! 

We had originally thought we would stay just one night, but decided to take a boat trip the next day and then leave early the following (Friday) morning.

It was a great decision! We found the boat the next morning among many others on the dock and had a great day on the water, and in the water along with maybe 25 others. Beer wine other drinks were available on board and we had a lady singer to keep us entertained along with chatting to the other guests. 

Paraty harbor

Another day cruiser

There was a couple from London, a German guy with his Brazilian boyfriend and a couple of Australian girls who were backpacking around Brazil and Argentina, as well as several Brazilian couples. Lunch was available for order, and was reasonably priced for the circumstances.

The boat traveled about 5 miles and pulled in to a little bay where we could swim. We were allowed (and encouraged) to jump off the upper deck (Candida was among the first to do this, and put many of the youngsters to shame!) into crystal clear blue water. Noodles were supplied to aid the relaxation. 

We stopped in several other locations and enjoyed the scenery and saw several homes and villages that could only be accessed by water. There was also a restaurant that was only water accessible. Kinda cool.

We finished up the day wandering around the old town. It has streets paved with large cobblestones that were originally from Portugal. Apparently they were bought over in ships as ballast, and the ships returned with Brazilian gold mined in the hills inland from Paraty in Minas Gerais. This was back in the 16^th century. It makes walking a challenge, but provides a good excuse if you are slightly inebriated as it is tough to walk straight when sober! We had seen a small restaurant with a good singer the previous evening and decided to have dinner there. They had a couple of tables out in the street that was not crowded and we enjoyed a baked fish dish.

Most restaurants seem to serve (and price) dinner for two. This can be limiting if you want to experiment and share, as we like to do.

Our bus left early the next morning, around 6am and arrived in Rio around 10.45. We decided that we would try to navigate back to Silveira’s all the way by bus. We found the bus that crosses to Niteroi across the 13km bridge and I had noted the bus company and route number as we drove into town along with some major landmarks. I was confident that we could get at least to within a couple of kilometers of the house. We passed the three major landmarks I had noted and then I saw the street we needed but too late to stop the bus. We ended up going one stop too far but backtracked and after a couple of turns found the house. They were SO surprised when we showed up at the gate it was priceless.

Paraty was one of the highlights of the trip so far and I am really glad we went. Later in the trip someone told us about how nice Isla Grande is, and it is close and on the list for next time.

Brazilian homes

We have been lucky to spend at least some nights with family and friends and have been able to see family homes.

I talked a little about the chacara in St Jose de Rio Preto and some of the similarity with homes and gardens in Africa.

City homes are quite different and the common theme is that the exterior or street view has little indication of the interiors.

One evening we visited Candida’s niece and family and the outside entrance looked like a garage or entrance to an industrial building, but once inside we went down some steps and in to a very nice (not large) home. Candida’s sisters home is the same with an electric gate at the street that gives access to three homes and parking for all cars. 

Entrance to Margaret's home in Sao Paulo

Again an ordinary entrance to homes with tiled or marble flooring and large kitchens and multiple bathrooms. All very nice.

Silvera’s home in Niteroi deserves special mention. I believe the family has owned the property for a long time and Silvera has been working on the new home for several years. It is on a hillside and the new home had to be built in front of the home they were living in and then some further excavation had to take place for the completion. The home is beautiful and when we arrived I looked out of the bedroom window and said to myself “wow, look at the big yard and very fancy grill his neighbor has!” It turned out that it was actually HIS yard with a huge patio and built in grill and shelter. 

Silvera at work at the grill

Huge patio and seating area close to the grill

Silvera's grill and pizza oven. I am jealous!

All his own design and a fantastic place to enjoy the cool evenings after a brutally hot day. The attention to detail is amazing.

Enjoying a few cold ones (geladinias)

Rooftop view from above Silvera's patio

The front of the house

Some photos to enjoy

Rio. A dramatic city to say the least.!

We are actually staying in Niteroi, which is across the bay from Rio de Janeiro with friends of Candida’s from way back. Silvera is an airline mechanic, who used to work for the now defunct Trans Brasil airline, and he and several others were assigned duty in Miami for a month at a time to do the overnight checks on the 3 or so flights that came in and out. Candida had these guys as paying house guests. This worked well for both parties. The mechanics had a nice place to stay that was not a hotel (nor did it challenge their per-diem like a hotel) and they got good Brazilian food while Candida made a little extra money.

Several long-term friendships developed from this including that with Silvera and his family. He now works for Trip an internal airline in Brazil that operates ATR 42 and 72s and Embraer 175s of which they now have 16. They have a fantastic house in Niteroi and he has gradually replaced the old house with the new and his attention to detail shows in everything.

It is about 15km from the house to the Niteroi shore and Silvera took us down to the new fast ferry to cross the bay. I had not appreciated the distance between the “old” ferry terminal that is right downtown and the new one which must be at least 5 km closer but more than that in time saved.

The ferry was about $8 and landed at the main ferry terminal in Rio. I was a little disappointed as it is totally enclosed and air conditioned, but the side windows are Plexiglas and significantly degrade the view as you cross. 

We headed to one of the two significant mountains called locally “Christo” as it is the one with the giant statue on it. 

Looking down on Sugarloaf and Rio

Even for a Monday with kids in school there were LOTS of people in a small space, but the views are spectacular. Ii is 710m above sea level and it is possible to see all of Rio and over to Niteroi. We spent about an hour and a half there and then headed on the city bus to Sugarloaf Mountain, which is actually two mountains with an aerial ropeway connecting them with mother earth.

 



  I think the views from Sugarloaf, (at 396m) while not as high as Christo are more dramatic and certainly less crowded. 

Sugarloaf from sea level

Looking up at Christo from Sugarloaf

Santo Dumont airport in downtown Rio. Short runways with the Niterio bridge in the background

There is a great view of Santo Dumont airport which is essentially downtown and is used for domestic traffic. It looks like it was built on dredged fill and the runways are only about a meter or so above the water. The runways also look short,(and they are for jets)  at 4341 feet 
An approach landing towards the bridge would give a dramatic look at the city and would have to be a visual approach only given the terrain and small area.

Old ferry across the bay

GOL (airline) taxiing at Santo Dumont. Elevation 11 ft (~3m)

It was very hot at about 38C (100+F) and we headed back around 5pm. We decided to take the “old” ferry for $1.50 each but then discovered that we had to navigate by bus back close to the other ferry where Silvera met us and drove us home.
We saw some evidence of the landslides that have plagued Rio.They have impacted the favelas (unplanned slum areas) particularly but this one had slid on to a major road in Niteroi.

An expensive repair according to the sign. Not sure where all the money is going!

Sunset over Rio