Recife

After João Pessoa the trip entered a different phase. LeeAnn and I parted ways – she shot straight down to Salvador to meet up with her parents who were visiting Brasil for the holidays, while I continued down to Recife, the next major city along the coast. So my solo travels began and would last for approximately the next two weeks until arriving back in São Paulo. Recife is a major metropolis in the northeast region of Brasil. It is a historically significant city in that it was temporarily ruled by the Dutch leading to ongoing battles for control between Portugal and the Netherlands. A Brazilian friend from the northeast once joked with me that after the Dutch were booted out of Brazil they went north and invested in a tiny island called Manhattan. So if the Dutch never left, New York would be in Brasil. Depending on who you talk to, Recife or Salvador is considered the largest city in the northeast. And more infamously, Recife is known for shark sightings along its shores. However, traveling around the northeast and swimming in warm, tropical waters, I found it hard to believe that most other beaches weren’t as notorious for shark attacks as Recife. Recife means “reef” in Portuguese and is named so because of the many coral reefs that line the city’s shores. Depending on the time of day and water level, you can see the reefs which are only about 20 meters from the beach and even go out to swim and sit on top of them.

Arriving in Recife I was first surprised to see that the city had a substantial and extensive metro system. São Paulo obviously has one, as does Rio though it lacks the reach to many neighborhoods. Belo Horizonte, Brasil’s third largest city, has a meager 2 line metro system at best. So being in a substantially poorer region of the country, I was surprised to see such elaborate transportation infrastructure.

In my hostel I met a cool Norweigen guy named Bjorn and we swapped travel stories. Much to my delight he went on and on about his experience on The Camino de Santiago: the pilgrimage trail from southern France to northwestern Spain. It has long been on my list of things to do with my buddy Eric but given how much he raved about it and how worthwhile an experience it is, it might have just gotten officially promoted as the destination of my very next trip.

Recife is also called the “Venice of Brasil” because of its many channels and rivers cutting through the city. While Recife lacks the gondolas it is a reasonable comparison since the its rivers are probably just as dirty as Venice’s. The downtown part of the city where I staid was called Boa Viagem and was your typical Brazilian city with high rise buildings overlooking the beach, offices, and booming commerce. A safe neighborhood but lacking the amenities for a tourist. Instead, the main draw is the old city with its baroque cathedrals and plazas spread out across three islands. I spent an entire Saturday afternoon walking around the old city snapping photos and sweating up a storm in the mid-day heat. The first island was essentially one huge outdoor flea market. It had about a dozen open air markets each stacked with thousands of people selling everything from fake Christmas trees to literally boatloads of shrimp that they scoop up for you by the cupful, to pirated electronics, and just about everything in between. A new record was set for the cheapest caipirinhas in Brasil. The going price for a caipirinha in your standard restaurant or bar was R$2!!! Folks, that is less than $1. The second island was a lot quieter and had a very historic appeal with its baroque churches and housing an old Portuguese fort. I didn’t think much of Recife’s beaches. In fact, its main beach, Boa Viagem, in the neighborhood where I staid was sort of a turn off. Recife being a big city, the beach had a Rio-type feel to it with the dozens of volleyball courts, umbrella vendors throwing themselves at you to sit in their chairs and buy their shade, and barracas (huts/tiki bars) lining the boardwalk. But the water itself was way too infested with seaweed that you couldn’t enjoy a good swim.

Recife is a good city in that it serves as a springboard for two other popular destinations: Olinda and Porto de Galinhas.

Olinda is the next town over from Recife and is just a 30 minute city bus ride away. Its historic center is very very very charmingly preserved and has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Atop the hill overlooking the city you get a stunning view of neighboring Recife. Stick around that same plaza until sunset on a Sunday night as I did and the town comes to life with a huge street fair. It was so typically Brazilian it could have been cheesy, but the fact was I saw no other tourists amongst the crowd of hundreds. In the same town plaza I was rotating between a kick-ass samba drum circle practicing for Carnaval in February and some of the best capoeira dancers I’ve ever seen. These guys were the real deal. If you got thirsty you drank a R$2 caipirinha and if you were hungry you ate the traditional northeaster snack acarajé: a deep fried cornball stuffed with shrimp, onions, and a bean dip. It was a great festival that brought the town to life.

Two full days and three nights in Recife and I bounced down an hour south to a hopping little beach town similar to Ponta Negra called Porto de Galinhas. Translated to English to mean “chickens port” it was named so because after slavery was abolished in Brasil (one of the last countries in the Americas to abolish it by the way) traders continued to smuggle slaves in through this port by hiding them under huge chicken cages. This entry is getting long and any further description of Porto de Galinhas will just get repetitive. But it was one of my favorite beaches in the northeast. It had the perfect stretch of coastline ranging from good waves to crystal clear shallow waters ideal for lazy swimming. Its big draw are its piscinas naturais (natural pools) that are formed during low tide by the water that gets caught in the huge coral reef formations just off the shore. In the pictures below of Porto de Galinhas, most of the boats you see are headed towards the natural pools.

Next stop: Salvador

Porto de Galinhas

Olinda drum circle

Capoeira

View from Olinda

Recife

Loads of shrimp