Photos from Salvador

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Another day out, this time our guide was Fernando and he was excellent, he had a good grasp of english and a good knowledge of the area. He was also one of the first locals we had found who had been outside Brazil.

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Photos

Hotel View
View from our Balcony at night

View from Balcony
The palm was nicely lit

Historic City center
This is the central square of the old city, this was where they whipped the slaves when necessary as an example to the others

Old Buildings
These are now all protected and being renovated, some go back to the 17th century and have been painted in the exact colours that were used

Historic Old Center
Apparently they had used an artist to make some of these ornate gates, they were really very nice - hope it shows up in the picture

One of the government buildings
This was at one end of the one of the squares, the nice part is it is all being preserved

More Old Buildings
I cant remember which one but they were all lovely - still in the historic centre

Fort in the harbour
There are forts all along the coast in Salvador, all protect the harbour and any invaders would have been caught in across fire. We could see this in the harbour as we stood beside the elevator - there is an elevator which goes up and down between the upper and lower cities but it is not very reliable so we just looked and then drove down - our guide was excellent

Old person Home
Most old people are looked after by their families - if there is no one they can end up in here - does not look too bad from the outside.

Favelas
As we drove we could get glimpses of the favelas, not a safe place to visit.

Basilica de Bonfim
The outside of the church built in the 18th century by a family that promised that if they made it from Portugal they would build a church.

Prayer Wishes
They have these ribbons that you can ties to yourself or tie to the church rails. Each one must have 3 knots and for each knot you got a wish - Mum was in my first wish

Get Well
This is in the church, they are wax casts of peoples limbs, heads or bits that they want fixed. This church has a reputation for helping.

Fort Mon Serat
Another of the forts but this time built to keep the Dutch out, apparently the sneaked around behind to try and take Salvador but got the crap kicked out of them at this point

Holy Crap
Nothing to do with the old city but just a VW struggling under a heavy load, what you are not seeing is that the car was bottomed out on the suspension and the guy had his hand out the window holding it on!