Unexpectedly enjoyable forced travels

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It wasn’t until my third work trip to Brazil that I got around to spending some time travelling beyond the area where we were working. The quantity of photos I’ve added to this blog, way more than usual, and these are only the photos from my third visit, confirm that I really should have spent more time travelling around. Brazil was unexpectedly great.

I don’t know why I say unexpectedly because I had visited Brazil in pre-blogging days and really enjoyed it. During the 1-year round-the-world trip in 2002-2003, we arrived in Rio de Janeiro for carnival intending to spend a few days celebrating then a few weeks travelling around the south of the country. In the end, carnival was so much fun that we spent two weeks there followed by just another few days for Paraty and Iguazu Falls before heading into Paraguay. But the country is so huge that my three work visits in the northeast were like being in a different country. Indeed, Fortaleza is 3700 km from Foz do Iguaçu. In Europe this would represent a drive from where I live in the Netherlands to Kazakhstan.



When I applied for the job in the Netherlands, the fact that the research was in Brazil was a point that really attracted me. Not only because I really like South America, but also because I didn’t want to become known as someone who only works in Ethiopia and the Himalayas. That job application was in February 2020 when covid hadn’t really got going. By the time I moved to the Netherlands in November that year, all fieldwork was banned. Consequently, the research project I was involved with (see https://3ddd-project.org/) became quite “academic” (because the PhD students still had to publish papers even though they couldn’t go out and do research – a fundamental fault of the Dutch academic system and a key factor driving me to leave; papers papers papers, it’s all about writing papers). Therefore, even when fieldwork was permissible, I still didn’t spend as much time in Brazil as I’d hoped. Still, over three years I visited three times for a total duration of about 2.5 months.

The first trip in November 2021 was for two weeks, predominantly in Fortaleza and the semi-arid interior of Ceará state, with a weekend trip down the coast to Canoa Quebrada, one of Ceará’s lovely beach towns that attracts tourists from all over Brazil (and only kite-surfers from the rest of the world).

The second trip in March 2022 was for a month but I never left Fortaleza, working from a government hydrometeorological office every day. It is quite a gritty port city, famously high in crime, though I never had any issues where I stayed near the beach. The beach promenade was my favourite place and I would run along there most evenings, despite the 30C temperatures and super high humidity, because it felt really Brazilian. There were lots of people running, roller-blading, playing foot-volleyball and beach tennis, there were outdoor dance classes and HIIT sessions, lots of street food and cocktails, the craft market and fish market, it was bustling and fun in an evening, and safe given the powerful floodlights and high police presence. I had intended to take some weekend trips down the coast but it was the rainy season meaning torrential downpours interspersed with hot sun. Thus at weekends I stayed on the city beaches darting undercover when the sky went black.

The third trip, which is the subject of this blogpost, in October-November 2023 was in order to close the research project. We held workshops and meetings to pass on the findings of the research with various government departments in Fortaleza and in the interior of Ceará. As my contract would end at the end of 2023, this was also my opportunity to use up remaining annual leave by staying on in Brazil after the work was finished. However, because the flights are now so expensive as soon as you want to go beyond Europe, I would be travelling alone (my €1500 flight was covered by the university but Magdalena would have had to have bought her own).



The interior of Ceará, part of the expansive sertão semi-arid region, has a charm of its own. It’s appearance is quite Wild West with sparse dry grasslands, odd-shaped granite monoliths, farmers scratching a living from the barren earth, rustic cobble-streeted towns, and huge skies filled with circling vultures. I like it. Fieldwork involved interviews and workshops with farmers, water managers and local governments as well as visits to reservoirs (usually dry), desalination plants (usually broken), deep boreholes (brackish water), and small rural communities (excellent tamarind and passion fruit).



When the work was done, I flew to one of those places that had been very high on my list ever since I first heard of it though I wasn’t sure I’d ever get there. The island of Fernando de Noronha really did live up to my expectations, and they were already high. The island lies about 350 km off the coast of Brazil way out in the Atlantic Ocean. It is formerly volcanic, the old volcanic necks poking up through the forest. It’s isolation led to a unique ecosystem (it is consequently a UNESCO world heritage site), in addition to its role as a prison for much of its history.

Fernando de Noronha restricts access by: 1) only having a few flights a day (from Recife, Natal and Fortaleza) on quite small planes due to the size of the runway, 2) there is the daily tourist tax paid on arrival (that increases with time to discourage you from staying too long), 3) there is the national park tax that must be paid as the majority of the island and beaches are in the national park, 4) then there are the extremely high costs of everything once you get there. It doesn’t matter – it’s worth it! But I did see a “type” of Brazilian that I hadn’t met elsewhere, essentially everyone was loaded. I had heard that it was an island reserved for honeymoons, and while that wasn’t completely true, almost everyone else was there as a couple. However, it was nice to see that real Brazil also exists here when you venture away from the tourist areas (like the streets around my little guesthouse) because the islanders themselves are far from rich.

Most people get around by renting buggies; only the main road is tarmacked whereas all others, especially those to the beaches, are quite rough dirt roads. Being on my own, and detesting the noise, I didn’t rent one. Tours in converted pick ups are also very popular, that will hit the 8 or 10 best beaches and viewpoints in a day. However, Instagram was not the focus of my trip thus these tours held little appeal. I got around by either taking the bus that goes up and down the main road or just walking. This occasionally involved some long hot boring stretches along the pavement or dirt roads but I was still able to get everywhere.

I spent four days and four nights on the island. It’s hard to give highlights because every inch of the island is a highlight, but these are the most memorable (when I write this 3 months later):

Praia do Sancho is one of the most beautiful beaches I’ve ever seen. I approached it from the walk to Mirante dos Golfinhos, which I had all to myself as it was the middle of the day and very hot. There was lots of wildlife to see from this walk, endemic birds and skinks as well as the very pretty but invasive tegu (like an iguana) and rock cavy (like a guinea pig). But it’s the clifftop views that are stupendous, firstly out over Baia dos Golfinhos (I didn’t spot the resident spinner dolphins) and then down to Praia Sancho. The long flights of ladders – the direction alternates every hour – mean the beach is very quiet. The few people were seeking shade under the occasional trees, the trees being full of red-footed boobie nests with fluffy white chicks as big as their parents. I had a quick snorkel and immediately found myself swimming alongside a turtle.

I had a morning of diving, which was extremely expensive (about 200 euros for two dives), but very well run and excellent. Within a few minutes we saw a tiger shark (apparently, I just knew it was something big at the limit of the visibility about 25 metres away); it was only the third time the divemaster had seen one in three years of working there. We also saw grey reef sharks, rays, barracuda, and some huge grazing turtles. I haven’t dived that much, if at all, in the proper Atlantic Ocean so a lot of the coral and fish species were new to me, which made the dives really interesting. On the topic of sharks, there are signs on the beaches warning about sharks after a little girl lost a leg a few years ago. Her parents sued the island, and won! Hence, the warning signs to negate any future litigation. The dive masters are not convinced it was a shark that did it. Though when walking along the beach it was pretty common to see fins of reef sharks in the shallows and in the breaking waves. It didn’t stop me going in – I love them.

For most of the hikes through the national park, which is most of the island, you need a permit and you need a guide. Bizarrely, obtaining a guide and obtaining a permit are two unrelated systems and you can’t get one without the other. You need to get hold of the phone numbers of the registered guides, check their availability, then you can book a permit for a particular day and time, of which there are limited numbers per slot. It is another way of limiting the human impact on the island. The online system is quite confusing but the tourist office is very helpful (if you speak Portuguese). I signed up for the longest hike on the island (for that exact reason), which was still only 11 km. It is actually one of the easiest to get a permit for, being the least popular, because it’s the longest hike on the island! I managed to find an English-speaking guide, who turned out to be German but was married to an islander and had lived on Fernando do Noronha for 20 years. The only other hiker was a Swiss digital-nomad, who I can’t fault at all for choice of office, but I’m not sure how she got any work done in such a paradise. The hike heads out to the western extreme of the island to a lighthouse, again with incredible views from the high cliffs from which, as well as the crystal clear water far below, you can see most of the island. The path then descends to a cave and some stunning rock pools – the reason most Brazilians visit Fernando do Noronha! Even I got in and requested a photo. We hopped across the black basalt boulders which the incoming tide smashed into before reaching some more shallow rock pools, this time with the odd baby shark using them as nurseries. There was a slight delay as we approached the stunning Praia do Leão as we waited for an amorous couple to realise they weren’t alone on the beach and to either finish or stop. This beach was the official end of the hike but we kept going past the point with it’s remains of old forts to the viewpoint of the again stunning Praia do Sueste. This island studded bay and sweep of sand was deserted, like all the others, and one of the most beautiful spots yet.

Perhaps my favourite walk/hike began from my guesthouse down past some of the historic sites of Vila dos Remédios to Praia do Cachorro. I had to linger here for a while to let the tide go out in order to make my way from beach to beach westwards along the north coast. I had my trainers hanging off my bag and these were occasionally needed to pass the rocky bits in between the stunning bays, all with a view of Morro do Pico, the high volcanic plug that symbolises the island. To escape the sun, I could have rented a sunbed and umbrella, but preferred to find an occasional shady spot under a palm tree or behind a rock, typically with no one else within a few hundred metres of me. Only at the far end of Praia da Cacimba do Padre did I come across many people, most of whom were queuing for the best selfie spots at Mirante dos Dois Irmãos, the two conical rocky islands just off the beach. Clambering round to Baía dos Porcos requires donning a hard hat for a 20-metre dash under a crumbling cliff. The bright red cheap plastic hats contrasting well with the white and gold Gucci beachwear of the Brazilian tourists. And then as the sun set, I did the whole hike in reverse, paddling with the reef sharks and watching the fisherman fight off the boobies and frigate birds that were eyeing up their catch. I didn’t want the walk to end.



The flight back to the mainland from Fernando de Noronha initially gave a great view of the whole archipelago (essentially a cluster of one big and lots of little uninhabited islands). Rather than back to Fortaleza, I flew to Recife with plans to then travel south. I felt bad about skipping a huge section of northeast Brazil, particularly because my two closest Brazilian work pals are from Natal and João Pessoa, the two cities I was bypassing. My justification was that the states of Rio Grande do Norte and Paraíba are mostly beach destinations (apologies Louise and Germano if you are listening – I know there is a lot to see inland as well), and I wanted some variation on this trip.

From Recife Airport I initially headed a little way north to Olinda. This is the older prettier sister of the huge sketchy metropolis that is Recife. Olinda is a small colonial town dating from the 1500s with cobbled streets, churches, monasteries, convents and brightly painted buildings. It’s really lovely. When I first arrived mid-morning on a Sunday, the streets were oddly quiet. Yet throughout my aimless but delightful wanderings, there seemed to be musicians, dancers and street food/drinks carts slowly gathering. The manager of my guesthouse informed me that starting in the afternoon there would be a bloco, a little carnival. “Why?” “Why not?” Within a few hours the deserted streets became packed and very loud. It was a small circuit that the different groups did through town, no floats, just musicians and dancers – it was brilliant. Turns out that every February/March at the Ash Wednesday carnival time, Olinda, despite being pretty small, has one of Brazil’s biggest carnivals, behind just Rio de Janeiro and Salvador. I guess the one I witnessed was just an early practice. The following morning, the streets that had been densely packed a few hours before were now deserted again, and spotless thanks to the street cleaning crews. I suppose being a UNESCO World Heritage Site necessitates keeping the place clean.



It's a long way down the coast from Recife to Salvador, more than 800 kilometres and about 16 hours by bus. Even though the long-distance buses are good in Brazil, I still wanted to break up the journey so stopped a bit beyond halfway in Aracaju (merely 10 hours by bus). That whole stretch of coast is lovely, with lots of great palm-lined beaches that are very popular with Brazilians on holiday. But, no beaches could compare with Fernando de Noronha so I just whizzed by. I felt bad to be completely bypassing the states of Alagoas and Sergipe, and just assumed I’ll be back there someday to explore further.

Aracaju seemed nice enough. However, the main reason for stopping there was to travel another 20 km inland to São Cristóvão. This little town was founded in the 1500s, and is the fourth oldest (European) city in Brazil. Its central square and monasteries are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. My Brazilian pals who I was working with in the northeast had never heard of it. It’s a lovely place; definitely worth the detour to wander around the cobbled streets, squares, churches and convents for a few hours.



Just as I was saying the long-distance buses in Brazil are good, my 5.5 hour bus from Aracaju to Salvador broke down. By the time they actually told us we had broken down, we had been sat by the roadside for an hour and the bus coming to collect us would be there in another hour and a half (we weren’t that far away from Salvador). I overheard someone mention Uber, who happened to be a Brazilian-French-Norwegian couple who let me jump in with them. I’d booked my onward bus into Chapada Diamantina the same day, with a 1.5 hour lunch break in the bus station – plenty of time to allow for any delays, I thought. Fortunately, they would be passing the bus station on their way into the city, but the driver’s GPS said we were an hour away and the bus left in 45 minutes. They were all great – the driver put his foot down, and the lady even called the bus company then the bus station and asked them if they’d wait for me – they wouldn’t promise. We were on course to make it until we hit traffic during the last few kilometres. We screeched to a stop, I said a too fast goodbye and obrigado, then sprinted through the bus station seven minutes late (another advantage of travelling with a small bag despite this trip involving work, beach, mountains, and cities). The bus was still there! The driver had no idea about our calls – the message hadn’t reached him. In the end we got going about 15 minutes after we should have. But I was half-starved as it was another 6.5 hours to Lençóis and we didn’t stop till we were nearly there.



Lençóis is the usual place to stay when visiting Chapada Diamantina. It’s a cute little town with lots to do, lots of nice places to eat, it’s very safe and very friendly. By the time I left, I already knew people and couldn’t walk through town without stopping to talk to someone. From here it is easy to arrange hikes and other trips around the Chapada Diamantina National Park. It’s fine to wait until you are there to arrange things. You’ll see signs outside guesthouses and tour offices with trips going out on subsequent days that are looking for more people to reduce costs. Lençóis owes its existence to diamonds, hence the name of the national park. It was a very rich town, but as the diamonds starting getting trickier to find and the prices dropped, it converted to tourism and coffee (reputedly the best in the country – I can’t disagree). People say the friendliness and hospitality are due to its inhabitants originating from all over the country. One of my trekking guides was an old diamond miner – an extremely fit 60-year-old – and he told me that when covid halted tourism, lots of the old residents reverted back to scraping the riverbeds and caves for diamonds. Nobody got rich, but they survived.

The national park is vast, 38000 km², which makes it bigger than Belgium and about the same size as the Netherlands. It’s known for mountains, ancient Pre-Cambrian quartzite flat-topped tepuis that are more well known from further north in Venezuela. This geology leads to waterfalls, caves, crystal clear rivers, stunning views and great hikes.



My first full day was a group tour driving in between some highlights. We were a small group and first stopped at Poço Azul, a beautiful deep cave with water like Bombay Sapphire. It’s one of the few caves that lets you swim, albeit with a life-jacket and after showering off any products. The water seems to fluoresce, it is so blue, even on the cloudy morning we were there. The clarity makes it look shallow but it’s nearly 30 metres deep. We then stopped at some natural swimming pools where a clear river cascaded over and around the odd-shaped geology. It was a lovely spot for lunch where a restaurant had been built into the caves. A little hike downstream hopping over boulders brought us to Poço do Diabo, a set of bigger waterfalls with great views from above or a chance to swim in the pools below. Tearing ourselves away was worth it for the sunset hike up Morro do Pai Inácio. This is one of the flat-topped mountains with great views in all directions. It’s a popular final spot on many tours so there were quite a lot of people all posing, leaping, selfie-ing and pouting for their insta shots. However, the top is big enough that you can find a spot to yourself. The moment the sun drops over the horizon you have to get down quick as it soon gets dark.



The Pati Valley is the most popular trekking spot. I got on a three-day trek; I was actually looking for a longer four- or five-day trek but there was no-one else who seemed to be keen. An advantage of the shorter trek is that you can stay with communities in the valley – you don’t need to carry camping equipment. But, obviously, you are not getting as out into the wilds as you could be. The three-day trek still involves carrying all the food, which was distributed between the group of eight trekkers and the two guides; I somehow ended up with a bag of spuds and a pineapple. This being my escape from home in the Netherlands, it turned out that five of the eight in the group were Dutch (plus one German, one French, and me).

It was a long drive of a couple of hours to get to the start near Guiné. The first day’s trek began in the heat of the day, climbed onto a plateau, then meandered through savannah until we stopped for lunch when we first had a view of Pati Valley. I won’t go through every bit of the trek, but it was very good. There were lots of river crossings and waterfalls, meaning it was easy to regularly cool down in the heat. Actually, much of the walk is through forest, so it was never super-hot; except for the final day back across the savannah to the waiting vehicles (though a life-saving river appears just as you are about to drop).

The accommodation is wonderful, much better than I anticipated. Lots of farms have converted to taking in trekkers and have dorm rooms with bunk beds, and even some doubles. There are hot showers, proper toilets, tables to eat from, and usually an adjacent swimming spot, it’s not roughing it at all. And the guides were excellent cooks – even getting up early to bake a cake for breakfast.

We climbed up onto the summit of one of the tepuis, Morro do Castelo, passing through a big cave to emerge onto rocks with cracking views of the valley. We also passed along the crest of the Fumaça waterfall, at anything from 340 to 400 metres high depending on which website you check, it’s the second highest waterfall in Brazil. It was quite dizzying to lay on the rock slabs and peer over the overhanging lip. Little of the water actually makes it to the bottom as it drifts back up and over the edge, glistening in the sunlight and filled with darting diving swallows.



I enjoyed the hiking so much, and wanted to take advantage of having any kind of topography before returning home to the Netherlands, that I delayed returning to Salvador and booked on a one-day hike the day after returning from the Pati Valley. The appeal of the hike to Sossego Waterfall was that it left from town, thus no need for lengthy car journeys. This time the group was me and four French, two of whom used to live in the Netherlands and had similar gripes to me about living in that country. The scenery was different to Pati Valley with lower rolling forested hills, and more hard work as the path often vanished and we picked our way up a gorge, hopping across the sparkly quartzite boulders. Our guide was great, this was the old diamond miner I mentioned earlier. I enjoyed his stories as the others babbled away indifferently. The waterfall itself was really nice and offered a bit of a cliff jump into the pool below. Another waterfall that we called in at on the way back was probably more fun with its long natural water slide that had you slipping and bouncing down a rocky chute into the awaiting pool.



I took the afternoon bus back to Salvador (there are only two a day) to have the opportunity to spend some more time in Lençóis, just pottering about, stopping in souvenir shops, and catching up on some work from cafes on the street. I could definitely return – it’s probably my second favourite place in Brazil after Fernando de Noronha.



My Salvador experience started inauspiciously after a late arrival and long taxi ride to the old part of town, Pelourinho, at about 10pm. The streets are not passable to cars so I had to walk to find my hotel. A homeless-looking chap asked me for some change, which I genuinely didn’t have – even the smallest things in Brazil can be bought by card, which everyone accepts, even coconut sellers on the beach. So he tried to offer me one of the coloured bracelets that are everywhere in Salvador for good luck, as “a gift”. This is such a common scam around the world that I just pulled my arms away before he could attach one. Then he said he had a big knife and I had to give him money. I didn’t believe him and tried to walk away. He pulled out the “big knife”, which wasn’t very big or sharp and by now I didn’t believe him that he was actually a genuine mugger so walked off. Unfortunately, when I got my phone out about 50 metres further on, I saw that I had walked past my guesthouse, which was back where this beggar/mugger was. As he saw me walking back again, he assumed I had changed my mind and was now going to give him some money, which I still didn’t have. Anyway, I got into my guesthouse. Which was horrible and my room didn’t even have a window.

Subsequently, I quite liked Salvador, despite the large amount of crumbling dilapidated old buildings. I had a day wandering around in Pelourinho and nearby neighbourhoods, popping into a few museums, cathedrals, monasteries and the Mercado Modelo for some early Christmas present shopping (it being November). Then another day around Barra, strolling along the promenade, into the forts and art galleries. The cobbled streets of Pelourinho are really colourful, with very photogenic yellow and blue colonial buildings, in front of bright white chapels and convents. There was always lots going on in the squares, like drumming and dancing and parades and capoeira. The food in Bahia is famously good, I have eaten acarajé and moqueca all over Brazil but in Bahia where they originate they are something else. It was also my last chance for açaí that I must consume at least two out of every three days that I’m in Brazil.



Overall, travelling in Brazil was great. It’s such a vast country, and extremely varied. I have only touched a few bits of it, but this trip convinced me to include more of Brazil on any future longer trips in South America. Only in Salvador, and a bit in Chapada Diamantina, did I come across other foreign tourists. It seems the foreigners stick to the south and mostly have a couple of weeks in and around Rio, whereas Brazilian tourists were everywhere, but never in a way that made anywhere seem over-touristed – I suppose there is plenty of room. The research project has now finished but I will definitely stay in with project partners over there in order to get in on future Brazil projects. Any excuse to go back!

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Photos

Praia do Sancho, Fernando de Noronha
Quite possibly the most beautiful beach I've ever seen.

Green turtle, Fernando de Noronha
It was grazing and came pretty close; it was at least a metre long.

Bloco in Olinda, Pernambuco
I never did find out the reason for the party, just on a random week night, but it was great.

Between Capim Açu and Praia do Leão, Fernando de Noronha
There were baby sharks in the pool.

Praça São Francisco, São Cristóvão, Sergipe
This square is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Even my Brazilian friends had never heard of this town.

Praia do Boldró, Fernando de Noronha
This palm tree provided my only shade for much of the walk along the north coast from Vila dos Remédios to Baía dos Porcos and back.

Capim Açu, Fernando de Noronha
About halfway round the island's longest trail.

Alto Da Sé, Olinda, Pernambuco
Recife can be seen in the distance.

Poço Azul, Chapada Diamantina National Park
The water begins halfway down those steps. It's quite a magical place.

Convento do Carmo, São Cristóvão, Sergipe
This place was full of wooden body parts; the tradition originated when people carried models and images of parts of their body that they wished to be healed as a promise to Senhor dos Passos.