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Archive for February, 2006

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The Amazonian Love Boat

Friday, February 10th, 2006

It was supposed to take 12 hours to get to Belém.  I knew we would never make it in that amount of time when I woke up in the middle of the night to the bus rolling in and out of holes, the driver getting his money’s worth out of the transmission.  I looked out the window – it was pouring rain and the road was chock-full of mini pools.  Oh man, I thought.  Here we are, in the jungle.  It’s raining and it’s never going to stop.  The roads suck and they’re only gonna get worse.  And we’re gonna be here for a long, long time… [read on]

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The ultimate Brazilian family vacation – Part III

Tuesday, February 7th, 2006

The next destination on our Brazilian family vacation (I call it that because we met mostly Brazilians along the way, all on vacation with their families, all visiting most of the same places as us), came highly recommended by many Brazilians we met along the way – it was a national park called Lençios Marenhenses, in the town of Barrerinhas. But, taking public transportation as we were (the one difference from your average Brazilian family, who was traveling by car), it was nearly impossible to get there in one day. Knowing that, we made no rush to get the early bus out, allowing us to enjoy the great free breakfast (eggs!) offered by our luxury hotel before heading out of town, making sure to get our money’s worth. We took the minibus to the main bus station (while, in the middle of the route we got rushed out of one minibus and shuffled around the corner to another, much more crowded minibus…whatever) and hopped onto the bus to our first stop – Tûtoia. [read on]

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The ultimate Brazilian family vacation – Part II

Tuesday, February 7th, 2006

In Jericoacoara, we found a cute little house for ourselves – another killer deal. It had 2 bedrooms, a little kitchen (only with a fridge), a living room area (which I usurped as my bedroom, slinging up my hammock), and a bathroom, which we soon came to learn that the ceiling dripped on you while sitting on the toilet. But all for less than $5 each per person, and we loved it. The town itself, eh. It had its charms, but I found myself more excited about our little house. There was an amazing breeze – really a pretty fierce wind – at almost all times of the day, making this a huge windsurfing and kitesurfing spot. The beach wasn’t all that spectacular for laying on during the day due to a huge tide movement – maybe about 1/3 of a mile between high and low tide. This movement was really spectacular; not being all that in tune with tidal movements (as Lake Michigan really isn’t affected), it was pretty cool to walk at night all the way out to the shore. A few hours later, it would be right back up at the edge of town again. During the day, though, the tide was out just a bit, but the sand was wet, hard, and gray, not the nice fluffly stuff you like to lay in. [read on]

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The ultimate Brazilian family vacation – Part I

Tuesday, February 7th, 2006

Quite satisfied with our awesome candomblé experience, we shoved off the next day, on a 24-hour, freezing cold bus, way to the north, to a town called Teresina, famed for being Brazil’s hottest city; we’re talking purely temperature here. The bus ride started out fairly empty, but a few hours later we stopped and piled the bus with hippies. (There are a lot of hippies in Brazil. Noticeably. And not just your normal, sort of laid back people, but either your trust-fund, well-dressed hippie or your dirtier, smellier type who think they’re saving the world by selling jewelry. You can find them in all your main tourist locations and any main plaza, square, or park in most major cities.) [read on]

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The magic of Candomblé

Tuesday, February 7th, 2006

This post will be dedicated entirely to describing our experience at the Candomblé ceremony, as well as I can do. Unfortunately, cameras are not allowed, so as not to make a tourist spectacle out of a religious ceremony, which I can totally respect, so there aren’t any corresponding photos. I may have mentioned this before, but we waited specifically for this woman to take us to a ceremony, as there is word of a lot of tourist operators putting on phoney ceremonies, and I really wanted to witness the real thing. When the woman showed up, we piled into the van as she introduced us to the others inside, all by places of origin. I, therefore, became Chicago and Vanessa became Australia. With us we had Couple from France and Pair from Finland, and were soon joined by New York Lady and Group from Greece. As the lady shut the van door, going around to the drivers side, I noted, “I thought she would be black”, to which those who were not shy about it agreed. This was, afterall an Afro-Brazilian tradition, and this woman was very white with a hint of Latina blood. [read on]

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