Salvador, Recife, FdeN Day 2

Day 02 - Tuesday, December 13, 2011 – Praia do Forte Day Tour, Salvador, Bahia, BR

Rain greeted us when we went down to the breakfast room. The air conditioning was broken so we sat by the lone fan in the room. I went out to check the weather; besides rainy, it was 79° with 85% humidity – not a bad start for our day in Bahia!

We scheduled a day tour of Praia do Forte, and the Northern Coast. The driver, Walter came for us at 8:20 and we went to a few other hotels to gather more people.

He picked up our guide, Carol at another apartment complex and we were a total of 15 on the trip in a small Mercedes 17 passenger van. Our group consisted of people from Sao Paulo, Curitiba, as well as Germany and London, and the four of us from the USA.

We passed white beaches with sand volleyball courts and beach soccer areas with stands for spectators. Just as abruptly, the white sand would transition to black rocky outcroppings; hence the many light houses along the coast.

As the rain came down in torrents, Carol told us a short history of the area and told us about the typical foods of Bahia. The specialty is sea food. But this is Brazil and the beef has been fantastic also!

She also gave us a general itinerary of the things we would do and see today. Our first stop was at the Abaeté Lagoon where we could use the rest rooms, buy water, and take photos of the popular tourist area.

We followed the Coconut Highway north along the coastline. The rain had stopped and the sun was doing its best to come out.

At 11:00 we visited the Brazilian nonprofit Tamar Sea Turtle Project. This sanctuary protects green, loggerhead, hawksbill, and olive ridley, species of turtles which all come to these pristine beaches to lay their eggs.

Eggs that are found on the beaches that are inhabited by humans or that face other dangers are moved to a safe nesting nursery. The turtles are able to safely hatch on their own; they are marked with an ID tag, and then allowed to find their way back to the sea.

The whole preserve is very “kid friendly” with displays, maps and diagrams, craft areas, and touch pools where children of all ages can learn about the migratory patterns and monitoring the life cycles of these dinosaur age reptiles.

After spending about 90 minutes watching the turtles we found our way to the meeting place and Gennie bought several post cards. We walked to the Post Office but it was closed. We hurried back to our meeting point and left the village at 12:45.

Our main attraction of the day was to go to the beach at Guarajuba. We had a delicious lunch at Laguna Restaurant. Bob and I had shrimp, Susan had grilled chicken, and Gennie had fillet of beef. The main dishes came with salad and a side buffet of Bahian specialties.

After lunch we got our bathing suits on and walked down to the beach. The sky was still overcast and it was not unbearably hot. The ocean was cool and we were very refreshed when we came out at 3:00 and went back to the restaurant to shower and change.

Walter picked us up at 3:40 and we drove back to the city getting home at 5:00 right on schedule. After doing some laundry and looking at our photos we decided our day in Bahia was almost perfect!

We enjoyed a light dinner; bread, cheese, meat, and an apple that we had purchased at the grocery store yesterday.

Accommodations: Portobello Ondina Praia Hotel --- Meal: B

Hello!!!!

enjoying your trip to Brazil via the "armchair" again!~ looks so lovely (We're leaving for Haiti in one week, tho!) Don and Nan

I would love to see the turtles laying their eggs!

nice photography class, vic!!

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