Recife, Brazil

We've been spending the last couple of days going through the limited information we have on Brazil trying to decide what areas we'd like to cover. There's 2,250 miles of coast to cover in the next 6 weeks between Recife and Punta del Este, Uraguay. We'd like to be in Mar de Plata, Argentina by Christmas. Now that we've spent almost a week in a big city we'd like to concentrate on the smaller towns and villages and it appears that we'll have a lot more opportunity if we concentrate on the coast south of Rio de Janiero. Our next stop will be the bay of Bahia dos Todos Santos, 380 miles south of Recife, which will require us to check in with all the authorities in the big city of Salvador. Once checked in we can cruise the whole bay before returning to Salvador to check out.

Recife is a city of 1.6 million people and it's huge. The downtown area has seen better days, most of it's buildings decaying, holes in the sidewalks and trash in the rivers. The older parts of the city spread westward while the new area is to the south along beautiful white sand beaches that stretch for miles and are dominated by high rise apartments and a few hotels . It boggles the mind to think of the number of people who live less than half a mile from the beach. And people talk about LA. The picture I took from Olinda looking towards Recife should give you some idea of the scale.

We are anchored on the inside of the breakwater just off the city. To get into town we walk along the breakwater to a park that was created to show piece the cities most famous artist Francisco Brennand, who does large scale multi piece creations. (see photos) Rowboats then take us across the harbor to a city dock, one of the more enjoyable aspects of our stay. I've also enjoyed walking through the hugh market area that consists of about a 10 block area that's crammed with small stalls selling just about anything you might want, in narrow lanes, and full of people. One could wander for days and not see it all.

We've cleared out tomorrow for Salvador and should be on our way by noon. We heard from our Brazilian friend Marco, who we met in Sal, Cape Verde and he's right behind us. Unfortunately, having already cleared out makes it impossible for us to wait for him (we'd have to clear back in and then out again, something that took us 2 full days to accomplish). Hopefully, we'll be able to meet up with him down the road.

Nancy & Mark