Brazil #4 - Salvador Area - April 2006 
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This page contains the story of our visit to the Salvador area, which we visited after spending ten days in Rio de Janiero.

We spent seven nights in this area & were quite impressed with what we saw.  Salvador was a major 'slave-trade' port many years ago.  Most people had dark skin, as many of the freed slaves stayed in the area.

This portion of the trip included a couple days in historic Salvador and then a few days along the beaches at Praia Do Forte and Conde.  While in Conde we drove a north to Aracaja to see what we could find up there. 

After landing in Salvador we picked up a rental car & headed towards the setting sun.  They didn't have any maps for us & we were guided only by instinct.

The airport was quite a ways out on the eastern side of town.  We were interested in staying in the oldest part of the city, which turned out to be tough to find.

We got lost when we came upon some barricaded streets.  After a few tense moments in a shabby part of town, we found the 'old district' & decided upon a hotel that had been newly re-modeled.

Our hotel was located in one of the oldest areas, which was listed as a World Heritage site.

Many buildings were renovated, but many more needed it.


Some buildings were in the process of getting their 'face-lift'.
This part of town was located on top of a steep cliff and the view from the terrace (common area) was quite nice.  We got a good view of the bay and of the harbor which was in full operation.  
If you looked to the sides though, you got a glimpse of the poorer style of life.

The whole city was quite crowded & the buildings were crammed into any available space.

Crime was supposed to be quite bad, but there were many policemen around and we felt relatively safe.
The center of 'old town' was pedestrian-only and we felt very comfortable walking around.

The European influence was visible everywhere... from nice squares to old ornate churches.
The old buildings, cobblestone streets, antique letterboxes, etc. made this a totally fascinating place to explore.

In the evening we found many  restaurants that set up their tables on the street.  We didn't find many unique 'local dishes' but the food was all pleasant.
The street art was one of the most unique aspects of this town.  The paintings were very colorful and so were some of the shops.

Some ladies also wore very ornate clothing, but I wasn't sneaky enough to get a photo of any of them.
To get down to the harbor area required us to take an elevator. The fishing boats were cute.
 Looking back up the cliff gave us some pretty interesting views of other big buildings.
The poorer people lived on the bottom row of buildings. We were most amazed, though, at the places that were built in the arches of the highway... I'd love to see the inside of those unique places!
After a few days touring Salvador, we headed north to Praia Do Forte (see the big map at the top).  
We didn't know what we would find in the area & we were pleasantly surprised to find a nice town.

The hotels were a bit pricey, as the area turned out to be quite classy... like 'artsy' Carmel along the California coast.

We initially rested by the pool as a storm passed by.  The hotel had a great set-up; the pool & garden area were very relaxing.
The best part was that the hotel backed right to the ocean.  The floor of the ocean was lava-rock, so except for a few very nice natural pools (deep areas in the rocks) you could not swim here.
We found a 'Turtle Research Center' and decided to tour the facility.  We ended up enjoying the place and saw many kinds of turtles. The entire coast is used as nesting grounds by many turtles facing extinction.  This Center is trying to ensure a future for the turtles by educating the locals. 
We drove north to Conde and the terrain turned much more hilly. You could tell this area gets lots of rain, as the erosion looked bad.  It must be hard for them to keep their roads in good condition!
It was interesting to see the mix of cultures... old & new... coming together at times. 
The herds of cattle were still handled by cowboys on horseback... as cars went zipping by.
The animals grazed wherever they wanted, which meant that we had to be careful while driving. Most of the time the roads were not in real good condition, so you couldn't go fast anyway.
I always think of palm trees as meaning a resort area... not grazing lands for livestock!
We had a tour book which mentioned a few hotels, but we didn't like any we saw.  Since it was low season many places were closed or had no guests.

We decided to check out a Swiss place that was far down a dirt road... it turned out to be exactly what we were looking for.
The resort was rather small and was built amongst the palms and sand dunes.
The pool area was nice, but we swam more in the ocean... which was just a little walk away.

The weather was quite warm and the sun was strong ... 
so this little hut came in handy; we drank many caipirinhas!
 

The beach was beautiful and all ours... as we hardly saw any other people!

The beach had nice clean sand and the waves were pretty strong ... good for body surfing.
Some other sights as we drove around the coastal area ...
 

We then drove north towards the town of Aracaja to see what we could find up there ... there was nice scenery along the way.
 
Palm trees were quite common... but this 'housing project' was the only one of it's kind we saw.

It does seem like the government is trying to help the poor people with small subsidized houses... but there are a lot of people!
We stopped at a 'ranch to see what things looked like back in the colonial days; Nic made a friend!
We visited another beach area which was very nice and served drinks out on the beach... then it was back to Conde.
We then headed back towards Salvador and spent our last night at a small coastal hotel that was close to the airport... we had a very early flight that we could not miss!
This concludes our visit to the areas around Salvador.  We now will fly inland to Manaus... 

To continue to the next page, click on :  Brazil #5: Manaus Jungle Lodge (the Amazon jungle area)

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