This blog will have two parts: Patrick's field trip to Bahia and our weekend in Salvador. This is quite appropriate as when you say "Bahia" the large state has two very different aspects: the vast interior plain is barren, barren and harsh - whereas Salvador is lively, colourful and a wonderful historical centre to visit.

Patrick's field trip out to Morro de Chapeu to the Irece Basin - named after the town in its centre - provided a great opportunity to experience one of the more characteristic ecosystems - caatinga, mata branca or white forest. It's called white because the vegetation largely looks dead - with occasional cacti, yuccas (that goes for a crop in these parts!) and termite nests to break up the monotony. We travelled by bus for hours along very straight roads - largely empty - but we did experience a roadblock! One community - reputedly because the police shot the wrong person after a robbery - had blocked the road. Quite a parking lot of assorted vehicles clustered at a petrol station and watched the Olympics on tv - whilst the police negotiated. After an hour we were on our way again through a mob of locals - mostly bemused bystanders - and heavily armed police. This was the only incident of note in what proved a very interesting week.

The purpose of the trip was to see Brazil's Neoproterozoic rocks - at ca.1,000,000,000 years old -these rocks contain the oldest lifeform - stromatolites - built up by very primitive cyanobacteria. It was humbling to think these are our ancestors and incidentally the same things the Mars rover is currently looking for!! There are few outcrops in this wilderness. The occasional lajedos (pavements) or cacimba (watering holes) were what we looked at - usually in someone's front or back garden and in a village street in some cases! All very interesting. Why were BG sending Patrick and some colleagues out there? It turns out that much of the recently discovered oil in the South Atlantic is in (much younger) biosediments like these. Hence the justification to learn more. Learn more we certainly did!

Our field trip party arrived back at Salvador airport at the same time as Kate's flight arrived from Rio so she and I then caught the bus following the coastal route into the city. We got off in Vitoria where we had booked a pousada (we even got off by chance at exactly the right stop). The Pousada de Casa Vitoria is a chic (by Brazilian standards anyway) and somewhat understated place down a quiet street on the coast and about a 10 min bus-ride from Salvador's historic centre. We took a walk to Barra the 1st evening and watched the sun go down over the beach. Salvador has west and east facing beaches - the former great for sunsets and the later good for surfing! It has strong links with Africa as it was where the ships carrying slaves first landed in Brazil in the 1800's and many of the African influences are still very apparent today.

The pousada had the most delicious breakfasts - banana compote and a trio of fresh fruits, omlette aux fines herbes, cake and ice cream , bread rolls (brown and white), coffee and jug of mango juice. Eaten in the pousada's simple plain surroundings - what better way to start a day! The shower was the best we've had in Brasil - especially after the cool showers Patrick had been experiencing earlier in the week in central Bahia!

It seems to rain in Bahia before 7am and after 11pm - very convenient! Our first mission on Saturday was to interview a Brazilian who had lived in Kent for 25 years - but was now back in Pituba, another suburb of Salvador. Margarida was a very good friend of the wife of someone a colleague at UFRJ is researching- Dr Ben Barnes the 'first' petroleum geologist in Brasil. I'm sure readers will hear more of this project as Kate has taken on editorship of the evolving book!

Margarida was a charming, sprightly, well-turned out widow who we guessed was probably in her early 80's who was glad of the opportunity to tell us how much she had enjoyed living in the UK with her English husband but wasn't able to provide us with much new information about Ben Barnes. Duty done however.

We then caught a bus to Pelourinho which is the old part of Salvador and was our 1st encounter with Brazil's stunning colonial architecture. The historic centre has a real buzz about it, provided in part by the large, wonderfully-attired Bahian ladies in their hooped skirts, colourful costumes and turbans, the pervasive music, the magnificent churches and the brightly coloured buildings dating from Brazil's colonial past.

Rio may be known as the marvellous city but in my (Kate's!) opinion it lacks Salvador's instinctive warmth and intimacy and certainly doesn't have a historic centre to match Pelourinho. We spent a happy afternoon wandering around soaking up the sights which are many and various, sitting in cobbled squares admiring the vibrancy of the historic centre, walking along yet another narrow street lined with colourful pousadas, bars, cafes and ancient churches and generally watching the world go by.

After our splendid breakfast we decided to skip lunch so had an early supper in the garden of a restaurant near the main square where a free concert was beng given that evening to mark the centenary of the Brazilian writer Jorges Amado who had spent a large part of his life in Salvador.

Sunday's leisurely breakfast was as delicious and beautifully presented as saturday's though with different juice, hot dish, fruit etc. We chatted to an interesting couple of fellow guests who were academics from the US and specialists in Latin America who'd been staying for 5 nights and had been given a different breakfast every day!

We decided to spend the time we had left in Salvador exploring the area we were staying in so walked to a nearby lighthouse and Patrick went round a museum of naval history. There was meant to be a geology museum nearby too but at the moment, anything with a government or academic link seems to be permanently closed until a strike gets lifted. The area also featured several attractive forts and churches left over from the days of Portuguese rule.

The beaches were full of people enjoying themselves and we were (almost!) sorry that we'd left our swimming things at the pousada particularly as we've since been told the sea is much warmer than Rio's and did indeed look positively inviting.
In spite of the fact that rain had been forecast for the weekend it was sunny for 90% of our time in Salvador.

Bahian cooking is meant to be amongst the best in Brazil so we sampled some acaraje from a beachside stall before heading for the airport. They're fritters made with brown beans and shrimps fried in dende oil - an acquired taste we think!

The bus to the airport took us through areas of Salvador we wouldn't have seen otherwise - their Zona Norte seemed as poor as Rio's but the end of the bus-ride was redeemed by the remarkable grove of tall bamboos that mark the entrance to the airport and that we'd noticed when we arrived.

We'd hoped to catch the Olympics closing ceremony on a tv screen at the airport but although various tv's were on in bars & shops, not one of them was showing the ceremony, despite the hand-over to Rio. We wonder what that says about the level of interest in 2016 in wider Brazil.

From all accounts, the closing ceremony capped the games off nicely and I'm sorry we weren't in the UK for the Olympics as the whole event seem to have engendered an atmosphere that it would be good to bottle. For Londoners in particular the past fortnight must have been pretty special, to put it mildly, with good weather, an undreamt of number of medals and no trouble to speak of. As my sister-in-law Ruth said, 'London has felt like a city on holiday' and even sceptics (Ol?) seem to have been at least partly won over.

It's going to be a hard act for Rio to follow. They should be fine on the party/holiday bit, just not sure that their organisational skills (even with the superb Sambadromo's experience) match Locog's and being on the ground here we can tell you that there's a huge amount to be done and not a lot of evidence that they're getting after it at the speed they're going to have to if everything's to be ready for 2016. Time will tell and in the meantime, good on Team GB!!