Salvador: 4-7 November

We arrived in Salvador in the early hours of 4th Nov, having spent all night on the plane coming from Manaus, via Belem. We managed to get some sleep, but having spent 4 of the previous 6 nights in hammocks, we were both pretty tired by the time we arrived.

Salvador is a big city (c3 million people), with a beautiful old town sat on top of a hill overlooking the new city and out onto the bay. During the 4 days we were there, we spent the mornings being lazy and catching up on our sleep, before going for a look around in the afternoons.

The old town is filled with colourful buildings, shops, restaurants and churches. There are lots of squares where there always seems to be something going on. There is a big African influence in this part of Brazil as a legacy of the slave trade and this is obvious in the people of course, but also in the food and music. Music is a big thing here, a brass band would practice on the tennis court on one side of our hotel in the morning, while in the evening the Carnaval school on the other side would open it's doors for a good old dance to live bands. In between there was live music in the restaurants and bands in the squares throughout the day. As we were in town over the weekend, there were also various events/performances staged by the Ministry of Culture that were free to get into.

Salvador is also one of the best places to see Capoiera, the martial art developed by slaves and disguised as a dance, which is still practised here - there are several schools where you can see performances/practices for free and there are often people performing in one or other of the squares. It's pretty amazing to watch - very acrobatic with lots of high kicks and somersaults.

We only ventured out of the old town a couple of times, firstly because there isn't that much to see in the new town and secondly because it's not that safe. The old town is heavily policed so there aren't many problems where we were staying, but the north east of Brazil is a very poor region and we were warned against going to certain places, including the neighbouring area dubbed 'cracklandia' by some of the locals. We did take the Lacerda Elevator (literally a big elevator that costs a few pennies a go) down to the crafts market near the docks, our other 'excursion' was to a football match on the Saturday evening.

This being Brazil, we were keen to see a game and a review of the fixtures showed us that Bahia (the name of the state in which Salvador sits), were playing at home against Sao Paulo. The season is in the latter stages and Bahia are fighting against relegation, while Sao Paulo were up around 6th position in the table. The stadium was a fair drive outside of the city centre, but we'd booked tickets through a tour company who drove us out there and picked us up again afterwards which saved the hassle and expensive taxi fees.

On arrival at the ground we were given our tickets and to our surprise found that we were with the visiting fans from Sao Paulo - we'd been told we'd be with Bahia; fortunately we hadn't been out and bought the team shirt! Loyalties adjusted, we settled into the away-end and thought that it would probably be better anyway - Sao Paulo are the bigger team, are higher up the league and had captain and crowd favourite Luis Fabiano (a name some of you will know) playing up front. Fabiano had a shocker in my opinion, but Sao Paulo were 1-0 up at half time and moved into a 3-1 lead in the 2nd half. Cue big celebrations in our section.

Football is a 'funny old game' though and Bahia desperately needed the win. They staged a comeback and snatched it 4-3 (we managed not to cheer when the last goal went in). Cue massive celebrations around the ground and a swift exit of the away fans. Turns out we'd been in the wrong end afterall! Outside of the ground, we readjusted our loyalties, rejoined the home fans and grabbed a beer at a bar across the road while waiting for our pick up - our driver was a local man who had watched the game at home on TV, so was pretty happy when he came to meet us!

One other good thing about Brazilian football: you don't need to go through all the argy-bargy for a pint and a pie at half time as they have people walking the aisles with snacks and drinks throughout the game. Bonus!

This part of Brazil is also famous for it's pristine beaches and our intention was to catch a ferry out to one of the islands off the coast for a week on the beach. Unfortunately the weather wasn't playing it's part; it wasn't cold, but was overcast and threatening rain. After examining the various on-line weather forecasts, we decided to skip the beach and head further south, hoping to get some beach time in better weather later on. So, flights now booked, we're off to Campo Grande from where we'll pick up a tour into the Pantanal, the world's biggest inland wetland.

Hope you are all well,

Dan & Sue.