Hi all,

Arrived in Salvador on Sat 8^th Fab after a fair crossing from St Helena, a quite different place as described in the last Blog update!

There were only a few (8) of us making the trip to Salvador, which is really unfortunate as it turned out to be a great stop, loads to do and see and nothing like some had feared. Having said that we’ve been to Brazil a few times before and knew what to expect and how warm the locals can be.

So arrived early in the morning and made the mistake of hitting the bubbly when we arrived, which evolved into a bit of a day party between a few of the yachts and downhill from there! Was Alan (Sulana’s) birthday but I ended up crashing out at about 4pm and missed the evening do L, put it down to being tired then um?

Agreed between the yachts that we’d do a trip to the Diamanté region (thanks to Alan for organising), circa 7 hour trip inland and staying in local hotel for a couple of nights. Turned out to be a great adventure and some great exploits including:

-          Hike through forest to nearby natural pool area with rock slide (forbidden by guide to use but no stopping us!)

-          Visit to an underground cave, with low headroom – great snorkel and bats and all!

-          5km Trek through a massive cave in the middle of nowhere - weird

-          Great evening meal in the local town centre with local Brazilian feel and a local band drumming

Hospitality at Salvador included party night at local yacht club and an award giving ceremony and a local drumming band, that decided that Trish & I needed to join-in, so all good fun.

We also took a sail to the ‘Iles de Frode’ island for an impromptu BBQ, and that turned out to be a great evening on the beach. Great views back towards Brazil also!

Finally got invited to an impromptu night out with Willi, the local tourism guy, starting with a fantastic local restaurant – amazing food and service and then onto a new nightclub sort of place – lots of dancing and Dave from Serendipity doing a bottle on the head dance – well that’s how we rock!

OK hopefully photo’s make up for the limited descriptions – next stop Fernando de Noranha, island circa 300nm off corner of Brazil.

Luv & hugs,

Paul & Trish