03:50S 32:24.5W Fernando de Noronha Island, Brazil
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Trying
to play catch-up with our blogs, but emailed from Babe so not too many
pic’s this time. We
originally envisaged that we were going to do Brazil in three stops along the
long coast at Salvador, Natal and Fortaleza and then onto the Caribbean,
however not having a specific deadline or particular desire to race back to the
Caribbean (which we intend to explore further at the end of the year)
we’ve been on a much more relaxed cruise and in reviewing the above and
based on feedback from other Oyster’s decided to swap the Natal stop for
a longer run up to the island of Fernando de Noronha off the top right hand
corner of Brazil, The timing also meant we could get to Fortaleza for the
Brazil Carnival – wicked! So
the run from Salvador to Fernando was as expected a bit of a slog, involving
motoring for the first ½ day and then beating for the next 4½ days, which we
haven’t done for ages – sloping at 30 odd degrees on a starboard
tack isn’t fun, especially with Trish moaning that she can’t sleep
because of the healing and that and it’s too hot and humid (it really is
flipin hot from about 7am and very humid). We
finally get there 5 days later, having to try to slow down in the end so as to
arrive at first light, closely followed by Crazy Daisy and Pearl of Persia,
from the After
a few hours of morning kip we spend the first exploring locally near the
harbour, which in itself was lovely – a stone L shaped wall protecting a
nice beach with a few local fishing boats in. Soon after found a nice posh
hippy style bar restaurant overlooking the harbour bay where Tish and I spend
the late afternoon eventually joined by the others. They did a special
Caipirinha with vintage Cachaca - wow enough to blow your head off, but
irresistible. An so the day melted into evening and following the Caipirinha
sundowner’s evolved into a tapas type meal with plenty of bottles of NZ
quality wine, food and banter, including with the gorgeous waitresses who we
(me mainly) got to know. Um never one to give up early we heard that there was
a drumming show and disco in the nightspot place in town so Trish, Ollie, Ed
and I ordered a taxi whilst the lightweights went back to the boats. Turned out
to be quite good with the drumming band prancing around an open air dance floor
and both locals and Brazilian tourists giving the place a great atmosphere
(apparently it’s the in place for reasonably well-off young Brazilian
eco tourists to visit and with a limited quote of visitors allowed on the
island seems to work well). Anyway after even more drink and a treating the
folks to a spot or two of proper dancing was time to stagger back and hope we
could manage to get safely back to the yachts – which no of us could
really remember, but clearly we did and to be fair only felt slightly rough the
next day.. Whish we decided we’d hire some
beach buggies (in fact which together with motorbikes is the only real form of
transport on the island). Anyway 2 x buggies and 2 x motorcycles and we were
all ready for a bit of an explore – only a couple of main roads and first
stop was to get some cash out – um told only place was at airport –
both ATM’s down – but thy pointed us to a ATM at the nature centre –
nop, unplugged – only had a little cash left (didn’t mention but it
cost us RR99 (£250) for a 3 day stay anchored in the bay, one day of which was
free!). So just had to go without cash… Anyway drive around was good fun,
especially down dirt tracks in order to get to some of the more secluded
beaches, eventually finding a small deserted beach in a small bay with an
excellent surf, so strip of and in most of us went – brilliant to be back
in the sea again!! Managed
to find another nice restaurant for the evening for the 10 of us near the
outskirts of the town, so squeezed into 2 buggies and enjoyed really nice food
and great company before a relatively early night (well after stopping off back
at the restaurant bar overlooking the bay for a night-cap). Next
day was again a case of trying the ATM’s again (no still not fixed), so
return the buggies and head into town on the bus to try to find somewhere to do
internet. On the bus on the way in Tish spots a Banco sign with a ‘quick
lets get off’, we head off in the direction of the sign, there down a
very rocky hill and 3 doors away from the night club we went to there all nice
shiny and red was a Santander bank, (we get very excited now, get inside and
there are 3 ATM all working) - Go figure guess the locals like to keep this all
to themselves!. So stocked up with a few spondulies we get to the
‘internet café’ – um dog slow and £5 for 2 hours, during
which time only really managed to do some basic emailing. Crazy
Daisy decided to leave, but we thought we’d stay another night and chill
for a little longer, so following a sun-downer on Pearl was back at the
bar-restaurant overlooking the bay for what we thought would be a quite early
evening, except the kitchen had some issues and didn’t serve food till 8.
No worries, well worth the wait and a tasty range of Brazilian tapas and a
bottle of the NZ sauv and we were sorted and back on the boat ready for setting
sail early the next morning. So
all in all an brilliant place and even though we like Nest
stop Lots
of love & hugs Paul
& Trish xx Photo’s: a) An island of beautiful natural bays b) Buggies to the ready c) Main island landmark – almost
phallic from a certain angle d) Our secluded bay for a dip e) Taking the girls for a ride f) The island even has Brazilian
Mermaids! g) The elusive bank in the plaza |
