Date: 13 March 2010
Position: Búzios 22:44.86S
041:53.02W
We weighed anchor and left
Vitoria at first light –
0530 – bound for Búzios 190 miles to the south. It should take about 30 to 36
hours. The wind was very light, not sailable, so we motored –and motored, and
motored. In fact apart from just half an hour of bliss in the middle of the
night, we had to motor the whole way. Nightmare. We arrived at 1000 the
following morning and a small dinghy came out to offer us a mooring belonging to
the yacht club, Iate Clube Armação de Búzios which we gladly accepted.
The yacht club has a novel policy
about visiting yachts using their moorings and facilities. Unusually, no charge
is made, on condition that you spend at least R$25 (£10) per day per head in the
restaurant and bar. As the food (breakfast, lunch and dinner) was excellent, and
the caipirinhas large and potent, this didn’t represent any great problem.
Búzios is about two hours drive
away from Rio de Janeiro
and is a popular weekend and holiday beach resort for the smart set of
Rio. Once a small but extremely picturesque fishing
village, it came to prominence in the 1960’s when it was adopted by Brigitte
Bardot and her wealthy Brazilian lover as their holiday location of choice. The
village was transformed and so grateful are the locals at her having caused the
instant swelling of their coffers, that the whole place is Bardot obsessed.
Restaurant Brigitte, Bar BB, Rua Bardot, the shops are full of Bardot T-shirts
and shopping baskets. There is even a life-size bronze statue of their divine
heroine sitting on a bench where tourists queue up to be photographed snuggling
up to her.
After the poverty-stricken
subsistence communities which had been our sole visiting places since leaving
Salvador a month ago, Vitoria and Búzios certainly were the little bit of sophistication that the
Downstairs Skipper had been yearning for. Pretty as a picture, surrounded by
numerous little coves with perfect beaches, it was a delightful change.
Michael had been wonderful
company, when we saw him. He’s like a dormouse and was seemingly capable of
sleeping about 18 hours a day, waking briefly to entertain us with a succession
of incredibly weak, old and corny jokes. Living off a diet of water and dried
biscuits he was also very cheap to maintain – a perfect guest really. The DS and
I greatly appreciated his company, particularly on the long night passages, and
we were very sorry to see him leave after two weeks to return home.
The DS and I stayed on for a
further day. Our next great mission was to sail to Rio
de Janeiro but in order to avoid a night passage
(which the DS is not keen on) we decided to break the journey at a small
anchorage 25 miles south at Cabo Frio.
