My travels in Brazil had been all well and good up to this point, but in going to an ecotourism hotspot, one of the most famous waterfalls in the world, and two huge global cities in the form of Rio and Sao Paulo I felt that I had not yet experienced the real Brazil, whatever that may be. I had heard many whisperings of a magical land called Bahia, spiritual home of all that makes Brazil great. So off I went.
The flipside of Brazil's expensive bus network is that a flight is often pretty much the same price, and given the huge distances involved it can save you a good day or two of your life in travel time, as was the case with my flight from Sao Paulo to Salvador, the capital of Bahia.
Even in the few initial hours in Salvador before jumping on a bus to Lencois, it was clear that you were in a very different place to the relatively safe and orderly cities of Sao Paulo and even Rio (everyone I met in Sao Paulo thought I would be robbed in Salvador and Giovanna's father was '100% certain' that I would be physically assaulted at least once). The first thing that hits you is the oppressive heat and humidity that had me dabbing my ears within 5 minutes of trudging around with my backpack on, and that oppressiveness is compounded by the masses of people buzzing around the transport hubs, selling their wares and generally living at a frantic pace.
This intense introduction and the warnings from the paulistas meant that I was happy to make it through my taste of Salvador alive and escape to Lencois, six hours inland and the gateway to the Chapada Diamantina national park. I arrived at around 9pm to a sleepy little town that could just have easily been in Belgium as in Brazil, but as I passed the two separate groups of little kids playing football barefoot on the cobbled streets, it was as if this place had been made to fulfil the most clichéd gringo idea of what a rural Brazilian village should look like. To be fair, it's not inconceivable that such a place could be built for that exact purpose.
The town was no less charming for this, and the national park on its doorstep was truly stunning. I think I knew I was onto a winner with this place the first morning, as my budget hostel served up a breakfast buffet including papaya, pineapple, slices of pizza, sugared cinnamon plantain, two types of cake and a full muesli buffet.
Day properly started, myself and a French-Spanish couple headed off walking with our strictly Portuguese-only guide (a common downside of the real Brazil) to NAME, a trail consisting of a bit of walking and a lot of leaping between huge boulders up a stream at the bottom of a 20m canyon. As with any physically demanding/life-threatening activity there needs to be a payoff, and we got two. The first was a leap into a refreshing (freezing cold) natural pool with a waterfall to scramble behind, and the second was the plain insane 'natural slide', a very bumpy rocky incline with a fast-flowing stream running down it. We feared that our guide would either kill himself doing the slide stood up or ditch us for his friends (I'm sure he planned the tour to rush through the sightseeing and get as much barbecue time with his mates by the barbecue as possible), but we made it back one way our another.
The next day a motley crew of myself, a Romanian wannabe pornstar on a sex quest through Brazil, his latest conquest, and a strange middle-aged bloke who'd been travelling so long he mistook me for an American (safe to see I wasn't his biggest fan after that) headed on another trip. This time we took in, and climbed up, scenery that looked like the result of several mini asteroid crashes, snorkelled through a pitch black cave full of feet-cleaning fish and a further huuuge underground cave. We even got to try curried cactus, which funnily enough tastes just as you'd expect.
The next day I filled up on sleep and kilo buffet food in the knowledge that I'd be needing all the energy possible for my night bus and for the sensory experience that is Brazil's third largest city, Salvador de Bahia. And what an experience it was.
Our hostel (HospedaSalvador) was situated a short stroll from the multicoloured façades and cobbled streets of the historic Pelourinho district, although any thoughts such carefree wanderings were put paid to by the charming hostel owner, who made it clear that we were not to walk left out of the hostel at any costs and only to walk around after sunset if accompanied and with only a photocopy of your passport and enough cash for your evening's entertainment or to satisfy a mugger.
So Salvador is dangerous, they were right about that, and in the five nights there my group (an Argentinian, two Italians, a Brazilian and myself, all speaking Portuguese) suffered a few hairy moments late at night with strange people trying to lead us away from our hostel. But Salvador is also the Brazilian capital of happiness, and in a country whose folk are well known for a pretty sunny outlook on life, that's no mean feat. If you take the necessary precautions you'll come to no harm, and then all that's left to do is sample all that this amazing city can offer.
The happiness of this city is truly contagious. It's almost as if the citizens soak up the energy from the constant sunshine and take that positive energy and happiness and use that in every aspect of their everyday life. You see it in the bright and vibrant colours of their clothes and handicrafts, you hear it in the African rhythms that pulse from practically every street corner, you smell it in the delicious shrimp acarajé and tapioca stands which seems to permeate the air, and, well, you just feel it. Salvador was the first capital of Brazil and the most important port in the slave trade in the days of colonialism. As such, around two thirds of the population is of African descent, and it is thought that Salvador is the city which has preserved its African slave culture the best of any city in the world. And this pride in their roots seems, again, to make people very happy.
During my five days there I enjoyed many a coconut on Salvador's excellent beaches, tied my deepest desires to my wrist and the railings of a pelourinho church in the hope that the three knots would come free and release my wishes with it, and soaked up the happiness in the form of another great kilo buffet or a capoeira show in the hours that it was bearable to be out in the
But it's in the night that Salvador shows its true colours and its happiness is at its most irresistible. From impromptu late night drumming sessions in the Rio Vermelho to an open air jazz concert by the museum of modern art and an open air samba concert down by the old lighthouse, Salvador is the city where the nightlife really feels alive. The best nights are Saturdays and Tuesdays in the pelourinho, where the whole district comes alive and the experience is almost like being at a European music festival, where you just want to get lost and stumble across a new band playing on the steps outside a church or in a wide open warehouse, swigging from your cinnamon liquor as you go.
Above all, it's the people who make this city great. Salvador was the friendliest city I encountered in all my south american travels, and you'd actually have to go out of your way to NOT make friends. We met many people desperate to sort out our two left feet, the gayest man in history who literally pranced one mile down the street with us (we were walking), a crazy bloke dancing around selling booze from a box on his head and countless people just curious to get to know us, no bad intentions to be found.
Bahia has beautiful scenery and people, Salvador buzzes with energy, and the bootylicious part? I guess you can figure that out.
