Caipirinhas & Caipiranhas

I’ve been working on a cocktail called Grounds for Divorce…

I’ve invented a cocktail that I’d like to share with you. As with all the best discoveries, it started off partly by accident, which was then supplemented by my own innate cocktail genius which I didn’t realise existed. 

The best caipirinhas in Brazil are found in Paraty, and hundreds of cachaças too from all over the country. This is a fact, unless you can find one that looks better than this one… Paraty also has an endless stock of cachaça liquers with jabuticaba, cacao and other fruity Brazilian delights to soften the blow of the rocket fuel, including the Gabriela (cravo & canela, cloves & cinnamon) which actually comes from a novela based around a Jorge Amado book title. The book was based in Ilheus, Bahia, the writer’s home town, but the novela was filmed in Paraty and stayed behind afterwards to influence the most famous cachaça liquer in town, and one that really does the trick on the few cold nights of the year there. The best caipirinha for taste also comes out of Paraty, being the only place where you can find the caiçara version on the menus. This is a mixture of lime and passion fruit, named after the local people who occupied the coastal fishing villages of the Costa Verde, and they complement each other wonderfully. Caipirinhas such as these have been responsible for many a lost night trying to keep footing on the wobbly cobbles of the historic centre in Paraty, which is hard enough sober.

The caiçara caipirinha led to other things. One day at home I made a spicy caiçara fruit juice based on the passion fruit and lime idea, adding some fresh ginger because it is the healthiest thing you can have in a fruit juice, and also some honey instead of sugar (you can have this one for free). It was so well-balanced and such a perfect mixture that it must be the best fruit juice I’ve ever tasted. Unfortunately, I’ve never quite got the balance so well since then, but hey.

So another drunken night in Paraty, Blondie couldn’t even pronounce ‘caipirinha’ properly, and it came out as ‘caipiranha’. Immediately it sounded like something fun, a serendipitous portmanteau of two of the finest things Brazil has, the caipirinha and the legendary piranha fish. So sat around the table we decided that we’d have to each make our own version of the caipiranha. Until now, only one has been invented, and that was mine. I went back to the spicy caiçara fruit juice and thought that being a caipiranha, then my cocktail would need to have sharp teeth.

There is only one way to provide that, which is of course to add pimentinha, fresh chili pepper.

The test run went well, at least for me. The group who tasted the caipiranha actually approved it but couldn’t handle so much pimentinha in a drink. I finished it with numb lips and a throat that didn’t know what to think about the mixture that had just made its way down, but the overall effect was highly memorable and enjoyable, and the invention goes down as a palpable hit in my eyes. Perhaps the best way to use the caipiranha cocktail though is as an excellent end-of-night challenge between friends. Only for those brave enough or drunk enough to tackle it.

I wish boa sorte, the best of Brazilian luck to anybody who wishes to try it. 

Especially for Dorothy. Some kind of Recipe:

The Caipiranha

To make one large one to pass around the group (Brazilian style) or to drink and grudgingly give a small taste to others (my style):

2 Limes
1 large Passion Fruit (they are big in Brazil) or maybe two of the small ones
2 tsp Natural Honey, possibly more to take the edge off the lime and the tang from the passion fruit. Brazilian Caipirinhas are VERY sweet so plenty of honey might be needed to match
A thumb-nail of fresh Ginger
1 fresh medium red chili - for Brazil a Dedo de Moça (Woman's Finger) would be about right, although definitely cut to taste! Green chili perhaps for a milder idea.
Crushed Ice 

First up, I would finely chop or grate the ginger and the same with the stalk-half of the chili. For a stronger bite, chop more chili, for weaker, less.

As with a regular lime caipirinha, you half, quarter and then eighth the limes first and grind them in the pilao, the traditional Brazilian mortar and pestle used to make the cocktail, and which also make good souvenirs/presents. 

This is used to gently crush the juice out of the lime, in order to bring out the juice but not the bitterness of the white lime pith. Adding honey to the mixture, and then the contents of the passion fruit. Another idea for decoration with the large Brazilian passion fruits is to just take the top off, like a boiled egg, scoop out the inside and then use the case as your drink container! The skin has to be thick and without any holes for this to work though. (In Bahia, this is done with cacao cocktails, a most beautiful-looking drink).

I prefer to leave the passion fruit with seeds intact, as I like to chew them and prefer the taste without them being crushed. No blender involved whatsoever, and especially not for the limes. Mixing in the ginger and chili should give you a lovely green-orange colour, peppered (geddit?) with red specks, something like a good Thai sweet chili sauce perhaps.

Add in the chopped ice, stir it all up, and then comes the piece de resistance. The second half of the chili can be sliced a quarter of an inch from the cut and placed on the edge of your glass. Your drink now has a tooth, and you are ready to get bitten by your very own caipiranha! 

The Real Rio Road Race

It isn’t often that you can say that the Olympic Road Race competitors have it easier than ordinary cyclists on a hilly 250km course, but Rio is no ordinary city for cycling. The regular roleur has far more obstacles to deal with on their way around the course.

Beginning in Copacabana, you can take it as read that any cycling on roads filled with horrendous traffic and Rio’s notoriously terrible drivers is best done where possible on the beach paths that run alongside them, for your own safety. These provide their own fun too, especially at weekends, with people crossing the path on their way to the beach while texting phones, carrying deckchairs and iceboxes, plus the workers with their supplies for the day. It gets even worse later in the afternoon when all this happens again, but with added drunkenness. Not one of them looks one way, never mind both. The beaches of Copacabana, Ipanema, Sao Conrado and Barra da Tijuca all have wonderful scenery to distract you before you reach the Reserva, with the Marapendi Lagoon on one side and the beach on the other, although a couple of Frogger crossings of the highway are necessary.

Passing through the time-trial start-line in Recreio, you start the rolling Grumari Circuit. Here, the ‘cycle-path’ is a few painted signs on the road, and impatient drivers completely ignoring it as they brush past to save themselves valuable seconds on the journey. There are regular road signs too, the old ones full of bullet holes were replaced before the World Cup. There was a sign with a bike on it once, but one afternoon of New Year’s Eve, a car coming down the hill managed to leave the road, took down the new sign, and rolled to a stop by the canal, upside down, smashed to pieces and with blood on the inner roof. Happy New Year.

A quick stop at Praia do Secreto, the secret beach hidden in the rocks, is possible here, with stunning views back the way you just came. The next bend brings the beautiful little Prainha into view, a surf beach corralled by mountains covered in Atlantic Rainforest. Here you can spot the scarlet Brazilian tanager, various monkeys, collared anteaters (even in the surf!), and maybe even a constrictor or two curled up in the trees. A short, sharp climb takes you over to Grumari if the road hasn’t been blocked by falling rocks at this point, as it was a few years ago. You can see rocks propped up with concrete on your right, a common sight in Rio.

Grumari is another wild, surf beach and the descent down there can be taken quickly but the pave that began on the flat was a chain-banger, supplemented by cars reversing out of blind parking spots into your way. You can always slow down, and even stop to take a look at Abricó, the nudest beach hidden amongst the rocks at this end of Grumari. The pavé used to run the whole 3km of the beach but now most has at least some asphalt behind the dunes and tatty beach bars. The sharpest climb of the route begins as you head over to Barra da Guaratiba, up to 18% and a couple of hairpins. Keep an eye and an ear out for the amphibian-like bark of toucans at the top, and also for the beautiful views from a remarkably ugly restaurant. Point de Grumari has fabulous panoramas to distract you from its new warehouse extension, looking out over the mangrove islands and curving beach of Restinga da Marambaia, and over a large section of the Costa Verde, Brazil’s spectacular emerald coast, including Ilha Grande in the distance. The steep descent here has added difficulty with drivers screeching their way up as they occupy most of the corners, although at least the collection of pot-holes connected by short strips have been replaced by almost smooth tarmac.

The flat straight between the mangroves is known as ‘The Anglo-Saxon Section’ but only by me. This is where there are more language and sign-language lessons for careless Brazilian drivers than any other part of the route. The buses racing each other to the next speed-bump on a road with no space regularly try to shave your left handlebar. You can always duck into the Sitio Burle Marx gardens for some respite, or stop to eat oysters and marvel or pity at the clicking crabs suspended from the roadside stalls.

The smooth climb of Grota Funda, the deep cave that is now a road tunnel comes next, a nice roll for a few km. The tunnel was only opened a few years ago, yet trucks are prohibited from using it, so they will always be your company on the way up, and to overtake on the way down. Truck drivers tend to be more cyclist-friendly than any other type of Brazilian driver though, and try to get you plenty of room on the road. Winding back to the beach road, the brand new asphalt makes a massive difference here, although the edges of the tight road still have grates at the old level, which are definitely best avoided. I also once had an open-backed truck full to the brim with shit spilling a little of its load on me down here.

Back on the beach road, and a little detour off it takes you to the urban caiman, the hardest animals in Rio and possibly the world, including Brutus, the toughest of them all and who we feed regularly with meat and fish leftovers. He comes when called now, our very own pet caiman. Look out for his missing back left foot, but do it with your nose closed. The lack of proper sanitation in Rio is very noticeable here in the Corredor Verde, the sarcastically-named (I presume) Green Corridor. The caiman in the oily waters of the Corredor Merde are probably the least dangerous creatures you and your bike will meet all day. Even the cute and harmless capybara of the Reserva can cause trouble if a family of them appears from the brush in the late afternoon, as has happened to me before. Running into the pig-sized daddy would cause more damage than the legendary Tour de France Labrador.

Back through to Sao Conrado and then another climb up the side of Pedra Bonita, with the imposing Pedra da Gavea monolith behind, and colourful hang-gliding wings overhead, you enter the Tijuca Forest National Park. Monkeys running on two legs while carrying arms-full of fruit are a possible hazard here. Around to the Vista Chinesa, then an adrenaline-inducing 4km winding 10% descent through the forest and down to the Botanical Gardens, with traffic to overtake during the week, and hikers to impress or to avoid as the road closes on weekends. As long as nobody taking photos gets in your way, this is definitely the most fun part of the route, and built for a top-tuber for anybody who thinks they could stay ahead for the final flat 12km along the beaches and back to Copacabana.

This being Rio, there are added obstacles for the regular cyclist that the professionals shouldn’t have (although you never know!). Luckily for the professionals, they don’t have to confront the Avenida Niemeyer coast road, with Keanu Reeves seemingly skidding buses around the corners. It was actually safer to cycle on for four months earlier this year, until the first big wave took down the criminally flimsy ‘most beautiful cycle path in the world’ and killed two cyclists.
Getting pushed off your bike and watching a group of local kids walk away with it is about the lightest possible outcome of a bike robbery in Rio, and there has been a spate of them recently. Sometimes in this city, the fastest road bike is not always the best one to ride. A rusty Mary Poppins might get you there in a far safer way.

So if you’ve managed to survive all of this intact, with your bike still rolling, and with most of it still between your legs, you definitely deserve some kind of medal!          

Around Brazil – Porcaria de Janeiro

The period around New Year is the great unifying time in Rio de Janeiro, and the beach is the great unifying place, more than any other in both cases. Everyone is on the beach at midnight as the New Year begins, and everyone is equal on the sand, in the sea and under the fireworks. All types of people are there mixed together, from the rich Zona Sul types of European and Mediterranean ancestry to the poorer people of the Zona Norte and favela communities, often of African and indigenous blood, all colours and all backgrounds are united by one thing – they all leave their litter on the beach.

Copacabana Beach on 1 January apparently has the largest single regular clean-up operation on the planet, and this would be no surprise to anyone who has spent that night, or a Saturday or Sunday afternoon at the beach in Rio. The sand is almost covered in rubbish with New Year champagne bottles embellishing the general waste of crisp and cigarette packets, flyers, beer and soft drink cans, plastic bottles and bags galore. At the end of a regular afternoon you can find all these things and even occasional used tampons and nappies if you are lucky. The justification that it keeps somebody in job, heard regularly from people across the economic spectrum, just doesn’t wash. People get paid to clean the streets and your car, but throwing your litter around in them doesn’t make any more sense there either. Perhaps the poorer people don’t know any better and the richer people don’t take their maids to the beach to clean up after them, I don’t know, but generally if you see people taking their litter away with them from Ipanema Beach, they are almost guaranteed to be gringoes. Not always though, because only today a Brazilian mother and daughter were filling up carrier bags between them with other peoples’ litter, three bags full between them and they’d hardly left their canga.

This is not the behaviour of the average middle class carioca though, the only people you find collecting litter on the beach usually are the cata lata people. It has long been my feeling that those who collect your aluminium cans from the beach are generally the most respectful, courteous people in the whole of Rio. It feels like almost the only ones sometimes. Having watched the wonderful Waste Lands film about the project of artist Vik Muniz in Jardim Gramacho, I had to expand this feeling to include people who collect litter all around the city.  Jardim Gramacho was the city dump on the edge of Guanabara Bay in the Zona Norte, the largest waste facility in South America and possibly even the world until it closed in 2012. No surprise that Porcaria de Janeiro produces so much waste with the uncaring attitude of most residents to leaving litter in beautiful places and recycling none of it. Even the children’s games and the religious ceremonies of Rio leave litter everywhere. Kids leaving broken kites on every street, while the macumba rituals leave the beaches full of candles, bottles, plastic cups and containers full of food for the rats and pigeons to enjoy.

Hopefully, if and when Tiao and Zumbi from Jardim Gramacho enter into the political world of Rio and possibly even the Zumbi Nation of Brazil, they might help to change those attitudes a little. I won’t spoil the film for anybody but it is as uplifting as it should be depressing, and another of Brazil’s Great Films of the past decade or so.

In the meantime, the beaches fill with litter which blows into the sea, the turtles and rays are poisoned by it, the drains block with it and cause all kinds of storm chaos, flooding and maybe even contribute to the landslides that are becoming a regular feature of life around the state. A little more education (especially for the educated cariocas) and lot more recycling facilities would help. Rio is expecting a whole load of visitors from abroad in the coming years, and if the proud cariocas want to show the best side to their city and their state, then the first thing that they should do is to stop visiting those beautiful beaches and leaving them looking so ugly. A small step to help turn Porcaria de Janeiro back into the marvellous city that it once was.

Statues & Self-Worth

Another year, another Jesus statue.

In November 2010, Poland launched their bid for the Guinness Book of Records with their 33m tall Pomnik Chrystusa Króla, Christ the King. Some people claim that it is the tallest statue of Jesus in the world, others say that the 2m high golden crown that takes it over the limit disqualifies it. Either way, the statue is a winner for the town of Swiebodzin and its 21,000 people. Catholic pilgrims now travel from far and wide to look at a plaster and fibreglass statue stuck on top of a mound of rubble. The recent benefits to the local economy may mean that he is not alone for long as an Absurdly Tall Jesus Statue in a Small Eastern European Town.

Now Peru wants to get in on the act. Lima is constructing its own statue of Jesus on Morro Solar just to the end of Lima’s main beaches, south of the city and the touristic districts of Miraflores and Barranco. The colossal statue is a pet project of the colossal ego (according to Wikileaks’ US Diplomatic Cables) of Alan Garcia. The President of Peru has decided to leave a gift to his nation, although he somehow seems to have managed to sneak in a whole statue and put it on a prominent city hill without anybody else in the city knowing, including the mayor.

Limeño Jesus was just about all paid for by the Brazilian engineering firm Odebrecht, who were also given the contract to build the trans-continental highway that recently connected the two countries. Before you can say ‘condition-of-the-bid’, the million dollar man will be up and looking out to sea, while Limeños look at him from all over the city.

The statue will bear a close resemblance to our very own Cristo, and at 37m tall will be very nearly 7m taller, not counting plinths of course. This fact alone may prove to some that the statue will be far more of a tribute to The President himself than to the relationship of his country with Brazil, but reports of the statue bearing a very close resemblance to Alan Gabriel Ludwig Garcia Perez are surely way off the mark. At least until he grows a beard perhaps.

So Lima Jesus will be the tallest Jesus statue in the world, taking the crown (ha!) from Cristo de la Concordia of Cochabamba in Bolivia... of course... you all knew that, right? Like quest to build the tallest building in the world, or the US/Soviet Union Arms Race, this Largest Jesus Statue competition seems to have grown legs (another ha!) and could be just as pointless and seemingly endless as the other two.

So many towns and cities around the world want to have their own Jesus statue, and I’ve seen a few in South America of very differing qualities, including the marvellously tacky Cristo Luz in Balneario Camboriu, Santa Catarina.

We all know that none of them can remotely compare to the best though.

The beauty of Cristo Redentor on top of Corcovado in Rio de Janeiro lies not just in the originality, the fine art deco lines of the statue itself, his iconic status or his age. As with property, it is location, location, location. The crazy idea that putting an enormous statue on top of a just about vertical 710m high mountain takes Cristo to places which other Jesus statues can’t reach. He is also far less intrusive up there, especially as a ghostly presence at night with swirling clouds. At Carnaval time he lights up in different colours. There are some tourist attractions in the world that are tourist attractions for a reason, and the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio is definitely one of them. The views of the city are incomparable, perhaps only Cape Town has similar views from so high up, right on top of the city. With such a wonderful location, the Rio Jesus should be clearly the Best Jesus Statue in the World, and size does not always matter. Neither does the fact that he disappears from view occasionally in the clouds of Tijuca Forest.

But he still isn’t the best. He isn’t the only one who disappears from view regularly. The Buenos Aires Jesus in the Tierra Santa Park also appears and disappears. I choke with laughter every time I see him rise. Unbeatable.

Understanding Brazil – General Elections

The 2010 elections in Brazil threw up many stories, some of which seemed to pass the foreign news agencies by a little. Dilma Rousseff not quite becoming Brazil’s first female president was the dominant story, while Green Party eco-warrior Marina Silva quietly impressed just about everybody with a dignified campaign and exit. She might make a bigger splash in 2014, especially if she can associate her campaign with a successful Brazil team winning the World Cup on home soil.

Romario and Bebeto can look to reform their 1994 World Cup winning Seleçao strike partnership as Rio de Janeiro Federal Deputy and State Deputy respectively. Neither made rocking baby cradles in celebration as far as anybody knows. Romario was once memorably described as playing football ‘like a lizard slithering across the rocks’. This kind of ability could come in very useful when it comes to a life in Brazilian politics.

The ‘comedy’ angle of the campaign was provided by Tiririca, a kind of unfunny clown who has his own tv shows and has appeared on others. Knowing that being an unfunny clown does not preclude a person from taking part in politics in Brazil, he declared himself for the post of Federal Deputy for Sao Paulo with a winning campaign slogan. ‘What is it that a Federal Deputy does anyway? In truth, I don’t know. But vote for me and I will tell you’. Well over a million people voted for him, comfortably the most votes won by any Federal Deputy in the whole of Brazil, and the second most in Sao Paulo State history. Whether such honesty can find a place in Brasilia remains to be seen, as it appears moves have already been made to keep him out of there. Francisco Everardo Oliveira Silva, to call him by his real name, has unfortunately already had his honesty called into question. Perhaps his declaration that ‘Worse than it is now, it won’t remain’ rubbed a few people up the wrong way. He also declared his ability to read and write as sufficiently high to enter into Brazilian politics, which requires an exam to be passed, when in reality this son of the Ceara coast in the north-east may have the kind of literacy level to be expected from somebody who began working in a Brazilian circus at the age of eight. Perhaps it is true, or perhaps this voting power has frightened those in his way who have turned to the dark arts in order to keep out this true Clown of the People.

Tiririca can always learn to read and write properly of course, although it may be a little too late for him. Such a lack of literacy earlier in life has been no barrier to Marina Silva’s political career as yet. Another issue that appears not to have been a barrier for our hero is that he was once prosecuted for racism, after one of his ‘comedy’ songs compared a black woman’s hair to a brillo pad and said that she smelt worse than a gamba. Children’s entertainment such as this could be the future of Brazil with him pulling the puppet strings in Brasilia.

That Tiririca was not the biggest clown with shady history involved in the Brazilian General Election of 2010 should not be a big surprise to anybody who has ever lived in Brazil, and taken a passing interest in the politics of the country. Or even watched a novela. The election story that should embarrass Brazil more than that of Tiririca is still that of Fernando Collor.

Fernando Collor de Mellor, 32^nd President of the Federal Republic of Brazil from March 1990 to December 1992, puts the achievements of Tiririca and every other Brazilian politician in the shade. After the huge Globo TV Network helped to bring him to power in order to prevent Lula’s first bid being successful, Fernando immediately disappeared on holiday for 6 weeks. His brief period of office was characterised by his right hand man and accountant PC Farias helping to salt away billions of dollars from the federal coffers into their own secret accounts. After being impeached in 1992, he later ran away to Miami and was there when his old friend Farias was murdered in 1996. Once the time to prosecute him had run out, he returned to Brazil, and in 2002 tried once again to become the Governor of Alagoas State. He failed, but in 2006 he was voted in as a Senator instead, after professing support for his erstwhile rival Lula. He failed in his run for Governor in 2010, although he did manage to win almost 400,000 votes, at 30% a reasonable effort in such a small state.

Whether the ongoing amazement that is Collor’s durable political career lasts longer than that of the professional clown remains to be seen, but whatever happens you can be sure that the 2014 election and the preceding World Cup shenanigans will throw up more over-the-top, highly unrealistic stories of greed, power, corruption and lies that will outshine even the most ridiculous novela. Such is the world of Brazilian politics.

Around Brazil – Oktoberfest Parade in Blumenau

Oktoberfest in Blumenau was never top of the list for Brazilian cultural events that I needed to attend. Even with Blondie’s relatives in the area, it didn’t appeal because going to a German festival while in South America just seems wrong. I’ve been to plenty of German beer festivals and always had a fantastic time there, but they had the added advantage of being in Germany, and full of Germans, and full of German beer. I didn’t imagine it could be this way in Brazil, although at least Oktoberfest in Blumenau is actually in Oktober.

Blumenau was founded in 1850 by Hermann Blumenau and his group of German immigrants. They headed up the Itajaí River in Santa Catarina past the floodplains on each side, possibly filled with flowers at that time as they are now filled with paddy fields and cattle. With a name that means Floodplain in Bloom in German, he must have felt immediately at home and decided to stop where the green hills on each side converged and their boat couldn’t travel much up into the mountains. The scenery may have reminded the fresh immigrants of home, with tree-covered hills and fertile land to grow the things that Germans love, such as hops and wheat amongst the native fruits.

They grew families too, with Blumenau having a high percentage of blond people, some who still speak German as a first language at home and have Portuguese tinged with Teutonic accents. With such a strong Germanic influence, perhaps it was no surprise that after the floodplains flooded in 1983 and Blumenau was cut off from the world for a few weeks that the locals turned to the fatherland for inspiration. With most Brazilian beers having been brewed by German immigrants with their pilsner knowledge, the idea was to start an Oktoberfest to cheer up the town. It worked quite well. Just over twenty years later and the town is famous throughout Brazil for its huge festival, the largest in South America.

Much as in Rio, there are also parades preceeding the weekend days of the seventeen day cervejaganza. The idea for us was to watch the parade and laugh at people we knew wearing lederhosen and dirndl. But our blond-haired blue-eyed Brazilian met with something of an accident as he was playing bowls on the night of his birthday a week before. While examining who was closest, the rival team hurled down their final bowl, slammed the jack into the air and straight into his conkers. The pain was so bad that he was carried home in the back of the pick-up. After arriving home, things got even worse for him but I should not go into such private details, suffice to say that he would not be leaving the house for the his club’s desfila. He’d only just bought a brand new pair of lederhosen for the occasion. We were offered their place in the line-up. Wearing the outfit. Now many gringoes can say they’ve taken part in one of Brazil’s largest cultural events wearing a Carnaval costume, but not many can say they’ve taken part in one wearing a German costume. How could we say no – it sounded like there may be some quality comedy involved as well as free beer and free entrance into the arena.

An afternoon of dressing up and giggling followed, with some dance moves learnt from youtube. Hats were to be worn, hair was to be rolled into buns and long white socks were to be bought. I never thought I could look forward to wearing leather shorts and dancing amongst large German men with moustaches, I’m not that kind of guy. But by Saturday afternoon I was already drunk with excitement and laughter, and still 12 hours away from the finish line of the night. This was really going to be a marathon not a sprint.

The reason that Oktoberfest was founded in October, the reason that those floodplains were full of flowers, and the reason that the area is so green is because the mountains behind attract the clouds. In spring it rains regularly and heavily in Blumenau and Saturday was one of those times. The clouds came down the valleys and obscured our view of the town in the afternoon. The phone call came half an hour before we were due to start. Cancelled. My Big Moment blown. I don’t want to hear that ‘Rained on Your Parade’ phrase, thanks.

Around Brazil – Praia do Rosa

The mainland of Santa Catarina has so many fantastic beaches that it would take months to visit them all. If you only have time for one, then Praia do Rosa is as good a choice as any. As well as great surf and great scenery (including the whale watching of course), the town itself has a twinkling charm that can also be found in places such as Arraial d´Ajuda or Jericoacoara. Unlike some of the more residential beaches, Praia do Rosa always seems to have that holiday feeling and doesn´t empty, even in the winter months of south Brazil. You can still find candle-lit restaurants open all year round here.

The bumpy, sandy roads help give Praia do Rosa the air of undeveloped beach town, yet this is also partly because the residents of the town appear to care more about their environment than many other places in Brazil. Construction has largely been limited to two stories, and the hills at the northern end of the beach protect it from the predatory eye of developers. The southern end houses some historic boat houses and also had prehistoric rock carvings (in Brazil terms), which were sadly destroyed some years ago.

Being set on a hill, one of the beauties of Praia do Rosa is that many of the small pousadas come with views of the beach. Falling asleep to the noise of the waves breaking on the shore, one of the most helpful sounds for drifting off, is something that I haven´t had enough of in Brazil. With a visiting mother to impress, and wanting her to leave Santa Catarina with memories of more than the days of rain that we´d had recently, we had to go for a Room With A View. We got just that. With a view of the whole beach at night, I couldn´t wait to wake up next morning for sunrise. The sun reflecting from the blue Atlantic Ocean, with surfers already bouncing in the waves below us is the kind of first sight of the day that I don´t wake up to often enough in Brazil.

With some of the best surf in Brazil on your doorstep, the very best kitesurfing just around the headland at Ibiraquera, the ASP World Championship Tournament event for the professionals just down the road at Imbituba, and the best whale-watching in Brazil also leaving from the port there and taking you to all three beaches, this is the perfect place to base yourself for a few days. Trails take you over the headlands to other quieter, pine-fringed beaches such as Praia Ouvidor and Praia Vermelho. If you can´t walk that far and the sea looks too rough, there are enough lagoas in the dunes behind the beach, and over the hill behind or leading from the dunes at Ibiraquera to keep you entertained.

As you would expect of a surf town, the streets are busy at night with plenty of bars and restaurants to pass the time. Some of the most charming pousadas with the best views in Brazil (we stayed at Vigia das Marés, with Nelson being a complete fountain of information on everything about the area), and plenty of cheap apartments to rent, just about everybody can experience the delights of Praia do Rosa – undoubtedly one of those special places in Brazil.

Around Brazil – Whale-Watching in Santa Catarina

The Whales are Here! Santa Catarina whale-watching season began in July with the arrival of the first three Southern Right Whales of the 2010 season. The Instituta Baleia Franca (IBF) had a little ceremony to open observation season after two adults and one calf were spotted playing around off Praias Ibiraquera and Ribanceira, between Imbituba and Praia do Rosa. Local authorities enjoyed a little jolly for the opening ceremony at Pousada Vida Sol e Mar in Praia do Rosa, which had already been organised. The three whales timed things perfectly and saved the local dignitaries the embarrassment of opening... nothing much.

The whales continue to visit the beaches and bays of Florianopolis and the rest of Santa Catarina through until October or November time. Whale-watching as an activity can be enjoyed at many of the beaches, with a little luck. Favourite beaches on the island for the whales include Moçambique & Barra da Lagoa, Armação, Matadeiro (where they were once herded into the sand for slaughtering - hence the name of the beach) and Pântano do Sul.

From the sands and the headlands of all these beaches, it is possible to see a whale or few going through their morning... their morning what? Nobody really knows why the whales come so close to shore at this time of year. They only seem to be playing, rolling around on top of each other, flapping the water with their flukes (a technical term that only those of us who have broken our whale-watching virginity are allowed to use – ‘fins’ to the rest of you), blowing, diving, breaching (another term) and all kinds of interesting behaviour. One theory has it that they hide their calves from the orcas of the area, but if that was really the case, then why do they only appear close to the shores in the morning? Do orcas only eat breakfast? Do they have an afternoon siesta?

There are more whales up and down the coast of Santa Catarina, with by far the best place to see these huge, beautiful, curious creatures being a boat trip out from Imbituba. This port town lies around 90km south of Floripa, slightly further south than Garopaba and Praia do Rosa. There are more whales per beach than anywhere else in Brazil (don’t check that stat please, I just guessed) and they like to hang around the waters of Rosa, Ibiraquera and Ribanceira in particular. These surf and kite-surf beaches can all be a little wild for putting a boat out, so the best idea is to drive to Imbituba.

The whale-watching voyages are run by IBF and are properly organised trips, with the whole coast being an Area of Environmental Preservation.

Luis and his team of guides run them from their office at the old Imbituba train station. Before the trip, a little education video is shown to the passengers about the work of the IBF and about the whales in general. The boats head out of the port and along the coast to where the whales have been sighted by fishermen that morning. The boats don’t drive too close to the whales as it can be disturbing. With calm seas, the boats can stop though, and the whales come nosing around to see if their visitors are worth impressing. This affords wonderful photo opportunities, and is one of the only places on earth that you can possibly come within touching distance of such a large creature in the wild.

Florianopolis is the usual starting point for tours, with Praia do Rosa certainly being the best place to stay close to Imbituba. Staying overnight there is not necessary to make the boat trip, but if you want to give yourselves the best chance of being nose to nose with a Southern Right Whale, a night in Rosa is a must. This way, if the seas are too rough for the humans to brave, or the whales are playing elsewhere along the Santa Catarina coastline, you can always have another try the next day.

The arrival of Brazil’s largest creatures is not guaranteed, but a memorable encounter with nature certainly is if they are around – especially if you find yourselves being interviewed for one of the Sunday night Brazilian TV Specials, as my own mother did!

Cultural Brazil – The Alambique

Você pensa que cachaça é água

Cachaça não é água não

Cachaça vem do Alambique

E água vem do ribeirão

This Carnaval Classic was my first introduction to Alambique, learning the words of a Brazilian song while dancing behind a Rio trio electrico driving along the Ipanema Beach road one sunny afternoon. I looked on maps and in guide books and couldn’t find this place from where Brazil’s famous firewater originated. It took me a few months, maybe even a year – not of constant searching obviously – before I realised that Alambique was more of a place in the house rather than a place in the world.

I had never visited one though. Having seen the menu of a cachaçaria, I knew that Minas Gerais has hundreds, the mountains of the south have a few, and even places I have visited such as Paraty have plenty. The original alambiques were powered by water running down mountain streams, with the water-wheels turning the grinding wheels to squeeze the caldo de cana from the harvested plants.

I also knew that my Florianopolis had many little alambiques around the coastline and in the hills, but that almost all of them had closed down. I felt a little shame that I had been in Brazil so long without actually visiting one, even though I don’t particularly enjoy drinking pinga pura. It hurts too much. Still, after an afternoon’s struggling through half-closed trails in rural Floripa hills, with Blondie scratched to bits and turning into a sulky 6 year old girl while also blaming me for her choice of footwear, I celebrated like we’d arrived at Eden when I saw the magical sign – Alambique do Zeca. It explained why I just thought I’d seen somebody walking down the trail with a urine sample for the doctor.

One of the only two alambiques left on the island, the other run by his brother, Ze makes what is regarded by those who know as some of the finest cachaça in Brazil. So he told us. He built the barn himself, and I can’t imagine any alambique looking more perfect – wooden wheels; packed-soil floor; stained and stencilled barrels; smoke; copper furnace; and the smell of all those things and more, mingling together to enter your senses, exactly the same earthy odour found in any alambique in the colonial history of the country. Brazil was built on that scent.

The whole cachaça process is simple but labour-intensive and done by Ze’s own fair hand, the planting, harvesting and processing of the sugar cane. He leaves the juice to ferment on its own, before stoking his fires and distilling the proceeds to produce one of the simplest spirits around. The evil liquid is then transferred to barrels of different sizes and colours to sit for a year, two years, five years, however long our cachaça expert prefers.

We arrived in daylight and left in the dark, stumbling down the down the dusty track with the lights of the beach villages twinkling way below. It didn’t seem so long, but we went through the different types - white and yellow; and the different flavours – apple, ginger, banana, honey, plum and one rocket fuel that would only bow down to absinthe. I could barely remember my own name when we hit the trail with still miles to go until we found the road. I remember some of the story though – that in spite of being one of Brazil’s oldest traditions, the alambique is a dying art. The artesans are prevented from burning their fields to regenerate the soil. I can understand if this if for environmental reasons, although it makes me wonder if the big business of Brazil had a hand in such decisions. It would be a shame if such an important part of Brazilian culture was to disappear at the hands of the larger factory operations.

Everyone should visit an alambique if spending enough time in Brazil. Do it soon though – while you still have a rustic old alambique to visit.

Tainha Time in Florianopolis

One surprising fact about Brazil that doesn’t fit with our lazy Latin stereotypes is the amount that people work. Not only does everybody in Brazil do something, from those selling doces on the buses and beaches to Paulista high-rise office workers, but they do it for long hours. At home, being a student means staying in bed smoking maconha all day and not being capable of making your two hours of Art History or Theology lectures a week. In Brazil, even students work full days then study another four hours at night, 5 nights a week.

Nobody works harder throughout the country than the fishermen of the southern coasts during Tainha Time. In the late autumn and winter months of May, June and July, the coastal waters of Santa Catarina are inundated with huge shoals of tainha, a type of mullet. Following tradition that has been maintained since the very first Azorean settlers arrived on the island, the local fishermen take to the open seas in their wooden boats day after day to make hay as the sun shines.

While the boats may have motors, the nets don’t. With no winches, all the catches are landed by hand. The nets are large to allow the young tainha to escape, while the adults are taken in great numbers into the boat. The typical Floripa Fisherman is short and stocky, with a deep tan and arms that make Popeye look like me. While out at sea, it is impossible to appreciate the amount of work that goes into pulling a net with perhaps dozens and dozens of 3-5kg fish.

Boat after boat arrives on the beach or at the dock to unload huge catches. Enormous nets are also spread out from the beaches, and the whole male half of the community, kids and adults, joins in the pull. The sands are soon piled full of hundreds of tainha, glistening and flopping around in the winter sun. One single cast into the waves with a personal net can bring in three or four at once.

As an insight into the traditional lifestyles that still form a big part of Florianopolis life, a trip to see the daily tainha catch arrive is very worthwhile. A helping hand may also result in you being one of the many people walking the streets of Floripa carrying a large fish as thank you for your help.

Clean it, gut it, fill it with fresh coriander and garlic, wrap it in aluminium, then put in the oven or the churrasco for 30 minutes. Leave the foil off for another 10 minutes or so and you can eat your catch.

President Lula in Florianopolis

Everybody’s favourite cuddly politician, President Lula recently visited Florianopolis and his visit was notable for a number of reasons, principally for the amount of money that the Federal and State Governments spent in relation to the visit.

Lula visited one of the traditional Floripa seafood restaurants, declaring that everybody who visits the Magic Island should try the Sequencia de Camarão dishes. He didn’t recommend the squid, unsurprisingly, perhaps attempting to preserve the species, but the idea for that sequence is just the same. Plate after plate arrives at your table, garlic, steamed and milanesa, until you really can’t look any more prawns (or squid) in the eye. Just as you are thinking about walking off the prawns with a stroll in the sun along the shores of Lagoa da Conceição, the main course arrives. The fish is usually eaten, the batatas fritas and salada too, but the rice usually goes back to the kitchen hardly touched. Once you have eaten one or two of these sequencias, you learn that when the menu says 2 pessoas, there is often enough for five people.

This immense amount of food surprises first time visitors, so if Lula and his entourage ordered the amount of food specified for each of them, there would likely have been an immense amount of waste. When the money comes out of the public funds to pay for this, there probably wouldn’t have been many complaints, and certainly not when compared to the money spent on the rest of the Floripa trip.

Lula was attending the World Trade and Tourism Council conference, one that has been many years in the organizing. As he arrived, he would have seen the huge adverts on the road out of the airport proclaiming Costão do Santinho to have been voted the Best Large Resort in Brazil this year. No mention of who voted for these awards, but if something smells a little fishy, it might not be your main course. The resort is a monstrosity dominating the corner of a beautiful beach on the Atlantic side of the island, with only surrounding dunes preventing the whole beach being developed. The resort’s owners have had a couple of run-ins with the Policia Federal over the years, for such minor crimes as not taking any notice at all of environmental regulations. Nothing ever comes of these cases though.

As well as spending millions of reais just to bring the gravy train to Floripa, there were a few hidden extra expenses, although not so well hidden that they haven’t made headlines in Brasilia. Being Brazil’s Best Large Resort, you would expect the price of hosting and housing so many conference delegates for the week to be very high. The resort had a new auditorium built especially for the conference. The accounts may not show, but the rent for using this auditorium was apparently unbelievably extortionate. Roughly the same price as it cost for the construction of the thing in the first place. Strange.

President Lula’s government agreed the price though, and will pay the bill using Brazilian taxpayers’ money, so surely all is above board. If this seems to the layman that the government is paying for the improvement of facilities at a privately-owned resort, the layman obviously doesn’t know the intricacies of government business. The fact that the owner of the resort is very good friends with the President of the Federation of Culture, who also happens to be the mother of the President of Embratur and friends with the Secretary of Tourism is completely unconnected of course, but if you would like to try to make connections for yourself, there are not too many dots to join.

Suffice to say that the next time Lula visits Florianopolis, whether he is still President of Brazil or not, he will probably not pay the rack rate for his stay in the Presidential Suite at Costão do Santinho.

Deported from Brazil? - continued

In the holding bay at Guarulhos Airport, I made friends with a Brazilian who had just been deported from the US after a seven-year overstay and a few months stay under lock and key. It didn’t bode well. He had no money to catch the bus into the city. I couldn’t help him, Blondie had taken all mine, plus the cards and was running around Sao Paulo airport with a deadline of the morning flight back to Lima. If she didn’t pay, I was out of Brazil and back to Lima with no money and no cards of my own. The Big Boss had been fuming that we’d arrived in Brazil with no money. I couldn’t make him understand the situation, especially with no cards on me. I could have shown him via my Online Banking that I had a fortune in credit, many thousands of reais, just waiting for my card to become usable again. He wasn’t interested. He was a humourless fella, neatly shaved beard, one hand permanently in his pocket, pushing his jacket behind in a completely affected Miami Vice pose. If he fancied himself and his title, I certainly didn’t fancy my chances of getting back into Brazil if he had anything to do with it.

I also had plenty of time to wonder if this had all been a cunning Blondie plan. Now I could finally understand why she had been going out with me. Her patience and planning had paid off with her freedom and the key to my credit fortune. I laughed admiringly at the thought that it might be true. I had to wait in the departure lounge with no news from the world outside, watching English football on the screens for hours on end. Such torture. Meanwhile a frazzled Blondie was spending the last of our cash in an internet cafe, reversing the charges to her friends and family to find somebody with a spare few hundred reais. The internet cafe is another of the frustrations of Brazil not considering foreigners – you need a CPF number to register there. No foreigners can use that internet cafe in Guarulhos Airport.

The drama continued without me as the only person we knew with the means to pay had to finish their supermarket shopping before heading to the local airport Policia Federal while it was still open. It was all skin of the teeth stuff, with faxes crossing Brazil even though payments wouldn’t officially go through for three more days. All I did was try not to fall asleep all day, just in case I missed somebody. Don’t worry, I did suffer a little though, getting on for 18 hours without food by the time my favourite man returned at some point early evening. His lack of a sympathetic expression meant that I didn’t know what was going on. He didn’t say anything either way, but beckoned me downstairs. He seemed to be chewing his chewing gum with more facial muscles than before, so it could have been because he was angry that my fine had been paid. Or was it because he’d found another flight back to Lima... He didn’t let on.

We walked through departures and down to immigration without a word being said, me wondering all the time whether it was to pick up my bag from the holding bay for check-in and tchau, ate mais Brasil! He motioned me towards the same girl that had looked at me quizzically 12 hours before, and she smiled, stamped my passport a few times and I was in. I walked out of the arrivals terminal with a relieved smile, remembering the first time I had arrived in Brazil at the same spot a few years before. I’d come out of the gate and there had been nobody to meet me, the moment when I realised that I had no addresses or phone numbers for my friends in Sao Paulo, and I could have been stuck at the airport waiting for them forever. This time, Blondie was there, she hadn’t run off with my cards. I was even happier to be back in Brazil than the first time I had arrived.

Deported from Brazil?

If I was one of the only happy people in Lima Airport on the start of the journey back to Brazil, with flight vouchers and a day of shopping and hotel spa under our belts to finish our Peru trip, all for free, the Gods of Travel didn’t allow me to be smug for very long.

I can’t say that it was a big surprise to be honest. An outstanding fine from a previous overstay that I thought I’d paid in Buenos Aires was not the problem - being unable to pay it in any way when arriving in Guarulhos early on a Saturday morning certainly was. Brazil has many ways when it does not consider things from the estrangeiro angle. I didn’t really deserve much favour, but there might be people in the same situation who do and they’ll be stuck too.

If you have any fine to pay on your return to Brazil for overstaying a visa, my first advice is to use another entry point. Certain other borders around the edge of Brazil are a little more lax, with late night arrivals met by a one-man immigration team typed into a system with one finger on an archaic computer that doesn’t look like it will be connected to any kind of network. Guarulhos Airport in Sao Paulo is not so accommodating, and one of the only places where you are certain to get stopped, all details being electronically processed and listed.

So having been stopped, what can you do? The first frustration is that you can’t pay the fine by card, which I was happy to do. Most people re-entering Brazil with a fine to pay are unlikely to have many reais on their person. The immigration team were quite friendly, certainly not what you would find at Heathrow or any of the big US airports, and accompanied us around the airport, even removing their pig-proof gasmasks. No joy though. The second frustration is that you cannot buy local currency at the cambio houses with foreign cards. Both of these could easily come with a credit card surcharge on top, problem solved, taxi caught outside, sat in the house an hour later. My problem was that the shopping spree in Lima had been paid for with cash, and the withdrawals only arrived in my account the following day. I couldn’t take any more cash out that whole day. You can’t use foreign currency either, so anybody arriving alone and without the necessary Brazilian money would not have any way of paying without being able to enter the arrivals terminal.

With no friends in Sao Paulo having easy access to the cash I needed help from further away. Something like this sounds like a job for Western Union, or any other money transfer company. For some reason they don’t seem to like having offices in the airport. The nearest one was in the area, but you try convincing a taxi driver to take you 2 miles down a highway where walking is impossible when he could be taking people right across the city instead. They refuse, point blank. After all the morning’s fun, Blondie would never be able to walk there in time before it closed at midday. I was totally stuck. It began to look like I was going to have to live in The Terminal, at least until the Monday. I laughed to myself as we returned, thinking that living in the airport for a couple of days would make a good little travel story for me, and I had no problem with that. Accompanied by my laptop and with English football on the departure lounge televisions, this would not be a big hardship.

Things took a turn for the worse when Blondie left to try and organise the money, and I had to return to the holding bay. The Big Boss had arrived and was shouting at the staff for letting me out and for not sending me back to Lima immediately. He wanted me out as soon as possible, and my nerves started to jangle as all of a sudden my time in Brazil looked like it was coming to an end...

Swine Flu in South America?

A little insight into the Latin American psyche was possible recently during the almost non-existent Swine Flu epidemic. I don’t know if ‘stoic’ is a word that exists in Portuguese, or Spanish for that matter, but I would guess not.* There was much comedy to be found in the airports of South America during the first stages of the worldwide ‘crisis’. Returning to Brazil from Lima on the eve of a public holiday across the continent meant being in a busy international airport late at night, with queues snaking around the pillars, seats overbooked, flights missed, voices raised, staff hassled, arms waving and a general air of Latin irritation. Factor in the impending doom and disaster from those Mexican Pigs and a few staff in masks and the atmosphere was slightly hysterical and highly enjoyable.

My favourite people in the airport were two Brazilian ladies of meia-idade, both with masks tightly clamped to their faces, and shouting at each other across queues, as they were heading to different destinations. One was scared to return to her Lima hotel because of the crisis, the other scared to fly away. Their panic became more infectious than the disease ever could be as they spread rumours of four LAN Airlines staff having been taken ill on the flight in from Buenos Aires. Masks of all kinds were appearing in the check-in area, tied in all manner of ribbons, bows, and general attempts to appear like the poodles probably waiting at home.

The three hour check-in was in reality a three hour queue, with nothing much moving. It was never dull though, as along with our ladies we had one of the Brazilian Copa Libertadores teams, the Peruvian Davis Cup team and a female volleyball team all in the same line and all battling to stay together with all their equipment. Another queue was full of irate Argentineans who had no seats left on their flight. Nobody wanted to stay at risk in the airport.

We began to have some fun with them, talking loudly in Portuguese about our new friend, a lovely Mexican girl that we’d met in Cusco and seen again in Lima Airport a couple of days before. We hoped aloud that she’d made it back to her family’s pig farm safely. She’d been trying to return home after a tour of Peru as the flights began to get cancelled. Hardly the Last Flight out of Saigon, but a late connection almost made her miss what turned out to be the last flight to Mexico City. Probably for the best, because although we would have welcomed her to Brazil with open arms, I’m not sure she would have survived the lynching from our masked friends.

So when it finally came to check-in, the flight was only 45 minutes away. No problem though, because it was full. Or almost. The fraught girl offered us an extra night in Lima, accommodation and meals paid plus a decent amount of vouchers for our next trip. Staying in Lima? When Pig Flu might be flying all around us? Are you crazy? We were the only two happy people out of thousands in Lima Airport that night. We had to go through exactly the same process 24 hours later, with no improvement in the mood. Sadly the flight wasn’t full and they made us leave.

* - I know, really, those lessons haven’t been for nothing.

The Best Club in Brazil…?

I can boldly state, without fear of being completely wrong, that the best clubs in Brazil, perhaps even in South America, are in Santa Catarina.

There is no other place that has so many clubs ticking so many of the boxes that the best clubs need to have ticked. It begins with the music of course. To have the best music, you need to have the best DJ’s. The best DJ’s in the world come to South America for huge events such as Skolbeats in Sao Paulo, Reveillon in Rio, Carnval in Salvador and Creamfields in Buenos Aires. Names such as Fat Boy Slim, Sander Kleinenberg, Darren Emerson and Deep Dish have all made the journey down this way recently. There is little point in travelling thousands of miles just for one gig, so they generally squeeze in a bit of a warm-up a night or two before. More often than not, they visit clubs such as Warung, on Praia Brava above Balneário Camboriú, and El Divino, P12 and now Pacha close to or on Jurerê Internacional on Florianópolis.

Perhaps they come here because the atmosphere on the way to and inside these places is more relaxed than Rio, less shady than Salvador. Perhaps the people who make the journey from Curitiba, Porto Alegre and even Sao Paulo provide a more cosmopolitan crowd than clubs in Buenos Aires with porteños all seeming to hide their insecurities behind sunglasses while dancing in the same ´treading grapes´ style.

Being sited out of the cities, the clubs have scenery of beaches, mountains and lagoons that those of Sao Paulo can never hope to match. There is nothing like being able to see the sea while dancing in a club.

My favourite club in Brazil, South America, perhaps even the world, doesn´t have this vista do mar though. Much like the best clubs in Ibiza are up in the hills away from the strip (and away from the drunken British holidaymakers!), Brazil´s Best Club is tucked away down the backroads on the rural side of the motorway from the mini-Rio of Balneário Camboriú. It makes a strange contrast to park outside a wooden cow shed, with the attendant smells of four legged beasts, while parking alongside some 4x4 beast that may have never been so close to mud before. The church-going villagers of interior Santa Catarina must wonder.

As with the best clubs in Santa Catarina, Ibiza and the world at large, it is an open-air venue, one tented roof to keep off the rain. As well as the music, the atmosphere and the setting, you also need beauty on the inside. I will put this place alongside anywhere you care to name in any place in the world. There are more stunning girls (and boys) than any club I have ever visited. The VIP Area earned the nickname Silicon Valley, but unlike in clubs built for being seen, this is a true dance club. Girls may be wearing floaty feminine summer dresses and high heels, but this does not stop them trucking on through the madrugada.

2008 finished in real style as we took our visiting friends there to see Paul van Dyk on 30^th December, warming up for his Rio Reveillon gig on Barra de Tijuca. You can be as astounded as our gringoes were as the sun comes up over the surrounding mountains with thousands of beautiful people from all over South Brazil still partying hard around the lakes and stairs of the club, as well as filling the space under the tent. As the dark of night and the grey of dawn turn to blue daylight, you will also begin to appreciate how well-named is my Green Valley.