Small town Brazil

I realised last night trying to sleep in the 15 degrees air conditionned bus that what I prefer when travelling is... travelling, i.e. when I am on the move. You get real excited and sometimes a bit nervous about your next stop: you do not know what to expect, who you will meet, where you are gonna sleep... and everytime it starts all over again: find a hostel, get your bearings, meet people, organise excursions, find the best and cheapest food...

Anyway, I am now lying in a hammock under a tree full of hummingbirds, in Lencois. Lencois is an old mining town, a 6h bus ride inland from Salvador. My original plan from Salvador was to get a boat to Morro Do Sao Paulo, a paradise island with very good vibes I had heard. But the weather was so bad yesterday that boats would not leave the mainland. And with rain in Salvador in low season and an empty hostel, what do you do? F*** all. So I jumped on the 1st opportunity to leave town and got a night bus to Lencois, in the heart of the Chapada Diamantina national park. To give you an idea, the park is larger than the Netherlands and offers wonderful landscapes, great walks, waterfalls, rivers, streams and simple, friendly and authentic people.


Going back to Lencois, I love the place, the best I have seen in Brazil so far. People are incredibly nice, there are almost no tourists and it is very pretty. You walk around the streets and locals salute you, an old man sitting on the pavement next to my hostel sings all day, house doors are open and let you observe people watching telenovelas (soaps) on TV... and a very strong caipirina will only cost you 3 reais (75p).


I just had a walk and I shook hands with last night´s barman, the shopkeepersaid hello and I realised the woman from the tourist information office knows me by my name. It is all a bit hippy and very chilled out here.

Wish European big cities were like that!