Lencois

Lencois

After Salvador we headed into O Sertao or the hinterland of the country inland. It was a vast area of little value to the bandeirantes who were looking for any 'get rich quick' scheme. They found no gold, silver or any other mineral worth exploiting so they left the area for settlers and farmers. It was only in 1822 when diamonds were found in the river beds and a mining rush developed reinforced by a rich discovery in 1844 which encouraged more miners. There were diamonds to be found but they were the lower quality smokey industrial diamonds rather than the gem stone quality that fortune seekers sought.

A bridge over a river en route to the Devils Hole, a swimming hole on a river where diamonds were found.

 A view down river from above the waterfall above the Devils Gole.

 Te swimming hole below the waterfall at Devil's Hole.

 Next was a trek up a butte with great views across the plateau to other buttes.

 One of the views back down the main road that passes through the national park.

 Another view from the top of the butte.

 And then there was a trip down a series of caves and this modest scrape in the ground indicated by our caving guide was the entrance to the cave system.

There were some wonderful stalactites and 'mites.

 Plus some columns where the two different types of formations had met to form columns.

 Plus plenty of unusual formations.

 And even some format.ions where some of the formations has upward facing structures where there had been a draft up through the cave

 A nearly formed column.

 And more structures.

 And there was an opportunity to snorkel in the crystal clear waters of the caves. 

Salvador

Salvador

I did a walking tour of the city. One side of the Igreja da Sao Francisco

 The stone cross in the middle of the main thoroughfare.

 The west entrance to Igreja são Francisco.

 Catedral Basilica.

 Universidade de Medicina.

 Igreja Rosario de Preto and the square where Michael Jackson did his dance routine.

 Looking out from the man square over the lower town and the commercial harbour.

 The old harbour now reserved for pleasure craft.

Municipal offices.

 This is how people get about the city which is built on two very different levels so there are a number of elevators to get people up and down between the two areas which cost just pence.

 The fort at the entrance to the old harbour.

 And there were dozens of other old buildings, both ecclesiastical and secular and after seeing so many so close together, I don't really want to see another church for a month!

Salvador

En route to Salvador, Brazil

We drove through some pretty scenery of rolling pasture as we made our way north.

 Plus of course a few vochos like this blue one...

 ...and one with  special paint job parked in a car park as we drove past and I was just lucky to have my camera in hand.

 Brazil has 7,000 kms of beautiful sandy beaches most of which w=are empty.

 It was a hot day so we stopped at a popular waterfall to cool off. The river was calm...

 bt the waterfall was a very popular place to splash about in.

 We stopped at Itacare for a camp on the beach in idyllic surroundings. Me up a tree.

 A view along the beach.

 A view back to the shore.

 The pretty post card picture harbour.

 And then we reached the ferry port to cross Baia do Todos os Santos, Brazil's largest bay to reach Brazil's third largest city of Salvador on the southern tip of the peninsular that creates the bay, a crossing  of nearly an hour.

 A view of the city shore line from the ferry.

 We found our hostel and unloaded the truck which was going to be parked in a truck park fot=r the next few days whilst we explored Salvador. Salvador used to be the capital of Brazil for more than two centuries before the sugar trade dwindled and Rio became the capital so it has a lot of colonial architecture but the only photo I took on the first night was of this former covent, now an old folks home.

Porto Seguro

Porto Seguro

We left Caravelas in the morning but not before I took this photo of the local church.

There were some unusual views en route north but this looks like a man made block but it is completely natural.

Porto Seguro was the place where Pedro Alvarez Cabral discovered Brazil and landed on the new continent. The old historic centre is located on the cliff top overlooking the port.

The beaches all along this coast are empty and all have beautiful clean and sandy beaches.

The church in the old historic centre of Porto Seguro.

Inside the church.

The museum.

The cross that the Portuguese erected on top of the cliffs.

Another old building, a warehouse.

The lighthouse that was erected on the top of the cliffs.

 The masts of the replica Portuguese ship.

 The entrance to the Epic Memorial to the Discovery.

 A side view of the ship.