Monday, January 19, 2009

Imabassai

Over the weekend Vilma and I went with 2 of her friends and her niece to this beach called Imbassai. It's located north of Salvador, about 65Km or so, and is one of the coolest places I have been to that's close to Salvador.

When you arrive, you park the car in a little village and walk to a bridge that crosses the river. At the bridge you can pay R$1.50 per person to go on this boat that takes you down to where the river meets the ocean (see above picture), or you can walk like 5-10 minutes to get to the same place. We walked.

At the point where the river meets the ocean, you can choose to sit at a beach bar (here they are called barracas, pronounced bah-ha-kahs) on the ocean side, or along the mouth of the river. We sat at the last barraca before the river meets the ocean, which was one of the most pleasant beach bar experiences I have ever had.

What's unique about this place is that because it's a river, there are no tides, and so the bars put their tables in the water. You can sit with your feet in the river, under an umbrella, and drink cold beer (or in my case agua de coco since I was driving), eat clams and acaraje, and watch all the folks doing crazy stuff in the river. Like this lady...
Here's a picture of one of the tables that is practically submerged!
And of course, what day at the beach would be complete without fried cheese:

And fresh, toasted cashews!

I had an amazing day of relaxation and respite from the city, and fully enjoyed the best of both worlds...river AND ocean!


1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I was wondering if you and/or any of your friend are aware of the international child abduction case. It involves an American 8 year old boy, a powerful brazilian lawyer from the state of RJ, his family and the natural father of the boy, the sole surviving biological parent of the boy. It has been all over the news here state side, yet due to the media gag that was some how imposed word is slow to spread. Your friend Rio Gringa has been following it also. The web site where you can get all the information and then some is www.bringseanhome.org.
I hope that you can help us as the more people from out side of the states, especially Brazilians, the better off we are.
thank you in advance.