Annoyed from to much rain I turned the state Minas Gerais my back and made a "quick" bus ride of only 18 hours to Porto Seguro in the Bahia. As every "gringo" (= foreigner) I fell into the same trap like already in Spain 2 years ago. First of all an oldery guy in the bus getting on my nerves since he always looked at me and starting a consversation with me. But me with my sleep sickness was to tired to be friendly at all. I only want that everyone let me in peace. Later, I was really in a deep sleep, his guy waked me up at 11 p.m. only to offer me some potato chips and I got pretty grumpy with him. But well, one time everyone needs a toilet, my time was about 3a.m. at night where everyone was sleeping in the bus and felt that I was the only one who left the bus. Coming back from the toilet in this gas station in the middle of nowhere, how else should it be be, my bus ran away in front of my eyes with all my stuff in there...I was running behind it shouting to wait, but no chance! But coming back to the station desperately, suddenly the the potato chips guy stand next to me, telling me the bus will come back in some minutes and I was sooo pleased to him this time.
So, after 14hrs sleep and 2hours Spanish music lessons on my mp3-player (longer the battery doesn´t last) and further 2 hourse nature watching I arrived in Porto Seguro - the place where Brazilians history officially started on the 23.4.1500 when Pedro Alvares Cabral under Portuguese flag discovered Brazil. Actually it was only a 10days stop there to get fresh water, food etc. to move on to India where at this time fabulous wealth could be gained. Regarding this obvious lack of interest of Cabral in their beautiful country, the Brazilians didn´t name any place, street, monument or anything else named after him. So Porto Seguro, nowadays, is a famous holiday resort with palm fringed beaches and a quiet animated nightlife. Since I was totally alone on my hostel I can´t tel you a lot about the later one :(. My only social contact where I nice Brazilian family I met on the beach with 5 children and I hung up with there 3 young girls around 13-14yrs old who taught me some portuguese and gave me some Brazilian music lesions. So cute, they asked me where I would spent Christmas and they invited me in there house if I would like only knowing me for a couple of hours - extremly hospitable the people here. Well the only dark side or let´s better say red side of this nice day at the beach with them was that I totally forgot my poor white European skin between my tanned Brazilian family which turned out in I got a incredibly sunburn on my back. always good when you have to where a heavy rucksack on that :)...AUUUAA!! After the pain was over was a living potato in the skin.
So after 2 days I move forward north another 8hrs by bus to Itacaré. My guide only left 7 lines for this beautiful place mentioning anything about surf. In reality it´s the heaven on earth for surfers and hippies there - a tiny village, the hostel woman talked something about some crack problems, with lots of bars and the coolest beaches I saw so far...and finally lots of other backpackers here.
So the next 5 days were totally the contradiction to my lifestyle before - leisure time stress because I spend nearly whole the time with other people likewise my 29th birthday where I also present myself my first surf lesions...actually I only rented the board..as I told the life guard at the beach he should watch out for me because I am a very beginner, he couldn´t stand more than 5min watching me falling in the water again and again...so he sacrificed himself to help me =)..and I really progressed the next days there.
The cool thing at this tiny places like Itacaré, later also in Morro de Sao Paulo and Lençois - you get pretty quick integrated in the community there. After 2-3 days meet already shake a lot of hands while only make a small walk through the streets which on the other hand side makes it more difficult to leave such a pleasant and homey atmosphere. At the end the only things which separated me from being a native from there were some rastas and some tattoos. Really here at the seaside nearly everyone is very tattoos - huge tattoos. Perhaps I make my secret rainbow turtle tattoo dream on my ass true here :). And the dark side of Itacaré were the Mosquitoes at night...If I wouldn´t have had the cool "Biteaway tool" which kills the itchiness I would have died. So I couldn´t consider my room mates at night who had to bear a continuous "beep" at night, always when I used this wonderful tool...Sebastian, thanks again for this useful present!!
To get a rest from so much sport I left after 5 days to Morro de Sao Paulo, a nice town the island Tabaré. also here gorgeous unspoiled beaches, but more a kind of hip atmosphere with trendy bars at the beach.
..and also watching the sunset from a really chilly place on top of a mountain there was a highlight. We lied on some pillows, again with a caipi in a hand, watching the sun go down and hearing laid~back Brazilian music a girl played from the back with her guitar.
But so beautiful beach and sun are, after 1,5 weeks I need a change again...so back to the mountains for some days. Next stop: Lençois in the Chapada Diamantina - looking forward for some trekking in a natural park in Bahia.