Recife, Brazil April 8, 2008

This was our last stop in Brazil. Giant city , over a million people. Brazil has 200 million with 150 million living on its coasts. The downtown is like any other- large, tall buildings intertwined with old churches and market squres, called pracas. We took the shuttle bus to the centro and then found a city bus to our day´s destination- Olinda. Olinda sits up on the hill about 6 miles north . The eastern part right on the ocean. It was settled by the Portugese. The streets are as steep as is physically possible to drive- narrow and , of course ,all cobble stone. The Cathedral de Se sits on the very top- sort of ugly- but a million dollar view through the thick jungle with sweet songed birds and multi-hued flowers looking down to the city of Recife and the turquoise Atlantic. We basically wandered the streets for a few hours gaping at the pastel colored houses. We went through every art gallery but never saw a painting that was "the one", It was hot and humid but so pleasant. Again not a soul spoke a word of English and almost no Spanish. They just do not get many tourists here. I really love the palms trees everywhere. The breezes are warm and you can hear Brazilian Samba everywhere you go. A municipal bus ride back for a dollar or 2 to the city. We did get kind of lost at that point so had to resort to a taxi for the ride back to the dock. No big deal. No internet though posting this a week late.