Porto de Galinhas
Tamandaré was where the muffler fell off. We had literally laughed while watching someone’s muffler fall off a few days ago. Karma.
Porto de Galinhas (Ipojuca), is a nice beach town positioned right in front of a reef. This was a major slave trading port, even after it was outlawed, and named for the ‘chicken boats’ that carried the slaves. Now, they’ve decided to gloss over that history and instead put strange looking chicken sculptures all over town. Well, I guess that is better for tourism.
One of the things to do here is take a little jaganda out to the reef. The thing is, it’s only 50 meters from shore and at low tide you can wade out to it. So, that’s what we did. We saw 4 spotted eels today.
A few miles south of town, we found beach camping at Praia de Maracaípe. It was a good place to work on a temporary re-attachment for the muffler*.
Free camping on the beach seems to be tolerated, if not encouraged, right in front of the surf break. There were maybe 4 or 5 other groups in tents – cool folks, just hanging out and surfing all day for weeks at a time.
*Jason says JB Weld was useless. Something given to us called ‘Quick-Steel’ worked for a few hours. Now, we’re running with no muffler again. It’s in bad enough shape that we’ll just get a new one instead of try to weld this one back on.
You can definitely hear us coming. And, this seems to be the only place in all of Brazil with a local sound ordinance!
Welcome to the state of Pernambuco. I hope this trip has improved the health of your child, and allergy decreased. I have read about your trip, do not know if I have the courage, but I admire them. Jason, my dad has a Volksvagem Santana 1985 (Quantum in the U.S.) and I have a VW Santana 2005, possibly there is similar in the U.S., but I know you like old VW really are good cars. Excuse me google translation errors. Good stay in our state. Live in Camaragibe Pernambuo. Alexandre.
hey – one man’s “strange looking chicken sculpture” is another man’s AWESOME looking chicken sculpture.
Yeah! JB Weld and tie wire! Never leave home with out it (and duct tape)
Hi Family!
I recently stumbled upon your web site via Sprinter Life. In 2009 My husband and I travelled in a 1982 dodge okanagan campervan with our two sons ages 12 and 8. We spent 6 months driving from Calgary Canada to Pelenque, Mexico and back. We loved every single minute of it ( except for the 5 or 6 times we broke down) I am loving reading of your adventures and I salute you for living life to the fullest. Maybe one day our paths will cross!
Liz Tompkins
Hi! Reading about your adventures is simply AMAZING. I’m genuinely happy to know people follow this lifestyle and manage to keep it up for this long, still going strong too. It’s admirable.
Anyhow, I write because I’m headed to Brazil. I’ll probably volunteer in Rio for three months, but the first one I spend in the country, November, I’ll backpack the north east starting in Salvador.
Will it really be possible to camp for free on the beach you mentioned in the post? Do you know of other places where I could do so? And finally, do you have any recommendations on where to go, being a devoted nature lover?
Thanks a bunch. You’re seriously inspiring.
Maja Vahlberg