Salvador Brazil & Carnival

Amazing enough – AURORA took 2^nd place on leg 15:

That was because we ran our engine very little compared to the other fleet boats.  It was enough to get Eilo up on her feet:

On the way in we could hear Salvador warming up for Carnival – and there we could see them getting ready:

 8 Miles off Captain Ken heard a really low droning sort of noise and was wondering what that was?  In other words - what was about to break?  Lucky it was only the bass notes coming from some nightclub in town at 3 in the morning.  As we got closer we found many different bands playing in various clubs along the coast… obviously warming up for Carnival.  The town is on 2 levels and we made good use of the elevator near the Marina, which would lift us from the strip of land near at the sea which was just a few feet above high tide, about 500 feet to the historic district the whole area being a UNESCO site.  Plenty of old churches:

some very ornate:

 and retail/housing buildings dating  as far back as the 17 and 1600’s :

And the odd palace:

All the streets in the historic center are cobblestone icing this historic cake:

You could not escape the warm-up for Carnival – it was everywhere from the drumming bands combing town you could hear approaching blocks away:

To the garb the locals were sporting:

More decorations being installed daily:

They obviously take this very seriously and must spend a huge amount of dinero making it happen.  And then it happened from February 9^th to the 13^th.  Each day around 5:00 in the afternoon the mayhem starts and it does not end until 5:00 in the morning.  Carnival occurs in 5 separate parts of Salvador.  About 4 million people attend each day which makes it the largest street party in the world.  We checked it out 3 nights out of 5.  The first night we went to the Barra district and checked out the Electronicos:

These are huge “Low Boy” trucks outfitted with scaffolding making them about 20 feet wide, up to 90 feet long and up to 30 feet high.  They hang speakers off all sides and cover them with huge plasma screens.  The speakers and screens hide the generators.  On top is a stage with full lighting providing space for the Brazilian pop artists, their bands and their groupies and everything they require.  In essence each electronico is a self contianed rolling rock and roll concert.  The artists spend about 4 hours preforming as they are pulled through the street at a slow and very very loud pace.  Then there are the rest of us either hanging out in relatively safe purpose built balconies (camarotes) erected next to the route which have food and drink and all the other things one needs to survive or you can tough it out in the street with the rest of the crazies.  Note that they also have everything they need – the yellow boxes lining the street are filled with very cold beer:

The next night we went up to Carnival in the old part of  town. The streets are not wide enough for the Electronicos so the carnival there marches past in full regalia.  Costumes span the spectrum from flamboyant:

to scary:

So we wandered around for hours and consumed our share of the 10,000,000 cans of beers consumed each night at this festival.  One needs to stay focused on the whole show including watching the processions pass or you could miss something:

What they can’t accomplish marching by is performed on one of the many sound and light stages set up around the old town;

We were burned out after night three so we cast off and AURORA took a break to a little Brazilian beach vacation spot called Morro de Sao Paulo:

It’s always great to check out where the locals vacation;

It is also good, or maybe not, to know how you might be treated if you fall foul of health – if a ride in this ambulance does not kill you it will make you stronger:

And the gang from the OWL, SANDVITA, TULLA MHOR, and AURORA was in rare form and very appreciative of the opportunity to visit this little piece of paradise:

Tomorrow we are off again for a port in northern Brazil, Cabedelo, 450 miles distant and on the 1^st of March are heading off on the final leg of this WARC to Granada where we will catch you up again.