South America 2007

My stay in Salvador was great, totally fell in love with the place and found it really hard to move on. Salvador is Brazils third largest city and has a strong African influence. Cobbled streets, afro-carribbean culture, live bands and music playing in the streets, artists, musicians, dancers, reggae bars, this place for me was so surreal. Bob Marley, bring it on!

Salvador has a reputation for thefts and muggings, seems every other traveller I have spoken to has had some nasty experience of being mugged at knife point, got involved with some kind of corrupt police scam or pickpocketed, its not hard to see why, Salvador is full of dodgy little side streets and full of corruption due to the poverty. Thankfully I haven´t had any problems yet and I have personally found quite the opposite. The locals are really really friendly, curious and helpful and they keep throwing their phone numbers and email addresss at me left right and centre for if I encounter any problems. Definately makes a difference being able to speak the lingo, even getting the hang of a bit of portugese as its fairly similar to spanish.

After carnival everything was pretty chilled, moved out of Barra which is on the Beach into Pelourhino, the cultural centre and spent most days exploring the city, museums, churches, the famous lighthouse, going to the theartre and visted a couple of capoeira schools - the traditional brazilian cross between a martial art and dance. Also went to watch condomble - an ancient ritual of spirit possession and voodoo.

Had a great time and again have met loads of amazing people, mixture of locals and other travellers, also starting to bump into travellers that i´ve met previously in other cities. I really have fallen in love with Salvador and the nearby island of Itaparica, only 20 minutes away by boat - white sands and clear waters...paradise. Even went horse riding along the beach.

First time I discovered the island was with a group of Brazilians from sao paulo and a brilliant guy from Uraguay called Mauizcio, who I got on really well with and who speaks like Borat (Hi Mauizico - I´ll be in motevideo after Paraguay - so see you soon and don´t forget the skydive!!!)

Also had quite an emotional couple of weeks, since arrival in Latin America haven´t really seen much poverty as I expected. Salvador however was full of beggers, mainly malnutritioned children. One night Mauizico and I met this kid on the street who was 13 years old but looked about 7, where he basically doesnt eat and his body hasn´t grown properly, it´s so sad.

Next stop is Rio de Janeiro.......