A Portuguese paradise

After joining our tour group in Rio we drove to the heritage-listed town of Paraty. This is a perfectly preserved Portuguese colonial town about four hours south of Rio. A truly photogenic town of old white buildings, colourful painted doorways, window sills, and trims, located on bone-jarring cobblestone streets.

Paraty is older than it looks. It was founded in 1597. Over time it developed into a regional centre for Portuguese colonists in the surrounding area. Its impressive array of colonial buildings sprang up after the discovery of the world's richest gold mines in the mountains of Minas Gerais in 1696. Paraty rapidly became a major export port for gold and a supply port for the mines. 

Interestingly, the precious metal was first transferred on coastal ships to Rio de Janeiro and from there on to Portugal. Apparently, the harbour wasn't suitable for larger sea-going vessels. The city briefly boomed again when the coffee trade picked up and again more recently thanks to sugar cane farming. Today tourism is Paraty’s major economic contributor.

Capela de Santa Rita is the oldest church in Paraty. This all-white structure, trimmed in yellow, was completed in 1722. This was the local church of the freed slaves and freemen, or former slaves. It reminded me of the Chapel of Nossa Senhora da Guia in Macau. Its white bell tower can be seen for miles and is instantly recognizable in promotional tourism images.

The town is set in a harbour of islands which we visited by boat the following day. Most of the boat trip was spent swimming, soaking up the sunshine, and drinking the national drink. We also got to see the town's unusual street-cleaning ritual in action. The town's Historic Center District is built below the high tide line. As a result, its streets are washed clean twice a day as the tides rise and fall.

We later learned that the street flooding we witnessed only happens once a month when there is a full moon and the tide is high. As these conditions align, seawater rises above its normal levels and pours into the town's colonial waterfront streets through special openings in the seawalls that separate it from the harbor.

The image above taken from the water line was captured with considerable care.  I wanted to capture the spirit of the moment during our idyllic day sailing around Baia Carioca. I grabbed my digital camera and without any water protection swam ever so carefully into the bay to turn and take the photo you can see here.

After two nights in Paraty, we headed south to San Paulo. The drive took more than five hours, with the last hour spent crawling along a freeway jammed with traffic on the outskirts of San Paulo. Shortly after leaving Paraty we stopped briefly to admire Cachoeira da Escada. This is a cascading waterfall on the edge of the Rio-Santos highway, about 27 km south of town.  The base of the main fall is protected by a slightly disheveled statue of Oshun. She’s the queen of freshwater, rivers and waterfalls. You’ll find her halfway up the falls in the first image above.