Fin-Tastic Recife

Fin-Tastic Recife
Recife, Brazil

Recife, Brazil

Recife is not much of a tourist destination, as with most major towns it is a bit heartless and sprawling, but for us served as a perfect base.

We had made some lovely new friends, Seve and Karmen, on our travels in the Pantanal who happened to be living in Recife so we couldn’t pass by without popping by and saying hello.

Thankfully Seve had already given us a warning about Recife before we arrived which was just as well as we may well have missed the signs if we didn’t know better. Recife has one of the most dangerous beaches in the world for shark attacks. In the last 20 years there have been 56 shark attacks and of those attacks 21 have been fatal which has made this beach the most dangerous for fatal attacks in the world. The sharks responsible are Bull sharks and there appears to be a direct correlation between the building of the Port of Suape and the attacks. Whilst the port commenced construction in the 1970’s it was not until 1992 that it started to attract significant shipping traffic. Large estuaries were dredged for the port and this is said to have disrupted the mating and hunting habits of the sharks and has caused a change in their behaviour and started the chain reaction which has resulted in many fatal attacks. It is also thought that the lack of treatment to sewerage and a large meat processing plant in the vicinity which pumps waste into the waters around Recife is partly to blame.

After a bit of searching we found the signs warning that the beach is dangerous but it is only when you read online that you realise just how serious the situation is. The lifeguards on the beaches in Recife are not able to train in the water and have an electronic shark shield to use if they need to go in, their training is more focused on shark attacks than any other lifeguards in Brazil. In 1999 a 23 year old surfer was attacked and had his hands bitten off by a shark and since then surfing in Recife has been banned. Some of the shark attack victims have been in water just 3 feet deep. Pretty much anyone with any sense stays out of the ocean completely in Recife as it is just too dangerous all as a result of man messing with the eco system which is a tragic tragic state of affairs.

Thankfully this story is not all doom and gloom and shark attacks, a committee called CEMIT was formed in 2004 to monitor shark incidents and they are actively catching, tagging and releasing sharks from the area into deeper waters, they have sunk boats to form artificial reefs to lure the sharks deeper into the ocean and so far the data suggests that the sharks that have been tagged have migrated away from the area. Sadly though there is one more problem looming on the horizon in that another sea port is planned just North of Recife which will more than likely only make the problem worse.

Anyway enough about sharks and Recife.

We had two reasons to be in Recife, one was to go on a day trip to Olinda and the other was to catch up with Seve and Karmen. Being Spanish we were treated to the most delicious homemade Spanish tortilla I have ever eaten and we had a fantastic night working our way through their interesting drinks cabinet which needed emptying before their return to Spain. Tongue tingling cachaça was certainly a new experience for us both. Thanks so much Seve and Karmen for your hospitality and for giving us the first normal Friday night dinner at someone’s house for a very very long time.

Our other trip from Recife was to the small town of Olinda, another place that we would have missed were it not for some great advice. Olinda is just 20 minutes outside Recife and is still a shark danger zone so you definitely avoid the beaches here, but it is one of the best preserved colonial towns in Brazil. Occupied by indigenous tribes for years the French were thought to be the first mercenaries to arrive in Olinda but in the 1500’s it was the Portuguese and the Dutch who fought over and sculpted this town into what it is today.

Quaint cobbled streets, numerous churches and small colourful houses line the sleepy streets which come to life once a year during carnival. Interestingly Olinda is the only place in Brazil where there is no charge for entry to the carnival. In the run up to carnival people are practicing in the streets and even during our visit there was a group of people practicing their drumming in the centre square on Sunday afternoon and the giant heads just parked in every art gallery and hotel give a brief glimpse of what carnival in Olinda looks like.

Olinda was absolutely stunning, so quaint and beautiful and relaxed and the views back over the towering city of Recife were amazing, we had a fab afternoon and were so delighted not to have missed this little gem.

Sadly Tim came down with a minor dose of man flu on our last day so we spent it relaxing around our hostel with the selection of pet rabbits, fish and the pet cat who it turns out can sniff out a rotisserie chicken at 100meters and cold quite possibly win a chicken eating competition against the colonel himself!

One thing that is a big secret about Recife is the fact that the bus station may as well not even be called Recife bus station as it is nearly an hour out of the city in the suburbs. So our perfectly timed 9am bus actually turned into a nightmare journey that had us up and dressed and on the road at 6:30 to avoid the work traffic. Seriously Recife, sort it out!!

Hopefully it will all be worth it as we are going onwards and upwards to one of our most anticipated stops, Pipa Beach.