Nivi's Adventures

Sunday, October 08, 2006

Chapada Diamantina - Day 2

Sunday's plan was to visit Cachoeira do Buracão (literally waterfall of big hole). We stayed in a very simple but nice pousada (hostel kinda lodgings) in Ibicoara, and it only cost R$15 (~11NZD) including breakfast! Breakfast was a lovely affair too - the wife was cooking for us and when Raquel said how she loved the beijú (tapioca pancakes), she made a whole lot more. And Luciane loves eggs so from the dining room table she called out asking if they had eggs, and soon enough out came some eggs. Such a homely feeling! :)

After finishing our hearty breakfast we picked up Henrique, our guide for the Cachoeira walk. Henrique had his name on his shirt and I kept wanting to pronounce it like the French would, but it was actually pronouced "en-hi-ki" - very different from the French way!

We drove a little bit further and finally parked the car and started our (3km?) walk to Cachoeira do Buracão! I've probably overdosed a bit on the photos - apologies!


The scenery was a very promising start to the walk, but the clouds were a bit ominous!


Buracinho, the little sister of Buracão


Man with a hat?



The final ledge before getting to Cachoeira do Buracão! And I KNOW that Lord of the Rings was filmed in NZ (in fact it's usually what people comment about when I say I'm from NZ) but this really looks like it could be straight out of LoTR!

Luciane's amped that we're almost there...


Cachoeira do Buracão!

Swim time! Check out the slumped rock layers in the upper right of the photo... Any clues Rach? Again any explanation Henrique might have given us was lost on me ;)

Journey behind the falls! Can you see us just to the right of the falls?


Almost completely behind the water... When I was in Niagara falls I went on a tour behind the falls, but being able to stick my hand into the water here gave me a slight inkling of just how powerful the water would be in a larger waterfall!

The way back

But swimming back this time :)


The view from the top!

The waterfall is 85m high

Us on a ledge to the right of the waterfall

Another pretty but much smaller waterfall on the way back

Henrique getting a drink

Raquel taking a shower :)

And Tiago and Luciane too, altho Luciane is taking a bit of beating as well by the looks of it ;)

The gang. L-R Tiago (driver), Henrique (guide for Buracão), me, Raquel, Luciane


The view from a lookout, getting our little white car in the picture too :)

The girls posing


Another view from the lookout. In the centre of the photo you might be able to see some shrubs that have been planted in straight lines?
It's coffee! They must have been roasting the beans at one place - It was really weird to be driving through this rural area and smelling coffee - a smell I tend to associate with cafes & cities!

These are the kind of roads we were driving on at times...

This somewhat random Byzantine Cemetary just out of Mucugê (where we had dinner on Sat night). They are all mausoleums, rather than burial plots and the white looks very stark against the dark cliff. And it's quite big, the person in the centre of the pic should give you an idea of scale...

I reckon sunsets are usually beautiful, but it helps when you're in an exotic location with new but dear friends :)

And this I just had to put in. It's a bad photo I know, but basically it's of the back of a ute/pickup truck. It was piled full of stuff, but there was a man sitting on top of it all (you can see his head)!!! On the open road, doing at least 100km/h! You just never see stuff like this in NZ! What was particularly hilarious was after we took this photo he started doing model poses!

An amazing, unforgettable weekend and it was a bit of a bummer to have to get on the bus on Sunday night and return to Salvador and work on Monday, but at least I had the opportunity to experience Chapada Diamantina! Thank you once again Luciane and Raquel for inviting me along! Muito Obrigada! :)

4 Comments:

  • WOW. Amazing place Niv, what a find!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:19 pm  

  • Ok Niv, these places are surrealy incredible. You will HAVE to be our official guide when we all want to go to Brazil :-)

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 12:58 am  

  • ok so Matt or Dave or even Bree could have answered this perfectly well, but: the "slumped rock layers" are an anticline :-)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anticline
    a bit prettier than the one at Eastern Beach we all went to on our "Introductory Engineering Geology" field trip though...

    By Blogger Mrs O, at 5:05 pm  

  • Nivi,
    You know you should go back to Chapada da Diamantina and visit Morro do Pai Inacio, Pratinha, Cachoeira da Fumaca...There are so many wonderful places there...
    Flavio

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 6:20 pm  

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