prawns and buggies

Well, the aftermath of getting drenched on our tour of the far-flung beaches of Paraíba was both of us getting colds - happily for us, Natal has the cleanest air in the WORLD (except Antarctica, apparently - this fact is confirmed by no less an authority than NASA) and what with that, and the usual plethora of fresh fruit and guaraná, before too long we were fighting fit again.

Prawns are big in Natal. So big in fact that one of the biggest restaurants there is called, with brutal simplicity, "Camaroes" ("Prawns"). Although it's next door to a place called "Only Pizza" which advertises itself as selling "salads, fish and chicken", so what's in a name, eh? Talking of names, it looks like the spelling of "Drive Thru" causes one or two problems over here...









The best place we ate was, however, Mangai, where we went for our Valentine's meal (this is us after dinner, with local legends Lampião and Maria Bonita - kind of like Robin Hood/Bonnie & Clyde figures from the early 1900s):









Also big in Natal are dunes, and the beach buggies you need to get on to drive around them. All very exciting, if not cheap - it wasn't till we were fortunate enough to run into a couple of Seventh Day Adventists and could share a buggy with them that we could actually afford the ride! You can either go for com emoçao or sem emoçao, (literally "with emotion" or "without", but "with terror" or "without terror" might have been more accurate), and I think we must have got the former option, as it was more than enough emoçao for the pair of us, much to the Adventists' disappointment. It didn't deter them from insisting on driving us all the way back to our hostel afterwards, though, which reaffirmed our faith in humanity. I also came away with massive respect for the bugueiros, who we had previously had down as cheeky rip-off merchants, as it really did feel at the time as though you put your life in their hands!

Watching Carnaval on TV was hugely enjoyable - not sure who ended up winning the Rio one, but I was glad to see Robinho present and correct (and looking fairly OK about not being in Manchester at the moment), and Paris Hilton adding to the pantheon of legendary quotes to describe this awesome spectacle ("It's beautiful, I love it"). The samba schools each play and dance to a newly-composed song, three or four verses, over and over, for OVER AN HOUR. I'm thinking of suggesting this as the way forward for Jonny Cola & the A-Grades when I get back - after all, no one else is doing that in London, are they?? Though I don't know if we will be able to summon up a cast of thousands in outrageous costumes...

We moved on to Pipa yesterday, only to find a POST-Carnaval Carnaval going on (you really can't avoid Carnaval in Brazil, this much is true), which looked like this:

After a night out trying not to get sucked into a conversation with an incomprehensible local drunk with no teeth, and then finishing off our cans of beer surrounded by hormonal pre-teens trying to cop off with each other, it was a relief to get up today and go for a swim, accompanied by dolphins, no less! (OK, they were a few metres away, but it was still amazing). Also amazing is the pousada we're staying in (Pomar da Pipa) - here's me getting into some hammock action...

I am now in dire need of a haircut - many places in Natal offered "Mega-hair", but I didn't take them up on this. In other news, we have just started taking our malaria tablets!! TOUCH WOOD we don't start suffering any ill effects (vomiting, headaches, nightmares, beating each other up), especially not on the plane tomorrow, we could both do without that. The next time you hear from us we will be in Amazonas...!