The Brazilians Are Worried About Us

I hesitate to write about Pipa.  If I write about Pipa on the internet, people on the internet might learn about Pipa, and then will be more likely to come to Pipa, and part of what has made Pipa so awesome is how uncrowded (made up word?  Unsure.) it is.

Related: I'm selfish.

To situate you, the reader, and dissuade you from despoiling my New Favorite Place: Pipa was not trivial to get to.  Our route took us from Pittsburgh to Houston (...not on the way) to Sao Paulo (really not on the way) to Natal (3 hours by plane NE of Sao Paulo which again, was not on the way), and then in a car south for two hours.  We were supposed to go through DC to São Paulo, which would have obviated some of the triangulation we ended up doing through Texas, but wouldn't have solved the actual problem, which was going through São Paulo in the first place.  Regardless, the point is: getting to Pipa isn't easy.

But whatever, dudes, we definitely decided within 30 minutes of arriving that we're coming back.  And that was BEFORE we saw the dolphins (spoiler alert!). Our pousada (Portuguese for "needlessly charming hotel/resort/B&B thing") is unreal.  Props to the travel agent on that one.

Pipa is on a cliff on the ocean; one descends the cliff to get to the beach. The main beach is somewhat crowded with boats and surfers, mediocre for swimming.  The better beach can only be reached (and returned from!  Important note! There is genuinely no way off this beach at high tide, no kidding) in the 2.5 hours or so around low tide --- one walks down to the main beach and then left for about 15 minutes.  Fortunately, today's low tide hit at about 1:30 pm, so we had a leisurely breakfast outdoors at the hotel (near a French family, of course, because French tourists are literally everywhere on God's Great Earth.  I know it's the Germans who have this reputation, but I've never understood why. Same is true for McDonald's actually which, in my experience, is not nearly so prevalent internationally as Subway.  Yes, there is a Subway in the tiny fishing/surfing village of Pipa.  They deliver!).*  Then, to the Praia do Golfinhos.

Golfinhos means "dolphin" in Portuguese, and people say "oh, yes, the dolphins go to that beach all the time."  But, what do they even mean?  Like, you can see them a half-kilometer out and are like "neat, a dolphin?"  NO, MY FRIENDS. THAT IS NOT WHAT THEY MEAN.  THEY MEAN THE DOLPHINS COME INTO THE BAY AND ALMOST RIGHT UP TO THE BEACH AND YOU CAN GET IN A KAYAK AND PADDLE AROUND AND THEY SURFACE SO CLOSE YOU CAN HEAR THEM EXHALE.  They don't like, actively approach humans, they're not tame in any way, but they're definitely not afraid of the humans, either.  I suspect the bay is a good source of fish for them, based on their behavior?  Whatever.  It was awesome.

I demonstrate with a Sequence of Unedited Because I Don't Have Lightroom on this Computer Photos:

(frankly best viewed as a slideshow, but I don't know how to do that in blogger):

Fish, making a valiant escape effort.

Valiant, but futile...

action shot, part 2...

And one more, for good measure:

This picture won me the "best dolphin pic of the day" award amongst the members of Team Family.  It's OK, really, because Adam totally won with his marmoset photo (not shown). 

The beach proper is remarkably uncrowded for being so beautiful.  Enterprising locals have set up shop such that one can rent a pair of lawn chairs under an umbrella for the day, and acquire at one's leisure capirihnas (some kind of DELICIOUS rum-based thing that is the National Drink of Brazil.  I loved Peru, but the capirihna definitely kicks the pants off the pisco sour) and coconuts with straws in them and beer (subject of one of my 3-but-growing-in-number-rapidly Portuguese sentences: "Eu quero uma cerveja por favor.") and foods on a stick cooked over a little grill, and then one pays for everything at the end.  Other enterprising locals rent out kayaks and paddleboards to fools like us who have not become inured to the dolphins (actually, the locals seemed to think the dolphins are pretty cool, too) and want to paddle around to see them better.  ALL the locals, enterprising or no, were worried that we hadn't put on enough sunscreen.  Several Brazilians approached us, unprovoked, to strongly encourage us to reapply, because we are so white, they were worried about us.  Like "you really should put more on.  And stay out of the sun.  You have an umbrella? Good, go sit there and stop standing in the sun.  You're so white, it's a little unsettling."

(that last part was implied.)

I spoke with one Brazilian woman (in English, obviously, my 3.75 sentences are limiting) while waiting to pay for our kayak session, and she asked me what I thought of Pipa.  I said, "Oh, I don't think I ever want to leave."  She laughed and said "Oh, that happens a lot.  That's why there are so many gringos here."

Sounds about right:

First capirinha of the day.  Of many.

This is a decidedly delicious activity.

*sorry, that parenthetical was excessive.