South of Rio de Janeiro about 250 or 300 km (who’s counting?) along the Costa Verde is the small town of Paraty. Paraty is a popular tourist destination with both the national and international crowd, and is a nice escape from the insanity of Rio de Janeiro. We had 4 days in this glorious place, where the dogs roam the streets and the Lula a Dore (fried squid) is plentiful.
Looking out to sea on Jabaquara Beach, Paraty
The number 1 (!!) thing I wanted to do in Brazil was kayaking, since kayaking is my most favorite thing in the world. Key word is KAYAK.
So, first day in Paraty, this conversation happened:
Me: “We really want do some kayaking, where is a place we can rent kayaks?”
Inn owner: “We have one, you can borrow it if you like.”
Me: “Great, you have a kayak?”
Inn owner: “Well it’s a Canadian Kayak, I think they call it, sort of a canoe.”
Me: “Is it a kayak or a canoe?”
Inn owner: “They call it a Canadian Canoe, I’ll get the paddles.”
(Inn owner produces on kayak paddle and one canoe-like paddle)
Me: “Thanks!”
So, Chris and I get ready, and walk down to where this questionable boat was locked up, and discover that indeed, it was no kayak. Oh well, it was free.
Oh, and it was low tide, in a shallow bay, which meant we had to float the boat out at least 100 feet to deeper water, but the boat was locked up on the end of the beach near the mangroves, which means that beneath that glistening water was a layer of very loose mud, which often was as deep as 1-2 feet! Luckily there weren’t too many people around to laugh at us.
Soon enough, though we were on our way.
I took the kayak paddle apart and used one half as a canoe paddle. Later on I just put the paddle back together and “kayaked” in our canoe. It worked better that way, though I felt ridiculous.
We first headed over to Paraty proper and paddled up the river.
Paraty
Going up the river
Then we headed back to “our” side of the bay for an expedition through the mangroves.
and someone got a little tired …
and then I took a really bad picture of a bird . . .
and then there were no more pictures taken.
After emerging from the mangroves and taking that crappy picture we paddled to a nearby cove where our lunch at a beach bar awaited us. Not too shabby huh? How often do you get to paddle up to a beach bar and eat fried squid sitting around in nothing but a bikini (bikinis and tiny men’s swim trunks are totally acceptable street and restaurant attire in Brazil)?
Now, in Brazil, or at least in the parts of Brazil we went to, restaurants don’t do appetizers like we do in the U.S. of A. You know, the kind of plates where everyone at the table barely gets one or two bites. In Brazil they have “portions.” At the beach bar we ordered a “portion” of squid and a “portion” of french fries. The squid was $40 real, which is about $25 U.S. dollars (*cough*). And it didn’t disappoint. We weren’t half way through it when we were regretting also ordering the fries (which didn’t arrive at our table for quite some time after we’d forced down the last squid ring).
Sadly, the weather turned foul as we ate, and we had to paddle back in the wind (in a CANOE, mind you). It was an exciting trip back, to say the least. We did not tip over, and we did not take on that much water from splashing, but our arms were on fire by halfway through.
We had a fine and silly time on our canoe trip, thank you very much.
