The Baia de todos os Santos invites you to explore the island. The one-day boat trip starting from the port in Salvador to Ponta de nossa senhora de Guadalupe on the Ilha dos Frades with a detour to the island of Itaparica brought a relaxing day and enough variety.
We booked this day trip for around BRL 120. In this price, however, is the journey to the port, the excursion by boat and the meal on the Ilha Itaparica in a restaurant on the beach, which serves Bahian delicacies.
The excursion starts early, around 8 a.m. you will be picked up by the organizers either at the hotel or at an appointment that has been agreed in advance. By the way, we booked the ticket the day before in a travel agency at the Pelourinho.
There are also other interesting excursions offered and very good advice. Once you arrive at the port, you will be directed to the boarding terminal. The port is opposite the Mercado Modelo in the Cidade Baixa of Salvador. There are also the boats that go to Morro de São Paulo. After all participants have arrived, it starts.
Boat Trip – Ilha dos Frades
The boat trip is undertaken on a schooner which first drives along the coast and thus allows a view of the popular beaches of the Ribeira.
You can also see the Igreja Bonfim which, in addition to the most famous, Igreja e Convento São Francisco de Assis, is one of the most beautiful churches in Salvador.
After about an hour’s journey on the boat, a caipirinha further and sprinkled with the sounds of samba and axé from our own on-board tape, we anchor at the quai of the Ilha dos Frades and go over the long quay to the beach where we take a bath and sunbathe.
The nice thing about some places in Brazil is that despite the possible sources of income from tourism, people are thinking about protecting nature and not exploiting it. Of course, this doesn’t work everywhere when you think of large parts of the Amazon. However, you can also see certain places where a balanced stream of tourists brings something to both the locals and nature.
Here on the Ilha dos Frades this means that the place is not overcrowded.
The village of Ponta de Nossa Senhora and its dreamy beach let you forget everyday life in a city for a moment.
Ilha Itaparica
After a 2 hour break we continue by boat to Itaparica. With its 240 square kilometers, the island is one of the largest marine islands in Brazil. By the way, in the Baia de Todos os Santos there are several islands, such as Ilha de Maré, Ilha das Vacas, Ilha Maria Guarda and others that you can visit by boat. The drive from Ilha dos Frades to Itaparica takes about an hour.
Since the schooner cannot go all the way to the coast, we will take small motor boats to Itaparica beach about 100 meters from the beach. A rich buffet of Bahian delicacies awaits us in the restaurant “O Mangueazul”. Here we will stay for the next 2 to 3 hours and spend our stay with bathing and sunbathing.
The beaches are very beautiful, although for me they are not among the most beautiful that I have already seen in Brazil. But don’t worry, a visit is definitely worth it and the boat trip is a pleasant change.
Itaparica is also the capital of the island and has around 20,000 inhabitants. There are many fishing villages on the island and near the town of Conceição there is also the Club Mediterranée which has already hosted a number of prominent guests.
The beaches on the east coast are the most beautiful on the island, such as Praia Tairú, which is about 30 kilometers from Itaparica. It is worth mentioning the Pantanal Baiano which is located between the southwest coast of the island and the mainland.
This area on mangroves, rivers and coastal jungle is home to whole colonies of birds, armadillos, anteaters and other animal species. These can also be visited in organized tours.
Around 3 p.m. in the afternoon, we slowly make our way home again and will come back to the port around 4:30 p.m. Most of the people on the boat are now tired and lie down in a place to take a nap on the way home.
When we arrive back at the port of Salvador, the tour organizer’s guide is already waiting for us and takes us to our domicile by car. This day was simply a perfect and varied experience which once again brought us closer to the surrounding area of Salvador.
Source by Dindu
