Parati

Thursday 19th May 1988

I got a liquid breakfast of yoghurt and Pepsi Cola before setting off for the Rodoviário do Tietê Bus Terminal at 09:00 hrs. The Metrô was fairly quiet – I expected it to be packed with commuters. I sat on my rucksack reading my book by Departure Bay 34, until the luxury Scania bus pulled in.

We left promptly at 10:30 hrs. and raced through green forested hills down to the Atlantic coast. We stopped for lunch and I demolished a couple of steak and cheese rolls. The system here in the restaurant was the same as for Monday night. You get a check sheet which the servers mark and you pay the tab on the way out.

The road along the coast was extremely winding amongst green hills covered in tropical forest. Islands dotted the coast looking like packs of sleeping dogs. We arrived at Parati at 16:00 hrs. after passing a multitude of other established and developing beach resorts and holiday centres.

Hotels in Parati were relatively expensive, but after a trek around the scenic holiday town with a group of young touts I checked into the Hotel Solar dos Gerânios on the Praça da Matriz. It cost me 1,500 Cruzados but I was hot, tired and sweaty and not in the mood to explore further. I showered and washed some clothes in my nice dark wood and white walled room.

The town had a lot of atmosphere and a holiday air. There were a lot of Brasilians in shorts and T-shirts on the streets and a holiday fiesta was underway. The buildings were solid old Portuguese colonial and the streets were uneven with huge cobble stones so walking along them made you feel as if you were drunk! A scroll bears the inscription “1660 Paraty 1844” These are the dates that Paraty initially achieved status as a town and then later city status.

The village of Paraty was founded in 1597. It was established formally as a town by Portuguese colonists in 1667, in a region populated by the Guaianás Indians. The Guaianás people who lived where the city now stands called the entire area “Paraty”. In the Tupi language “Paraty” means “river of fish”. Even today the Brazilian Mullet (Mugil brasiliensis) still come back to spawn in the rivers that spill into the Bay of Paraty. When the region was colonized by the Portuguese, they adopted the Guaianás name for their new town.

Like Venice in Italy the quaintness and uniqueness had been exploited to the full. Every building was an expensive tourist gewgaw shop or a fancy restaurant. I got a meal and a Kaiser beer at a pizza place. A middle-aged man with a young dolly-bird pulled up in a fancy car and sat at a table by their car with it’s stereo system blaring out loud music.

I walked back through the main square where there were a lot of stalls and kiddies everywhere were lobbing firecrackers about. The big cathedral had a capacity crowd for evening prayer. I resisted the temptation to join them as I was tired and retired early to bed.