After getting an engrossing and somewhat alarming one-on-one tour of Rio's largest favela, Rocinha, Steven and I needed something lighthearted to visit for the rest of the day. Ilha de Paquetá, a popular tourist spot in the Baía de Guanabara, sounded like it would be an ideal escape from the city’s bustle and the morning's events. Knowing that, because of its size and the fact that it is accessible only by boat, Paquetá was one of the safest places in Rio with virtually no crime was especially important then, too!
Luckily, it was very easy to take the metro downtown, then walk past the Imperial Palace on the Praça XV that we'd toured on our first day to the ferry terminal. We couldn't believe how fortunate we were when we happened to arrive there just ten minutes before the ferry left at 2:30 as the next ferry wouldn't have left for another 90 minutes!
A view of Sugarloaf in the distance:
A ferry returning from Ilha de Paquetá:
The Baía de Guanabara was where you may remember the 2016 Olympic sailing and rowing events took place.
The bridge across the bay to Niteroi was one of the longest I could remember seeing.
An oil platform likely?
The very pleasant ride across the bay took 75 minutes.
Some history of Paquetá courtesy of Wikipedia! Up to the end of the 15th century, the Tamoio Indians used Paquetá as hunting and living grounds. It was officially registered by the Frenchman André Thevet in December, 1555, and acknowledged by King Henri II as a French discovery in 1556. Together with Paranapuã Island, Paquetá was one of the main centers of French resistance to Portuguese occupation. While the French had the Tamoios as their allies, the Temiminós Indians led by Araribóia supported the Portuguese.
The Portuguese victory was consolidated with the expulsion of the French and the defeat of the Tamoios. Paquetá was then divided into two allotments assigned to settlers; the one now called Campo was given to Inácio de Bulhões and the Ponte area to Fernão Valdez. Apparently the characteristics of this division between Campo and Ponte were still evident in the island's festivities, in soccer matches and in the parade of dancing and singing groups during Carnival.
The ferry we had come on was the Ipanema, named after one of the world's most famous beaches, and which we looked forward to exploring the next day.
I bet this 'Christmas tree' would have been pretty when illuminated at night!
The island was an auto-free zone so travel was limited to bicycles, bicycle rickshaws and horse-drawn carriages. We chose none of those options as we'd been around so many people for days on end, preferring to wander by ourselves and content with whatever we came across.
While walking around the small town we were both entranced by the proliferation of colorful flowers.
I almost got hit taking this photo as I wasn't paying attention to where I was. Oops!
What an adorable and happy mural, unlike some we'd seen earlier in Rocinha that commented on the favela's struggles.
Since my camera had gone kaput way back, I only had my phone camera to take all these photos. The telephoto lens, sadly, wasn't strong enough to capture the birds atop the rock who, as long as we looked, didn't move one iota. I was sure that they were sculptures until Steven persuaded me otherwise!
Most of Paquetá’s houses dated from the beginning of the 20th century, but there were some older buildings dating from the early 1700's, all of them well preserved.
Along this beach was Tamoios' Park and an old cannon from the beginning of the 19th century that was used to salute the arrival of Prince Regent Joao to the island.
We found a very quiet spot along the waterfront, a good distance from the town, where I read and Steven played solitaire on his iPad, both happy to relax and take in the beauty around us. I loved hearing a departing ship's horn in the distance knowing we were in no rush to leave.
After a good while, I got antsy wanting to explore more of the island so we ended up walking down a dirt road that took us to the beach on the other side of the tiny island.
Our selfie taken on the pier seemed a world away from the gunfire we'd heard twice just a few hours ago in the favela.
I loved this shot of the colorful paddle boats waiting to be rented for a spin in the bay. Unfortunately, the water surrounding the island was polluted, so we couldn't swim there.
We strolled to the end of the boardwalk through gates to Parque Darke de Mattos, a park that was as pretty as it gets. We found a bench to sit on but, all too soon, a man came by to let us know the park was closing so we needed to leave. What a shame as we thought we'd found another slice of heaven on earth.
It was fascinating how the portico had been built around a famous baobab tree called Maria Gorda or Fat Mary which residents kiss for luck. Paquetá's twenty baobabs, a type of African tree, were the only ones in the country beside one in the public square in Fortaleza in northeastern Brazil. The baobab is the national tree of Madagascar, a country on our wish list of those we'd love to see. The trees were brought by African priests and planted in specific places for the worship of African religions. According to an old African legend, if one is buried inside a baobab, his soul will live while the plant lives. It and many other specimens of 100-year old trees were registered and protected by law.
It's safe to say that never in our lives had either of us ever seen a tree protected by a hand-crocheted cover! I could only wonder who had taken the time to make it and why!
As we meandered back to what constituted as the 'town,' we passed a huge get together near the beach. The food grilling on the BBQs smelled so delicious, I wished we'd been invited to enjoy it!
After getting some street food across from the pier, we had enough time to visit the Catholic church called Paróquia Senhor Bom Jesus do Monte before our ferry left at 7.
I only had a few minutes to take these pictures of the Christmas celebration about to take place at the church.
I was hesitant to take the photo of the Three Wise Men but, one of them, Balthazar, was so friendly and said in perfect English, they welcomed my photo as Mass hadn't yet begun. How I wished we could have stayed for Mass that evening but we needed to return to Rio.
A last view of the beautiful church and the harbor on Ilha de Paquetá. Our time on the island was like going back in time and was a delightful refuge from the nonstop crowds and horrendous traffic we had come to associate with Rio.
Seeing the spectacular sunset on the ferry ride back to Rio, we were glad we hadn't taken the earlier ferry as originally planned.
As we enjoyed one of the most beautiful sunsets we'd ever experienced, we couldn't help but reflect on that part of our tour of the favela that morning when we'd heard gunfire. We remembered how Zezinho, our private tour guide, had said people just knew from experience to lie down on the floor when gunfire transpired.
We felt badly for Zezinho as he had been far more concerned than we had been about letting us down after assuring us, just 48 hours before, we'd be safe. Once the gunfire erupted, he later confessed he wondered if something might happen when he spotted the SWAT team. We remarked to each other how little faith Zezinho seemed to have in the police who had gone after drug dealers when they escaped in the favela's alleyways. We didn't live his life but I thought I could begin to understand his philosophy.
This image brought to my mind some of the fabulous 18th and 19th century nature paintings we'd seen in museums.
We got back to the center of Rio about 8:30 and were so surprised how desolate the area was on a Saturday evening. Not a person was around except for a significant homeless population who had already sought a quiet place for the night. I had hoped to grab an ice cream cone but the only place around had just closed for the night - so sad to end such an intriguing day without ice cream!
Next post: Visiting the sacred Mosteiro de São Bento and the marveling the famous Ipanema and Copcabana beaches!
Posted on June 12th, 2018, on a very stormy day from Grayton Beach State Park on Florida's Panhandle.
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