Santos - the beach

The beach at Santos is really quite amazing. Here is a statue for the first European explorer.

The beach is at least 100 yards wide and about 4 miles long. The sand is a very fine white sand.

There are a few palm trees which I suspect were planted. They are located up near the park that runs along the main road. The beach was very clean.

Off in the distance I could see many cargo ships anchored waiting for their turn in the port.

All the housing is built just on the other side of the main road. On the summer weekends the city about doubles in size. Many Paulistas love to leave the big city and go to the beach.

If you look real close you will see people in red shirts. They were teaching kids how to surf. The waves were small and not very impressive.

The beach was not very busy since it is still winter here and a weekday. Although it was about 80 degrees and a beautiful day.

There are clubs that you can join and they go out and stake out some territory and provide chairs, umbrellas and carts that sell food.

I didn't take off my shoes to dip my toe in the ocean. I figured a shoe in the ocean would be good enough. I didn't want to have to deal with sandy feet.

There were fountains in the park area all along the way. This one has a surfer with water splashing up around him.

This statue honors the Brazilian who introduced surfing to Brazil. Now that is a long board.

This city is very bike friendly. This bike trail runs the length of the beach and there were lots of people using it. All through the city there were bike paths. I think I would be tempted to come back and rent a bike and go riding up and down the beaches.

When Mike was on his mission he worked in Santos a couple of times. One time he lived on the 17th floor in an apartment that overlooked the beach. It was memorable because it was leaning. While driving down the road he spotted the building and I quickly snapped a picture out the car window. He was surprised to see the building still standing after 40 plus years. Maybe they went in and shored up the foundation.  The lean is hard to see in this picture but believe me, it was doing some leaning.

The drive home was interesting since the road climbs up about 2,000 feet in elevation and we had lots of trucks leaving the port to keep us company. It was pretty slow going until we topped out and then it opened up. It took us about one hour to get to Santos and about two hours to get home. But the drive was beautiful and the whole experience was totally worth it.

Santos - Orchid Land

BB had read about a place called Orchidario. It was botanical along with some zooilogical displays.

I always get a kick out of the school kids. They all have uniforms and they always have way more energy that I do.

Running free on the grounds were these rodents called Cutia. They were about the size of an average cat.

This one figured out to just get into the feeding trough of the turtles and life was good.

This is the area where the orchids were displayed.

This was about the total of the orchid display. I wonder when orchid season is.

A few more orchids.

This pretty water feature is in the orchid building.

A peacock strutts his stuff. Too bad he didn't want to impress me.

I thought this white face duck was interesting.

This is a water fountain with a lady holding a horn that spews water upward. Many birds were gathered around it. A black hummingbird was resting on the palm fronds and taking a bath while we watched. He sure looked like he was enjoying it.

After this quiet interlude we headed off for the beach.

Santos - Old Town

I am going to divide our trip to Santos into three seperate posts. It will be easier to read.
 
On Thursday we took a break from Sao Paulo with another missionary couple and went to Santos. You have seen them before. We really enjoy their company. We went together and rented a car and drove to Santos which is about 60 miles away. It is on the coast and has the largest port in South America. Santos was very important in Brazil's early history. A lot of goods went in and out of Santos and they still do.

We started our visit in Old Town which is very quaint with buildings built usually in the mid 1800's.

 There is a church that was constructed in 1641.

The outside is so unassuming but the inside was spectacular.

The ceilings had paintings on them.

The walls were adorned with statuary. The whole was very impressive.

Next door to that was a Victorian train station. Dr. B remembers taking a train out of this station while on his mission.

Mike and I looking very touristy.

We walked down the street to the Coffee Exchange building.

Right in front of that building is a street that leads out of the port. Truck after truck with containers filled the street.

The back side of the building and the entrance to the Coffee Exchange museum.

This museum had a fantastic stainedglass ceiling. There are no pictures because although photographs were allowed, flash was not. I don't know how to turn off my flash on my camera. I am from the generation that only restaurants had menus. This building is across the street from the Coffee Exchange house.

We tracked down a small road way that was closed to cars. This area had several buildings that had been restored.

This blue tile building was undergoing restoration.

This street had several interesting buildings.

See anything unusual?

 There were weeds and trees growing out of this facade.

The blue you can see through the windows is sky. The building had no roof. So this shows you need to weed your building even if it is not occupied.

Walking back to the car I noticed all the houses built up the side of the hill. A very steep hill I might add. 

We then headed into the newer section of town.

Happenings at Home

During the temple closing most missionaries go elsewhere. Here in our apartment building I believe we are the only couple to hang around. Since not many people are here maintenance is scheduled during that time.  Yesterday they took the door off to refinish it. It was back in place around 9 p.m.

They brought in air conditioners.

They hung them in the ceilings. One in the living room and one in the bedroom. They still need to finish up the trim work. When it gets hot and humid I will be very grateful for these.

While Mike was doing battle with the IT guys to get our internet back (we are still having some issues) I was able to get a quilt cut out. It is a baby quilt. My daughter-in-law is expecting our first grandchild. It is a girl. She is going to get a very bright wonky butterfly quilt because that is what I can make with the stash I brought with me. It was great fun using a rotary cutter again.

Tomorrow they are going to turn off the power for most of the day. We are planning to go to Santos.

I want to show you what one of the temple missionaries brought us before she left town. Empanades. They were very tasty.

Embu Redux

On Saturday we were invited to go with three other missionary couples to Embu. We had previously been there but we were game to return. We hopped on a bus and 40 minutes later we were there.

There weren't as many people shopping this time as the time before.

There were about the same number of vendors set up.

The couples we were with really did some shopping or serious looking. I saw more this time than the time before.

I really like they way this vendor had his wares displayed.

With our missionary tags on we meet many member of the church. This couple stopped to talk to us. I don't remember where they are from. We also met a family from the USA (I can't remember the state) but the kids were all going to BYU.

This little outing was our celebration of our 40th wedding anniversary. It doesn't seem like it has been that long. My parents celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary on this day not to mention by brother and his wife celebrated their 40th. It was a very good day to get married.

What was the celebratory meal? Cheeseburgers. I know, two in one week. We are really living it up.