Jericoacoara, Brazil - Many places in north-eastern Brazil remain insider tips, even for Brazilians. One of them is the area between the fishing village of Jericoacoara and the colonial city of Sao Luis, an almost surreal- looking landscape of dunes, turquoise-coloured freshwater lagoons, dense mangrove forests and the longest and most secluded beaches in Brazil.
For most travellers to Brazil, too, Jericoacoara was a blank spot on the map until fairly recently. Then the surfing crowd made "Jeri," as the village and its beach are fondly known, a kite-surfing mecca. Not long afterward the Washington Post Magazine dubbed Jeri, whose dunes are immense, one of the ten most beautiful beaches in the world.
The secret was out and surfers no longer have the beach to themselves. Surfing schools, handicraft shops and cute hippy and chillout-style restaurants have moved in.
But Jeri was lucky. An asphalt access road was never built so the only way to reach it is by jeep through 20 kilometres of dunes or by dune buggy along the beach. The original character of the village has thus been largely preserved. The roads are still made of sand. Chickens, donkeys and pigs scurry about.
Jeri is virtually deserted during the day. Most of the visitors are out surfing, while others are driving dune buggies in the 8,500- hectare national park nearby. In the evening, surfers and non-surfers alike meet atop the 30-metre-high Sunset Dune to watch the sun sink.
While the last romantics are still spellbound by the sunset, the beach is already abuzz with activity.
Some boys are playing football and an English couple are trying, unsuccessfully, to imitate their teacher's capoeira moves. They keep glancing enviously at Caesar and Marcelo, who lightfootedly dance around each other to the rhythms of a berimbau, a long bow instrument. An acrobatic war dance, capoeira was brought to Brazil by African slaves during the colonial period.
All of Jeri's inhabitants have mastered capoeira and would naturally like to show off their skills to the pretty blondes from Europe and the United States. Meanwhile, the first beverage stands selling caipirinhas and mojitos light up at the entrance to the village. Each stand on the sandy village road has its own gas lamp or candles, since street lights are lacking.
The next morning we take a jeep ride north-west. There are no roads - we drive right on the beach, kicking up seawater as we go. No one is around who might be disturbed aside from a few fishermen. They even bring small sharks ashore in their wooden sailboats. At deep river mouths, rafts are ready to ferry jeeps across.
After driving dozens of kilometres along deserted beaches we finally reach a road that goes to Parnaiba, a port city in the state of Piaui.
The dune landscape has given way to a green world of mangroves and giant rainforest trees. Negotiating the Parnaiba River Delta is only possible by motorboat. The route to Canarias, one of some 80 islands in the delta, is a maze-like network of channels.
The next stop is Cabure, a 200-metre-wide strip of sand between the Atlantic Ocean and the Preguica River. It does not even qualify as a village, consisting merely of a few wooden huts and three guest houses.
Day trippers come by every once in a while to enjoy the empty beaches and fresh fish. In the evening, the inhabitants and guest house lodgers have Cabure to themselves. A warm breeze blows in from the Atlantic. From the other direction, monkeys' howls can be heard.
A motorboat takes us to Pequenos Lencois, which means "little bedsheets" in Portuguese. The snow-white dunes stretching to the horizon in Lencois Maranhenses National Park really do resemble a wrinkled bedsheet. Experts surmise that they are fringes of the Sahara Desert formed before the South American and African continents drifted apart.
From the top of the dunes, which are as high as 40 metres, the ocean is visible. "But wait until tomorrow. Then you'll really see something great," said Juan, our guide. "Because if there's a 'small bedsheet,' there's probably a big one, too."
In the "Grandes Lencois," also part of the national park, we encounter sizeable groups of tourists for the first time since our lonely jeep ride along the coast.
Tourists take day trips by jeep to the "big bedsheet" from the small colonial city of Sao Luis nearby. Since most of them go to the park's "Beautiful Lagoon" and "Fish Lagoon," Juan chooses a spot further west, near Santo Amaro, which is less well known but just as spectacular.
The drive -- several hours long on a sand road - is strenuous but worth it. A visitor to Santo Amaro is practically alone among the dunes. Bathing in the turquoise-coloured lagoons is sheer luxury. The "big bedsheet" covers more than 155,000 hectares and stretches some 70 kilometres along the coast.
Internet: www.braziltour.com.
