Historical/Background Info:
Santos is Latin America’s largest seaport and is 60 miles from Sao Paulo, the capital and largest city of Brazil, with a population of over 21 million. Santos has a population of 420,000. Exporting coffee in the early 1900’s gave rise to the city and is where coffee prices were once set. There is a Coffee Museum here which I will be touring today.
Gonzaga beach is a curving stretch of white sand lined with hotels and condos. Light crude oil was discovered offshore here in 2006.
Brazil is the largest country in South America and was Portuguese. So unlike the rest of South America, Portuguese is spoken here not Spanish. Brazil is the 6th largest country in the world. It is larger than the 48 contiguous States. When I used to fly from DFW to Sao Paulo, half of the flight was over Brazil. I primarily flew into Buenos Aires but also spent several months flying into Sao Paulo and Santiago, Chile, to break up the routine. I knew a few words in Spanish and Portuguese, just enough to order dinner at restaurants mainly. But I would end up speaking Portuguese in BA and Spanish in Sao Paulo. They did not like that at all. You see the Argentines and Brazilians do not get along too well. Anyway, our layover hotel in Sao Paulo was a very nice Renaissance hotel just off the main street, Paulista Avenue. One of my favorite restaurants in the world, not for the food but for the ambiance, was not far from the hotel. I would love to take Rebecca there some day. That’s why I wanted two nights in port here. We would spend the night in the Renaissance and go to this restaurant. Sorry to digress. Sao Paulo is the 3rd largest city in the world by land area, population and density behind Tokyo and New York City. The metro population is over 21 million with another 12 million in urban area. As a side note, Sao Paulo hosts the world’s largest gay pride parades. I was there on a layover one year and it was very wild to say the least.
Sao Paulo was settled by the Portuguese in 1554. For the next two centuries it was a poor and isolated village. Gold then sugar cane helped to expand it to city status in the 1700’s. Brazil gained its independence from Portugal in 1823. Coffee production then became the major factor in the growth of Sao Paulo. From 1869 onwards railroads began to connect Sao Paulo to the port of Santos and other railroads connected interior cities to Sao Paulo. Coffee was the economic engine for major economic and population growth here. Slaves were used in the coffee plantations until 1888 when slavery was abolished. Today Sao Paulo is a huge cosmopolitan, melting pot city, much like any in the world. The Portuguese and blacks interbred back then so there are what are called mulattoes, blacks, and whites in Brazil now. Sao Paulo also has a large Asian population.
What We Did Last Night:
We had a lovely dinner in Compass Rose with Susanne Peters joining us. We enjoy her company and have some interesting conversations. We did not go to the show to see the English comedian/pianist. Instead we had an after dinner cocktail since we skipped dessert.
What We Did Today:
I was up early at 7:00 am as I had a 7:45 meeting time for my excursion, "Highlights of Santos".
I will let the photos tell you about that tour. It was not one of the best ever tours. The bus was super nice however. Only problem is it took a lot of time boarding and unloading at each stop.
I was back on board by 12:45. After a washing my hands we headed down to Compass Rose for a bite of lunch. After that, I started with transfer of photos from camera to laptop. Then I have to write captions on them in Picasa before syncing them to the web. Then I can come up with a link to put on the blog for you to view. In the middle of this process the ship lost all electrical power for 15 minutes. That's a first! Then I had problems getting internet back. It was my fault as I had to restart my laptop to get connection back. So now I am working on the blog again. Enjoying to boats of all sizes passing by the balcony today. Big cargo ships, nice yachts, and even 4 guys in a rickety row boat.
BAD NEWS AGAIN! The ship had another case of the GI bug so we are back to all the restrictions. They normally have wash clothes in all the public toilets to dry your hands with. I think this is classy and certainly very nice. They have removed them again so now they have tissue paper to dry hands. Just try using Kleenex to dry your hands!!!! Does not work! Try it. So no more canapes during cocktail hour and no more serving ourselves at buffet. I DO like someone serving me at the buffet. Takes a lot more ship manpower to do it all over ship. No more salt or pepper shakers on any tables. Waiter has to come do it. It is a royal pain in the butt!!!! We shall survive as did it over two weeks previously. We heard last night (whispered in our ear by a management person) that these restrictions would be going back into effect today. So I went into a toilet and grabbed 5 wash clothes. I hate the Kleenex and now have my "stash" of wash clothes.
We will be sailing at 6:00 pm for the next port at Ilha Grande. Be there tomorrow morning. This evening we will have cocktails in the Horizon Lounge before dining in Compass Rose restaurant. We have asked Chef Michael to prepare veal parmesan again for us. The show tonight is the final production show of this cruise segment which will be ending in Rio de Janiero on Friday. This is an amazing show, "Cirque Rock n Roll" featuring the specialty dance couple with the Jean Ann Ryan cast.
No comments:
Post a Comment