Jumping seven waves
Trip Start
Oct 16, 2008
1
22
35
Trip End
Apr 16, 2009
Saquarema,
State of Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Santa came all the way to Saquarema and brought Patrick a wall hanging of a scarlet macaw, just what he wanted! It seems he got the message from the pretend Santa in Iguaçu. Christmas morning was our first breakfast at the new digs and boy were we glad we decided to move. It was superb. Fresh ham and cheeses, fruit salad, freshly squeezed juice, great coffee, and mountains of bread and cake. This would be easy to take for the next 12 days! We spent the morning at the beach, like one does on Christmas day, and it was perfect conditions for us, a bit of high cloud, not too hot, but the water was frigid and the waves crashed right on the beach, making swimming a serious challenge. So we just played in the sand and went back to the pool to swim there.
We cracked our first beer at about noon and the preparations for lunch took a while. After a couple of hours everyone was gathered by the pool, Stephanie and Jeremy, and Anna from the hell hostel, with their contributions laid out on the table. For having no kitchen and few provisions, it was a bloody good lunch. At some point in the afternoon it started to poor rain and the party had to move around the front to the pizzeria, where Jorge and Marina were enjoying Christmas with their family and friends. Round two of eating occurred and the drinking never quite stopped, we staggered to bed around midnight-ish, full of more than the Christmas spirit.
The next few days were a bit up and down, in both the weather and our spirits. The rain kept us away from the beach and we lolled around a bit, trying to decide where we might go next after Saquarema. We were regulars for lunch at The Twins, and even more regular at the little whole-food shack by the beach that made awesome soy burgers and açai slushies. When Patrick's hives returned after a week or so absent, I thought I might tear out my hair. Marina was very helpful with suggestions and let me cry on her shoulder, she cooked us simple dinners so that we could know what was going into the food, and she let us use their kitchen whenever we wanted. Jorge called his friend who was a doctor and he came to take a look and offer yet another theory as to the cause of the hives. He was convinced it must be laundry soap or fabric softener and suggested we wash everything in neutral coconut soap and wash his body with Dove. So we did that too. My dad wrote to tell us that he had suffered from hives as a kid whenever he went near a farm and had unpasteurised dairy products, so we were working with that theory too: Patrick was off the soft cheese at breakfast.
We became good friends with Anna, who visited us daily, played soccer with Patrick, and tried to teach us how to play her didgeridoo. Her physio was progressing well, more as a result of her own diligence than the actual treatment, but the doctor had still failed to produce a report for her. We also became friends with the capirinha, a Brazilian cocktail made artfully by Marina in the pizzeria. As the new year approached the guesthouse filled up, and among the guests were a couple of kids that, despite not speaking a word in common, Patrick managed to befriend and play with at the beach and in the pool. Rodrigo, the 8yo, was particularly patient with him, and he stood in goal endlessly facing increasingly hard kicks with Anna's beach volleyball. We also spent days at the beach looking up at the sky for parachutes, one of our fellow guests was among the daily jumpers. On the rainy days Patrick played happily with Lego for hours - we really need to get him lots of that stuff when we get home - but a full day of inactivity had its consequences at bedtime. He was in the pool every day though, and his swimming came along in strides, initially inside an inflatable ring and rapidly progressing to swimming back and forth across the pool without help. Those goggles I bought in Salta were a good investment.
On New Year's Eve, Marina decorated the pizzeria with a million balloons and cooked a magnificent Brazilian feast for all the guests who wanted it. Anna came by after dinner and we wandered down to the beach to watch the fireworks. The whole town was there and everyone was dressed in white (for peace) and had brought floral offerings to the sea goddess Yemanja (spelling?) to toss into the waves. There were gladiolas galore and candles all over the beach. At midnight the official fireworks began and were going off at either end of the beach, it was hard to know which way to look and they seemed to go on forever. The three of us held hands and jumped over seven waves together and made three wishes for the coming year to comply with Brazilian superstition. It was magical. When the fireworks petered out we went back to the guesthouse and made the rounds with kisses and wished everyone a Feliz Ano Novo. We know ours will be.
