Honey Island.....so sweet!!!
Trip Start
Nov 24, 2005
1
8
25
Trip End
Nov 24, 2006
Ilha do Mel,
Brazil
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
01. Curitiba
. Basically we didn´t have the best impression of the place to start with....but we went anyway and I´m sure glad we did! Sure...the island had a few more mosquitos than other places but I found the best thing to do was not to get bitten...clever huh!?! Secondly, we didn´t come across any deadly bichos (that I know of....) and finally the island was absolutely stunning. The majority of the island is a protected forest and coastline and there are two main settlements, Brasilia and Encantadas. We chose to stay at Brasilia as we were told (by the tourist info) that this is where the better surf was. They weren´t wrong.This island has absolutley no cars with small sandy walkways through the forest. Initially we had some trouble finding accommodation, as to our surprise there was no one trying to drag us off to their hostel. Seeing as it was peak season (just after New Years) many places were full and charging a small fortune anyway. We ended up settling for a tiny room which contained a broken fan, an uncomfy bed covered in some unfamiliar looking insects (perhaps bichos..?), a bunk-bed which took up the majority of the remaining space and to make things worse the room was barely lockable. This didn´t sit too well after the Florianopolis theft. Needless to say we moved out the next day. We moved to the Pousada Valentim which was reasonably priced, clean and closer to the beach. We decided to spend four nights on the island. During the day there was plenty to do. We spent most of the time at the beach (naturally) and found the island to have great surf, in fact easily the best of the trip so far. We´ve been quite lucky with the people we´ve met in Brazil. On Ilha do Mel we found a cool little place called Astral do Ilha which basically translates as `(Good)Vibes of the Island´. This place sold food and drinks, had hammocks and lovely staff who we got to know well during our stay. The owner was a guy called Tizzot who had spent some time living in Perth and travelling the world as a sponsored surfer
02. Us and the beach...
. Tizzot was a lovely guy who just made everyone feel welcome and involved in everything. He was also a great help in advising me on where to surf and when. Without him I would have missed out on the best surf!! Thanks Tizzot! Also during one of my first surfs on the island I managed to destroy the nose of my board and Tizzot was there with gaffa tape to patch me up! Incidentlly this is my second board of the trip. The board I brought from home mysteriously lost a fin during my last surf with John on Florianopolis (perhaps it was stolen too!) so I took John´s board off his hands which he was going to sell anyway.Aside from lazing our days away at the beach there were plenty of walks to do. We ventured up to a lighthouse for sunset one evening and on another day we did a beach walk to a large old fort. Photos of both are included.
Not only was Honey Island a beautiful place with amazing surf, it also had a great and relaxed nightlife. Pretty much every evening there was live music at a number of different bars or restaurants. Our favourite evening´s where spent at Tizzot´s Astral do Ilha when he had live music. It usually would start off with a single guitarist/vocalist but as the night progressed more and more people would join in the jam session
03. Another shot from the lightohuse hill
. You can see from the photo that there are flutes, bongos, tamberines, salt shakers etc.We also experienced the best food we´ve eaten in Brazil so far. A five minute walk from our Pousada took us to Praia Grande (transalation: `Big Beach´). Sitting in the sand dunes was a lovely yet pricey hotel called ´Grajangan´ (Grajangan is actually a city on the southern tip of Java in Indonesia and is more commonly know as G-land which is one of Indonesia´s best and most famous surf breaks. The hotel even had a surf viewing tower just like G-land and the owner assured us that Praia Grande breaks like G-land sometimes). Anyway we would have loved to stay here but for over $US100 a night it was a touch out of our budget! We did, however, splurge and have dinner there. We weren´t disappointed. Delicious fillets of fish grilled to perfection with a tasty sauce and grilled prawns on top and rice on the side. Yum!!!
Sadly our time on the island drew to a close. We weren´t ready to leave but it was just a bit too expensive. We even asked Tizzot if he knew of a cheaper place to stay. He wasn´t sure. We packed our belongings and prepared ourselves for the trek back to the pier. Before we left we headed back to Astral do Ilha to say our last goodbyes to Tizzot and the Astral boys
04. Lighthouse
. As we rounded the corner we bumped into Tizzot coming the other way declaring that he´d found us cheap accommodation! To make things better the accommodation was right next to his place and the beach!!! Very convenient! We went back to Grajangan and ate the same fish dish to celebrate. After three different accommodations we realised that we had slowly been making our way closer and closer to the beach and Astral do Ilha.
We stayed three more nights and scored even better surf than before. It was the right choice to stay! Anyway we eventually and reluctantly moved on. A good time was had on Honey Island and the people we met there won´t be forgotten.
Next stop is Rio where we plan to get touristy...until then.
Comments
Where's the music piccy
Love the story - so much fun! altho'sad about the board. But you didn't give us the musical salt shaker photo!! luv m xxx