Days 47-49 1st Hostel Experience By CS

Trip Start Nov 28, 2007

Trip End Feb 15, 2008

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Flag of Brazil Natal, Brazil
Wednesday, January 16, 2008

We arrived in Natal after a flight from Fernando de Noronha at about 4:30, without a place to stay, so we find the nearest internet café and pay 4 bucks for 15 minutes online. After a brief search, we find one of Natal's two hostels, Albergue da Costa in Ponta Negra. We take a 45 minute cab ride for $30 (thank goodness for list prices, honest people, and no rip offs) and arrived at our quaint little hostel just as it began to downpour rain.

We were placed in a 3-person all-girl room and I quickly jumped on the top bunk to claim it as mine! The hostel had a little outdoor bar with a very informative bar tender, a small pool, a kitchen and breakfast area, free internet (hooray!), tv and reading room, and a nice little dog named Sharon Stone. All in all, a pretty nice place to stay and meet other international travelers. The place was owned by George, a long haired, 30+ yr old, laid back surfer.

As we were pretty tired from all of the hiking and activity and traveling from Fernando, we opted to stay in, have a couple of drinks and shish-ka-bobs at the bar, and meet some of our fellow travelers. There was a tall skinny red-headed boy who had just moved here from England. He speaks Portuguese surprisingly well, plays in a British punk rock band (which we heard a couple of nights later, and it just turned out to be a cover band for popular songs in English) and surfs all day. Our second new friend was from Switzerland, not what you would consider a country known for surfing (banks, yes... chocolate, yes... neutrality, yes... but surfing?). Turns out he had come to Brazil on vacation with some buddies, surfed for 2 weeks straight and fell in love. He was on his second 6-month stay in Natal. We also met a nice couple from Argentina. The guy spoke English very well... turns out his 2 older brothers stayed with a nice family in Hawaii during a high school exchange program. It seems that the family was so nice, that the youngest brother decided to stay with them too, even after they moved to Missouri to be closer to their children.

The following morning, we woke up to yet another splendid breakfast of fresh watermelon, pineapple, melons, papaya, fresh bread, cake, tapioca, coffee and juice. And since we still felt a little beat from all of the traveling and activities from the previous couple weeks, we spent the day on the beach, swimming, reading, and playing paddle ball. Since we had such a nice kitchen to use at our fingertips, we went to the nearest grocery store to pick up ingredients for pasta and meat sauce and brigadeiro. It was nice to have a home cooked meal after all of the eating out on the road.

The next day, we spent most of the morning calling family and updating the Barreirinhas, Jericoacoara, and Fernando de Noronha blogs, took a nice long run along the boardwalk on the beach, and went to the sushi restaurant across the street for dinner.

Our second to last day in Natal, we had to do a confusing change of rooms, for it seemed about half of the rooms in the 12-room hostel was changing from one room to another. All to accomadate a group of three that had made a reservation in the 3 person room. Weird. We explored the beach all the way to the far point past the sand dunes (Morro do Careca).

Sunset over Ponta Negra

Dunes in Natal

Forbidden Beach in Natal

Erin at Sunset in Natal

Then we enjoyed the British boy's band playing at the hostel while we dipped our toes in the pool and sipped caipirinhas. A very nice night.

Our last half day in Natal, we went to the beach early to get Erin some surf lessons in English. Since I had done relatively well on my own in Jericoacoara, I decided to just rent a board. I don't know if it's because the waves were way more frequent or if it was because the board was quite a bit shorter, but I couldn't get up. I kept getting blasted by waves when I was trying to get past the place where the waves break, and I just couldn't seem to get up other than the last couple of seconds at the end of the wave. They just seemed to break really fast and really close to shore here making for a really short ride. I feel your pain with the bad surfing experience, Holly. Erin, on the other hand, had a great time, getting up several times and finally finding her spot and balance on the board. I guess all she needed was a teacher who spoke English to clarify some of her doubts and to give her some tips on what she was doing wrong.