Miss B and the Creperie

Following some last minute advice from a group of fellow travellers, I decide to squeeze in an overnight stop in Brazil’s famed hotspot, Buzios. But I must admit there was not much to look at on the way in, and as I stumbled off the bus and checked where I was going, I started to think that maybe I had made a mistake.

The big map I am shown by a guy at the bus stop looks impressive enough, but as I looked up and down the street ahead, I couldn’t really see how it related to the surrounding environment. Fortunately I am further guided by some friendly internet café workers who point out that my hostel is just around the corner. And suddenly a whole new world opens up to me…

The main drag is complete contrast to its dusty road in, and is shaded by a leafy overhang that keeps the restaurant alfresco areas and boutique windows very cool. I find my hostel conveniently located in the middle, perched overlooking the front of the bay. Sand and water are only an eight-step staircase away. Suddenly I know why Brigitte Bardot named it the St Tropez of South America.

Beach buggies are the mainstay of transport, used to cruise along the cobbled streets or down to awaiting fishing boats to spend the day offshore. The more elite tourists of the country and region come here to eat, drink, dance, shop and swim – roughly in that order.

Not one to go against good trends, I make quick friends with a Canadian girl Elena, and down some chicken curry crepes, before drinking a bottle of local wine and dancing it up at Pacha. Like most other clubs in Brazil, it is a pretty sleazy experience, unless you have a few male friends around you. Unfortunately it seems that the lighter your skin is, the easier they think you are, so often just the exchange of names is considered enough to make physical contact. Hmmm.

With only a few hours spent on our pillows, we get up just before lunch to head to the beach. But it seems everyone here is slow to wake up, and things are only just starting to move on the streets after midday. We decide to hop on a collectivo – roughly translated to shared transport aka a mini-bus jammed full of locals – and head to Geriba to sample more of the local scene.

Despite the impossibly hot sand, Geriba is well set up with all of its rainbow of umbrellas and tables neatly pre-arranged. It is definitely not the grab-what-you-can affair of Copacabana that I am used to, and even the wandering vendors seem to outnumber reclining patrons. They seem to have more of a business sense than those I pitied before in Rio, and we keenly sample oysters, haloumi and the flaming meat-on-a-stick. Of course the water beckons us too, but its icy greeting quickly encourages us to move to warmer Brava.

More discrete, and with fewer people, we jump in for a quick dip before I have to leave to meet my afternoon bus. Sitting back in my recliner chair, sand in between my toes, I am glad to have made my little detour, and know that I will definitely be back here again.