Meeting this resourceful, solo female traveler who barely had to spend any money, yet was able to visit various beautiful places all around Europe, made me vow that one day I would participate in a work-exchange program myself. And, I finally got around to doing it this summer! Earlier last semester I signed up for workaway.com, a work-exchange website, and I got in touch with various hostels in Brazil to try and volunteer at one during my summer break. I ended up spending three weeks volunteering at Casa Coco Verde in the tiny town of Jericoacoara, in Ceara, a state in northeastern Brazil. In exchange for 5 work hours a day I got a free bed and breakfast. I actually spent minimal money on food because the great thing about hostels is that there are communal kitchens and when you befriend the guests they often share their food ;) With room and board pretty much covered, I ended up spending most of my money on just a few things: transportation to get to Jeri (expensive because of distance from Rio and high season), and the occasional caipirinha (just 5 reais!), surfboard rental or buggy tour.
#nofilter. One of my favorite memories was surfing under these pink cotton candy sunset clouds before my night shift one day!
The work was a bit boring and consisted mainly of cleaning up after breakfast, gardening, grocery shopping for breakfast, and helping guests check in, but the downtime I had on my time off made it all worth it. Getting away from Rio in an isolated paradise was JUST what the doctor ordered. I was completely and utterly burnt out after my semester in Rio. And although I loved having my family and later my friends from California visit me there, being the designated "local" and translator was a bit stressful. By the end, I really needed time for myself where no one would rely on me... In Jericoacoara I could finally exhale, make my own schedule (ie read in a hammock for three hours straight if I wanted to), walk in the streets (made of sand) barefoot, go out without any fear of being robbed (oh Rio....), watch the sunset on a giant sand dune, nap, etc. Aaaah the simple life. I miss it already!
The giant sand dune where the whole town would go to watch the sunset.
Some of my favorite memories from the summer:
-Arriving in Jeri. I got into the Fortaleza airport at 1 am. At the crack of dawn at 6 AM I boarded a Van that took me all the way to Jijoca de Jericoacoara. From there, I had to switch to a truck that took us into the sand dunes. Jericoacoara appeared like an oasis in the desert after the long journey (more than 6 hours in total).
-Becoming really good at making pancakes, french toast and garlic bread! I made pancakes daily for the hostel breakfast. And, with the leftover bread from breakfast, we would make french toast and garlic bread around 3 PM so guests could have a sweet or savory post-beach snack :)
- Dancing forro until 4:30 AM with my fellow volunteers and friends Pia (24, from France) and Selina (18, from Germany). I got really into dancing forro in Jeri. It's an upbeat, northeastern style of dance and music that uses accordion, triangle, and drums as the main instruments. By the time the forro ended, the three of us were some of the last people there along with Angela, our boss. We joked that it was a Casa Coco Verde staff party. After forro, we went to the bakery, padaria Santo Antonio, and ate delicious pao de chocolate (only 2 reais!) fresh out the oven.
-Walking to the Jeri lighthouse at sunrise. It is a sorry excuse for a lighthouse, being more of a glorified pole with a small light at the top, but it sits at the top of a huge hill covered in cactuses and wild goats/donkeys. Walking up there to take in the view and be completely alone in the silence of nature was such a treat!
Walking up to the lighthouse :)
-Taking buggy tours on my days off. The first one was to lagoas paraiso and azul with my hostel buddies Matthew, Felipe, and Nick. We had a hilarious driver who insisted on taking a bajillion photos of us doing all kinds of optical illusions. The lagoas were great as well...they had crystal clear waters and hammocks built such that half of your body was in the water!
-My friend Kate's visit! She arrived in Rio in January to study at PUC and we had met at i-house in Berkeley my junior year. We took another awesome buggy tour, this time to the Tatajuba lagoon. This time the lagoon was rather muddy and anticlimactic, but the journey there was the real adventure. We had to cross a river on the buggy (by going onto a man-steered sort of raft). We also got to climb these huge and amazing mangroves, ski-bunda or sandboard (and walk all the way back up the dune... a struggle), and swim on a beach on our way back to Jeri that was completely deserted as far as the eye could see!
Post sand-boarding happiness! Although climbing back up a huge sand dune with only a rope to help is not so fun. For each foot I would climb it felt like I sank 11 inches haha!
Kate after a swim on our own deserted beach!!
After Jeri, me and Kate continued onto the Lencois Maranhenses park in the state of Maranhao for a couple days. Now that trip was a whole other adventure deserving its own post.... someday soon I will write about it hopefully, although things are heating up in Rio for Carnaval, with tons of pre-carnaval celebrations happening right on my street in Ipanema, so I can't make any promises....>__<
Thank you for reading!!!
Tchau beijos
Marie
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