Day 48: Teddy’s Birthday – Heading Up The Coast to Praia Do Forte

Salvador so needs to be done without kids. Had visions of setting out for a last few hours of touring — a market, a gallery, something — before heading up the coast, but it just wasn’t going to happen. Playground instead.

As a tourist in Salvador you’re either dealing with subject matter that is complex/heavy and requires reflection, or you’re out to enjoy vibrant nightlife and dancing. And it’s 90-degrees in the shade. No room in there for our nerds. We’ll be back.

A tradition in Salvador is to tie bits of designated colorful cloth around your wrist or to church gates and make a wish. We are wearing ours!

We got picked up after lunch for a 1.5-hour ride up the coast to the beach, where we’ve blocked off 5 days of “vacation” at a Tivoli resort in Praia Do Forte.

It’s very much a big, family-friendly beach resort, with hundreds of rooms, lots of pools and activities and buffets. Feels funny to be in such a place after the 2019 we’ve had so far, but we’re on vacation here, so we’re going with it.

They served us coconut waters at reception and a guy in a white polo drove us to our room in a golf cart.

Soon after we unpacked in our room there was a knock — champagne and cake for daddy’s birthday!

We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the property and wondering with amusement how we ended up in this place.

After showering up, we set out for dinner and passed a German couple and their 6-year-old daughter on our walk. Got to chatting. She’s half Brazilian, which is why they were there. We ended up having dinner with them — they showed us the buffet ropes and we drank some caipirinhas.

There was an epic sugar crash in our room after too much dessert, so, we learned that lesson.