Fortaleza, Brazil

[Guest Tomcal_]

Has anyone spent time here? I hear it is a beautiful beach area with a pop. of 2 million. There are 3 suanas shown there. Are they like the ones in Rio and S.P. ?

[trilingual]

It's been a long time since I was in Fortaleza, but it's a nice place. One of the contributors here has been there more recently, and I believe he said the saunas were OK but not at the level of Rio or S.P. Of course, all it takes is one hot guy who tickles your fancy to have a great time.

 

All that being said, I don't know if I would recommend Fortaleza as a place to go in the Northeast if you've never been to the region before. The beaches are beautiful (although the closer in-town ones are questionably clean; Praia do Futuro is a better bet for swimming) and the food and nightlife are very good. Mostly, though, Fortaleza is just a big city with lots of modern high rise apartments and hotels. There's very little of historic interest left to see there.

 

For a first-timer, I'd strongly suggest going to Salvador and Recife over Fortaleza. Both have fine beaches, too, they also have excellent food and nightlife, but most importantly they have lots of interesting things to see and do. Salvador is the oldest city in Brazil, and it was the capital for more than two centuries, so there's an amazing amount of historical buildings and churches to see. The old colonial center is very well-preserved and has recently been restored (it had been allowed to deteriorate appallingly until about ten years ago). It's also the heart and soul of Afro-Brazilian culture, and the place where many of Brazil's finest musicians come from. Recife, although it hasn't preserved it's old center as well as Salvador, still has a lot to see, and the colonial center of adjoining Olinda IS almost perfectly preserved, with beautiful old houses and churches. Of course, both cities have saunas and other gay life, too!