Walking the beach

I've taken several walks along the beach in the week that I've been here. The entire coastline in the Recife area is extensively built up, with apartments and hotels lining the beachfront. Most buildings are 12–20 stories high, many quite attractive, but the newer ones, including many under construction, run 30 stories and more. In the Boa Viagem area where I am, the buildings are all across the street from the beach, leaving the water side as an extensive, linear public park with a wide walkway between the street and the sand. In some places the beach is quite wide, with palms and other trees, as well as shrubs and groundcover before the sand begins, as well as playgrounds, tennis courts, seating areas, public showers and bathrooms. There are also sets of chin-up bars, push-up bars, and varying inclined concrete pads for sit-ups. People (well, young men) use these. South of my hotel, the beach becomes narrow and sometimes steep and in some places has been hardened with boulders to prevent further erosion.

In the late afternoons when I've been out, there are people of all ages, shapes, colors, degrees of fitness, and degrees of prosperity on the walkway (in Spanish this would be called a paseo, but I don't know the Portuguese equivalent). Most people seem to be Brazilians--at least I feel like the most conspicuous gringa, though there are a few other people who are pale of skin and hair. Many are dressed in athletic clothing and are bent on exercise, others stroll and talk, some ogle the others, and some are aiming to sell food, drink, or CDs. Children skate and skateboard, old men play dominoes, and where the beach is wide enough there are games of soccer and volleyball. Every several hundred yards there's a concrete bungalow with a circular thatched roof that serves as a food concession, selling fresh coconut milk in the coconut, soft drinks and liquor, and packaged snacks. Other entrepreneurs with pushcarts sell fresh peeled oranges, roasted corn, and things I don't recognize.

The walkway is lined with trees—the only one I recognize is the coconut palm. There is some kind of tree with broad leathery leaves that remind me a bit of southern magnolia leaves, though the tree shape is very different. There are some lovely trees that look at first like pines, with long, feathery needles, but on closer look, the needles are segmented like those of a cypress and the bark has a shredded texture, also like cypress.

I do not have any pictures of the beachfront because I'm afraid to bring my camera with me. I've been advised not to take anything I don't want to lose. I haven't seen any skullduggery, nor have I felt at all threatened, but given what my students were talking about the other day, as well as the advice from Angela and Judith, I won't get any pictures until I have company for one of my walks.