Streams and Mosquitoes, but no Diamonds

Ah, the beauty of nature.  We arrived last night in Lençóis, Brazil, an old diamond mining town of about 8,000 residents, and the starting point for tours of the Chapada Diamantina National Park.  Lençóis is a six-hour bus ride west of Salvador and we will stay here for a few days to do a little hiking and communing with nature. There isn't much mining going on in the town now, but a diamond boom started around 1844 and lasted until huge diamond deposits were discovered in South Africa around 1880, at which point Lençóis was pretty much deserted.  One of the interesting geological facts I read about the diamonds in Lençóis is that they were formed near present-day Namibia, which would have been right next to the Brazilian state of Bahia back when all the continents comprised the one supercontinent Pangea.  And since Namibia is just north of South Africa, people searching during those boom years were traveling the globe to exploit diamonds that were probably all initially part of one huge deposit, but only separated from each other by continental drift over the course of millions of years.  It sounds like many of the diamonds found in Lençóis were of industrial quality rather than gemstone quality, so I'm sure that also contributed to the relatively short boom in Lençóis.  Ultimately, many of the industrial diamonds from Lençóis were used to dig the Panama Canal and the London Underground among other places. 

 

Anyway, back to the present day, the Chapada Diamantina National Park was established here around 1985 in response to growing ecotourism.  The park is known for it's natural beauty, including many streams, waterfalls, mountains, monoliths, and caves.  I'm sure I'll have more to say about it once I actually visit it, which we're doing tomorrow with an all-day tour consisting of about 14 km of hiking and visits to some of the main natural attractions in the park.  Nevertheless, the pictures in the brochures and online look amazing, so I'm really excited to see it.  I found an interesting LA Times travel article about the park online.  If you're into ecotourism or just curious, it's definitely worth a read [LINK].

 

One last note.  My best friend, Carsten, asked a while back why we were only hopping from big city to big city on this trip.  I explained that while it would be nice to see more of the countryside in South America, logistics often made it impractical, if not impossible, especially when you consider the time and expense factors.  I loved every minute of Iguazu Falls, but it was far out of the way and quite expensive compared to spending time in the city, especially if you want to do any activities.  Besides, as much as I love nature, I'm a city boy at heart and can only take the bugs and trees for limited periods of time.  Unfortunately, I'm allergic to trees, weeds, and most everything else that floats in the air in a natural environment; and the bugs... they're just relentless.  I'm a mosquito magnet and can't tell you how many times I've been bitten over the last few months and the bites for me are more than just a mere annoyance.  I've grown accustomed to spraying myself down with Off at sunset every night, because on the occasional night when I forget, I inevitably wake up the next day to huge, itchy bites on any exposed skin.  I awoke this morning to a mosquito bite on my forehead... again.  I'm willing to go through such inconveniences and annoyances for the simple pleasure of seeing some of the beautiful and amazing things that nature has to offer.  But you will NEVER see me living in a place like this. 

 

Cheers,

Ozell