Recife

Recife - Tuesday, 15^th January.

Today was a very sad day for me as a very good friend of mine, Doreen, who died Christmas/New Year 2012, had her funeral today, and because of this cruise I was unable to attend.  She was a lovely lady, who used to live in Fairoak Drive and she (and Jack) used to join us every Thursday morning for a cup of coffee and a chat.  A couple of years ago she moved to York to be near her daughter, Christine, and regrettably we had not been up to see her.  However, we commemorated the day by saying our goodbyes on the aft of the ship and I threw a white rose into the sea.  Goodbye Doreen.

Today we arrived in Recife, our first stop in Brazil, South America.  We had decided to book an excursion on a catamaran doing the sights of the city from the river. 

This turned out to be not a particularly good excursion with the views of the city limited from a very smelly, highly polluted river edged by mangroves.  However, we did see what the city had to offer.  

After the cruise the coach dropped us off at an interesting market place in the old jailhouse with the stallholders occupying individual prison cells (see pictures). 

We had intended to return to the town in the afternoon but decided we had seen seen enough. with the temperature reaching over 30 degrees and being very humid.  Needless to say Recife is not on our list of places to return to in the future.