Day 2: Rio - Salvador

We woke up and had breakfast at the hotel, got ready and headed out to grab a taxi to the airport.

The airport experience was less than ideal - after being directed to the wrong line, then having to switch to a long un-moving line and worrying we were going to miss our flight, we finally made it and amazingly so did our luggage! After an easy flight we arrived in Salvador and took a cab to our hotel - the Sheraton Bahia.

After consulting with the "concierge" (who also checked us in) we decided to go hang out in Rio Vermelho, which he said was the nicest neighborhood in Salvador.  Inspired by an NYT article, we headed to the Largo de Santana Plaza and had our first taste of Bahian food.

 We tasted some of the Bahian fare - Acaraje (balls of dough fried in dende oil and served with spicy sauce and shrimp) from the Casa de Dinha stand as well as a "taco" where the shell was made out of grilled tapioca powder - the first was filled with meat and cheese - and second was filled with coconut and sweetened condensed milk - YUM.  We ate the savory one with an amazing garlic sauce - DOUBLE YUM.

We washed those down with about six bottles of the local beer "Skol" while playing an intense game of "would you rather".  We watched the sun set.

We decided to walk to a restaurant that another article talked about called Dona Mariquita but it turned out to be closed so we walked back to another place that seemed popular - turned out to be a samba club that our "concierge" had recommended! We had a very odd dinner (we ordered something we saw at another table that looked good but turned out to be rock hard chicharrones and unintentionally ordered a chicken dish that was average) but it allowed us to get into the Samba club without a problem. 

An AWESOME live band was playing so we watched locals dance and did our best to move our feet half as fast. We later learned the band was playing Axé - a genre generated in Bahía that combines Afro-Carribean and Brazilian music.  It was super energetic and entertaining. 

After we had our fill, we headed back to the hotel via taxi.