The flight to Natal from Salvador took about an hour and a half. I had no arrangements for a hotel, I figured I would wing it when I arrived. There was not much information on ClubHombre to go by, so I figured I was breaking new ground. The only point of reference I had was a club named Isla Fantasia in Ponta Negra
At the airport, the tourist help booth was unmanned, so I went over to the airport help booth, where a young man named Watson tried to be very helpful. He showed me a book with a number of hotel listings in it, including pictures and information about facilities. I went through the book looking for hotels with an Internet connection near Ponta Negra, which I found out was a section of beach south of the city. I settled on one called Praiamar (remembering the good experience in Salvador across from a good-looking hotel of the same name), and Watson called them on my cell phone. The clerk spoke English and said they had a fast Internet connection in the business center, and I thought they said they had dial-up connections in the rooms, like the hotel in Salvador.
So I took a cab to the hotel. The room was R$148 and it was pretty basic: a window looking out over the ocean (we were a block above the beach boardwalk), a queen-size bed, a small table (that rocked when you put your hands on it) with two chairs, a TV. It was not very big and it was not very bright. I also noticed that the electrical receptacles were 220 volts. I had not known that Natal had 220-volt current, so I had not brought along a transformer.
As I checked in, I asked if it would be okay if I bring my girlfriend up to my room. The clerk said yes, put her name down here. I said, “I will write it down later,” and he said okay. A bellboy took my bags down a long corridor, past all of the first floor rooms. How stupid—the elevators were located on the opposite end of the hotel from the lobby! We got in the elevator, which stopped on 2 to let somebody on, and he started to leave with my bags (I was in room 326). I tried to tell him this was not 3 yet and he insisted come on. Finally just as the door was closing he realized that we were still on 2 and we both got back on the elevator.
A few minutes after I got to my room the phone rang and the clerk said that there was a problem. I had to write down the name of my girlfriend now if I wanted her to be able to use the room. I told him I did not know it. He said, “Well then you cannot bring a guest up to the room.”
I unpacked partially and went down to the front desk to ask if they had a 220-to-110 volt transformer I could use. On the way I noticed that the business center was closed on Sunday. At the desk I asked about that and they said, “Yes, it is closed for the day” and there was not any Internet connection in the room either. They also did not have a transformer I could use. I asked where the nearest Internet café was and they pointed right across the street.
Sure enough, there was a sign that said “Internet” in what looked like a convenience store-bar right across the street. I walked over and said I wanted to use the Internet, but they said it wasn’t working right now. So I asked where another Internet café was; they told me that I could find one up on the main street down a few blocks.
I walked down one block to the beach, long the boardwalk and then up a steep hill to the main street. I walked along the main road looking for the Internet café, but only found one which was closed on Sunday. I continued walking, hoping to find one, and finally asked directions to an Internet café elsewhere, and the guy pointed me back in the direction I had come. I walked a couple of blocks in that direction past where I had started, but it did not look promising, so I turned around. This main street did not really seem to have a lot happening on it. As it turned out it was not really THE main street where things were happening.
I bought a newspaper to look for ads for escorts, but that was no help either. It was pretty thin for a Sunday paper, so I scoured it completely. There were only nine ads in the “companion section.” One was for a transvestite, two were for men and the others had the briefest of descriptions so you had no idea what you might get. (Next time, I’ll try the phone book too).
The hotel was turning into a total loss. The next time I went down to the front desk, a boy was cleaning the elevator doors with a rag. He stopped to let me go in but the elevator doors would not close. I think he might have dislocated the infrared beam that checks for objects in the door. In any event, an hour and a half later when I returned from my fruitless search for an internet café, the elevator still was not working.
Every time I went into the hotel lobby it was crowded with people. Apparently, tours used the hotel, and so I had to wait each time. I asked whether I could check out of the hotel without paying because the Internet was not available and that was the reason I was at that hotel. After they explained that I had already paid and that they would only charge me for one night if I left, I asked to see the manager. At that point I got a refund for the cost of my room.
I asked the clerk if he knew of a nearby hotel which had Internet access and he pointed me down the street to the Esmeralda Hotel just three blocks away. At the Esmeralda I asked if they had Internet access and could loan me a transformer for my computer. They said yes to the access and no unfortunately they did not have a transformer available. The clerk--named Gerson offered to find me a hotel which could help me and made a few phone calls. At that point I decided to stayt here. The hotel looked very nice and the staff was very friendly.
I checked in, and the hotel turned out to be very nice. For the same cost as at the other dingy hotel, I had a lavish new hotel right on the beach, and my room had a balcony overlooking the beach. It was clean and well lit, and the hotel lobby and atrium were elegant. There was an extensive collection of apparently local paintings on display.
I checked the Internet and discovered that Isla Fantasia was not open on Sundays. Oh, just my luck. I went to the front desk and asked my new friend there if there were any clubs where I could go to meet girls. He said, “No, it is Sunday, they are all closed. Carnatal is the big thing happening right now. It’s the last night but you might be interested in that.” I asked him what it was and he said it was a number of bands playing and people dancing and I would probably find it interesting.
He called to see if he could arrange admission but all that was left was a t-shirt (ticket) in the student section for R$100. I said I would take it, and a few minutes later a cab pulled up with a man with the t-shirt. They took me to the Carnatal site, the guy got out along the way (I had no idea who he was or where he fit in to anything).
I found my way to my section and went into the crowd. I discovered that the venue was similar to the Sambadrome in Rio, except it was not a permanent-type structure: it was a stand made out of metal poles and wooden components with canvas tenting overhead. The stands flanked the street. Everybody was young, perhaps because I was in the student section. I looked around and there were maybe 3 people over 25. Many of them appeared to be under 18.
Soon a whole bunch of people came dancing down the street. I looked down at the street at the dancing masses and they were all very young too, very few appeared to be adults. They were dressed in more or less regular clothes rather than costumes like Carnaval. After at least 1,000 dancing, writhing, clapping people had marched on in front of us, the music got intense as a tractor truck pulling a huge trailer somewhat like a float pulled up and stopped right in front of us. On top of the trailer, probably 20 feet off the ground, was a stage-like area with a band playing. In the trailer were what sounded like 100,000 watts worth of equipment and speakers. I suspect the sound level was well above where it starts damaging your eardrums, the speakers were 10 feet away from me. After stopping for about five minutes the truck slowly moved on, followed by another 1,000 or so dancing people and another truck with a trailer with more people on top (no band). The extra trailer may have been part of the band’s set-up for when they played at concerts, it appeared to have restrooms in it plus a facility for selling drinks or ice cream.
This scenario was repeated over and over again, with thousands of dancing people and trucks with trailers containing bands high up above the street. Apparently these were very popular bands, judging by the reaction of the people around me. Many of the dancers surrounding any given band were wearing the same t-shirts, so it was an interesting effect. I tried to do a count and I figured there were at least 5,000 people surrounding each band.
My ticket bought me unlimited free beer and everybody else had the same so naturally people were in quite high spirits. However, there was no unpleasantry like in Salvador. After several hours I got tired of standing in one place, being jostled by the crowd, and so I left. My ears were hurting, too. As I was leaving I mingled with the crowds to see whether it looked like there might be some working girls there. There did not appear to be any prospects for GdP action, either in the stands or outside. In the parking/street area, food vendors and others had set up numerous stands, creating another festival atmosphere, but I didn’t see anything else that looked promising.
I took a cab back to near the hotel where I had seen a restaurant that claimed to offer a taste of the northeast cuisine (or tasty Rio Grande do Norte cuisine, depending on how bad your Portuguese is). The restaurant was called Camaroes (shrimps). I had an excellent meal of shrimp sautéed with onions and cashew nuts—a huge platter, more than I could eat, for R$40, a lot less than a shrimp dinner in Rio. I noticed later that the menu indicated the dinners were for two. Afterwards, I went back to the hotel to turn in early and get a good night sleep—a last. I would have to save garota-hunting for tomorrow.
The moderately sumptuous buffet breakfast was served until 10 AM, and the pineapple was outstanding. I took my plate out by the pool to eat. Afterwards, and after checking my e-mail and the board, I put on some suntan lotion (I was still feeling the slight burn I had gotten two days before) and walked down the beach. The Ponta Negra beach stretched for almost two miles, and my hotel was near the north end. A stone-paved boardwalk (stonewalk?) extended along most of the beach. When I got to about the midpoint, a street descended from the bluff and ran along the boardwalk. Here were the bars and restaurants, more pousadas, travel agencies and souvenir shops, along with a 24-hour storefront with 3 ATM’s. I didn’t see the ATM’s at first, but was able to get R$600 on my way back.
The action was clearly happening along this part of the beach—the umbrellas, stretched out single file to the north, were thick and more people were out (but it was not crowded like Praia das Putas in Rio). Along the whole stretch of beach, I did not see one obvious GdP, and very few Natalians. There were a lot of tourists: couples, guys, and girls (mostly not Brazileiras, judging from their tans, bellies, and suits). I saw a lot of red-skinned people, and it occurred to me that the strong breeze was lulling the fair-skinned Europeans into believing that the strong sun was mild, while it was turning them into lobsters.
Near the south end was a disco, Club Something-trintanove. I looked inside, and it did not look like it was operational. I found out later it had been closed by fire for two months, and was supposed to open this night (maybe, based on what I saw). It was around noon, so I thought it might be too early. I dallied for a while, and walked back to my hotel. The beach was very nice, and not particularly well developed, especially the north half.
Around mid-afternoon, I took the stroll down the beach again, and at exactly 4 PM, saw the first GdP. She came walking down the street descending from the bluff onto the beach street, obvious in her heels, tight dress, and her whole affect. Initially a few dozen yards in front of me, she zigzagged, so I came up alongside her—and looked her up and down, of course. She said something, we exchanged a few lines and names, then went right into “Do you want company?” I said no thanks, and continued on. She was the only one I saw for a couple of hours.
I stopped to talk with a real estate agent who spoke decent English. He had a few interesting listings: a pousada with 8 rooms and a nice owner’s quarters north of Natal, about R$800,000; and a penthouse condo owned by an American at the top of a newer, high-class high-rise (I think it was the 32nd floor), US$285,000 (whew!). I left with the impression that US$100K would buy some nice beachfront property in the area. Unfortunately, I was not at all familiar with all the different places around Natal, and discovered that Ponta Negra was actually some kilometers south of the city, one of many “beach towns” around Natal.
Around 6, people had moved off the beach to the benches along the boardwalk, and there was a little foot traffic. As I passed a kiosk, I saw two cuties who looked like they might be GdPs. My glance lingered on them (they were worth the linger), and they noticed. Walking back ten minutes later, I traded eye contact, then stopped a dozen yards further on, ostensibly to watch a beach volleyball game. Two minutes later, they came up to me, and suggested we sit down and have a drink, would I buy them one.
We sat at an open restaurant/bar. Tatiana was the one I liked: tall and thin with a nice figure, young looking (she said 19), she was so cute when she giggled and put her hand over her mouth, I thought she might be “fresh.” Claudia had a broad face and fuller figure, and had been studying English for three months—she could speak a little. She was from Salvador originally, and her family had been living in Sao Paulo for six years (long enough to lose the Bahian accent, I could actually understand her). Tatiana was from Natal.
After we were talking for a while, Claudia basically asked me if I wanted to have sex with Tatiana, so I asked how much. Tatiana said R$200, I said too much, R$100, she stayed firm at R$150. I confirmed that she liked to kiss, but CBJ was all I would get, but we’d have 2-3 hours for that price. I suspected that I was paying probably double the going rate, but my little head does the thinking when I see a body like Tatiana’s with such a cute face. The three of us got into a cab to go to the love motel. Along the way, I asked Claudia where we were dropping her off. She replied, “You like two girls?” Of course, I said, but it would be too expensive, I could only pay R$200 for both. They said that would be OK (confirming my suspicions of overpayment), and so on we went.
Then, we turned off the paved main street onto a dusty dirt road. No stores, only walls along the road. I became increasingly uneasy as two blocks stretched into three, but then I saw a big neon sign, “Oklahoma Motel.”
The girls asked for the Millenium suite, R$50 for 3 hours (two other options were R$21 and R$24). A hand reached out of a tiny arched opening—just big enough for an arm—to take the R$50 bill. It was bizarre.
We went into a room directly off the garage area, two levels with a main room plus a grotto room on the first floor, and a loft with the bed. The grotto had a large tub with a rock protrusion for a waterfall four feet above the surface, it was pretty nice when it got going. Strangely, you had to call the office to engage the drainstop (!—I guess they would open it when your time was up), and the water never got hot or even more than slightly warm (there was a single valve). But we never made it into the tub. Of course, I would not have figured out about calling the office to engage the drainstop if the girls didn‘t know, much less been able to communicate about that in Portuguese.
The girls started dancing, opened a couple of drinks, and requested a dance CD from the office. Tatiana started the tub filling, and added bubble bath. There was piped-in music upstairs, and a boom box system downstairs. Tatiana took off her top and put on the CD, so we had competing music. Claudia took a shower, but Tatiana kept dancing, and when Claudia emerged in a robe, she too started dancing. They did not seem to be in sexual mode, and I started to get that sinking feeling that this wasn‘t going to work out the way I wanted. I told Tatiana to shower, and took Claudia upstairs. Things got worse—Claudia wouldn’t kiss, after a few caresses she reached for the rubber, I said, no good. I called for Tatiana to come up, she was eating cashews. I put them down, and pulled her into bed—she got the nuts again and continued eating.
At that point, I knew this was not going to be worth the trouble. I told them to get dressed, I was not going to pay them, we were leaving. They called for the bill and a taxi. When the bill arrived at the room, I paid it, and we left. I only got a couple photos of Claudia in the shower:
Photos: Claudia 49 50
I gave them R$50 each as we left. At the gate, they started demanding payment in full, and I told them no way. The cab driver , in the midst of the maelstrom, stared stoically straight ahead. After a few minutes of impasse arguing with them in my best angry Portuguese, the metal gate opened, and we left. I was pretty pissed by then, and when they asked for a ride home, I said no way, you were worthless, you can get out at my hotel and walk. As we got close, I decided it would be a bad idea to dump them near my hotel (or even know which hotel I was at), so I told the taxista to take them home.
Five minutes later, I regretted that decision. We had left the main road and were barreling down cobblestone streets, and it did not look like a friendly neighborhood. We were getting further into the city (favela?), and I was getting really uneasy. It was starting to get dark, and I did not like the neighborhood one bit. But the girls were a little more friendly at that point, and when I asked the taxi driver if it was dangerous there, he said, “Not with me, your friend, here.” After we dropped the girls off, he told me he didn’t want to admit it was dangerous in front of the girls, but it was—maybe that’s why he was driving so fast.
Anyway, we got back to my hotel OK, an extra $R20 in cab fare. R$200+ wasted on a really unpleasant experience, one of only a few ever in Brasil. So much for my ability to judge fresh, innocent-looking talent.
A couple of hours later, Isla Fantasia would open. I killed the time by walking back to the area of the beach with the stores. A few GdPs were in evidence, sitting at bars or just walking along, but not very many, and none looked good enough to eat or take home to mom.
I hailed a cab to go to Isla Fantasia, and the driver told me that Club Senzala was better. I asked him why, he told me that the rooms were nicer, there were more garotas, prettier garotas. It was only 10:30, early yet, so I said sure. Senzala wasn’t mentioned on this board, so I’d have a chance to take one for the team.
We turned off the paved road onto a dark, bumpy dirt road, and drove down several blocks. Again, I was starting to get uneasy when I saw a building lit up with red lights, and several cabs and other cars parked in front (the only cars on the entire road).
We went inside, a sign at the entry said men $R10, women R$50 (they added it to my bill when I left). Inside was a bar on the left and a piscina on the right. Beyond the bar was a stage. A video was projected onto a large screen on the right. A large open area in the middle contained tables and chairs, along with maybe fifteen mostly bored-looking women and a handful of men. The area was open-air, covered with a canvas-on-metal-rods structure anchored to the building at the rear, where the kitchen and the rooms were located.
I took a seat near the TV screen and the center of gravity of the women, and started looking around. One doable spinner, one 8 or 9 who left just after I arrived, but otherwise 5s to 7s that I would not want. A waiter brought my drink and told me that he would bring over any woman I liked. None approached me during the half-hour I was there, and I didn’t get any details on how the place worked (sorry).
At least the TV had subtitled text of whatever the sexy singer was saying (mostly Portuguese lyrics) so I got to practice comprehension a little bit. After nursing my drink, hoping for more arrivals, I got my bill (R$10 admission plus R$18 for a Red Bull) and left. The taxi driver told me more girls would arrive around midnight (it was 11:20). We passed a few lonely streetwalkers—probably transvestites, the driver said.
Isla Fantasia was closer to the central beach area, above it on a main (paved) street, and was a typical club room with a stage in the middle surrounded by booths, and booths and a bar around the walls. It was darker than Senzala, and difficult to see the girls who were on the other side of the room. However, the girls appeared to be better looking (mostly 6s to 8s). I took a seat between the stage and the bar, and looked around. No girl struck me as a must-have, and several approached me, asking to sit down.
Eventually, Rafaela came over. She was a vaguely Asian-looking girl with green eyes (contacts) that I had been looking at as one of four possibilities. We chatted for a while, and started talking business. She told me that the rooms were R$40 for one hour, the earlier information of unlimited time was no longer accurate. There was a R$60 exit fee, and we could go to a love motel at R$20 for three hours. She wanted R$150 either way (???), and passed the interview. I just sat there for a while thinking and looking around some more, and she sensed that she might be loosing me. So she lowered her price to R$100, and I decided to go for it. It was 12:30 by then, and no influx of girls was apparent—just a few had appeared.
We got into a cab, and drove off to the Oklahoma Motel (again). Only basic rooms were available this time, but it was really all we needed. Rafaela was not a young hardbody, but she was the perfect antidote to the afternoon’s bad experience. She kissed sensually, gave good head, and came nicely when I went down on her. We had sex in several positions, I got in two pops, and she was very nice and accommodating. A true GFE experience.
Photos: Rafaela 51 52 53 54 55 56
Although we still short of the two-hour mark, I wanted to get up early to go for a swim, so we paid our bill and left, R$38 including a R$13 teddy bear that I bought her as a tip. I gave her a ride home, she did not live far off the paved roads.
The next morning, I got up at 8 to take a swim in the incredibly inviting water before breakfast. It was so nice I lost track of the time and almost missed breakfast, lolling in the soft surf and warm water for well over an hour. There was no undercurrent like in Salvador, just smooth swimming and decent bodysurfing.
After breakfast, I packed and took the 20-minute cab ride to the airport (R$29). I was tempted by a sandwich shop in the airport:
The flight back to Rio stopped in Salvador, the plane was almost full both legs. The Bahian who go on there and sat next to me spoke a Portuguese I could not understand at all, once he turned off the two cellphones that were ringing constantly from the time he boarded.
It was raining at the Rio airport where Vera met me, but I was happy to be “home.”