Jacare

We had been advised to visit Jacare in Joao Pessoa for some time so one evening Carla offered to drive us there.
For some years a jazz saxophonist has taken it upon himself to go out on a boat into the bay and play Ravel's Bolero every evening around sunset (like you do). It has become quite a big tourist attraction.

So we headed down a dirt road with what seemed like throngs of other tourists, parked up at ten past five but kick off must have been at five as we could already hear Bolero in full throttle blasting out on the saxophone.
Following Carla we hurried past restaurants to a balconied area of the bay, pushing past Brazilian tourists to get a glimpse of an old rotund man in a white suit being slowly circled around in a small motor boat playing Bolero on saxophone with a microphone. The music could be heard all along the little shopping street and in the restsurants, hundreds of people watching as the sun begn to go down.

I've never heard Bolero played on a saxophone and as he drew to a close his bay-side audience cheered and applauded. I have to say it was pretty cool and I can see why it took off. He then made his way up to one of the restaurants and began to play a set of familiar jazzed-up tunes. Apparently he has an understudy who performs on the nights he doesn't wish to so I guess we were lucky to see the original.

We were then at our leisure to browse the souvenir and gift shops and had an icecream whilst Gareth took an age to set up a photo of the setting sun (nice photo but Jeez Gareth, get on with it!).
We then had our photos taken with a couple who go round dressed like Pariban soldiers (Pariba the state in which Joao Pessoa exists once had its own army and fought against the country as it wanted to remain independent from Brazil). An embarrassing experience if I'm honest but we grit our teeth and got on with it, thinking of the Facebook photos.
It had been an enjoyable evening viewing a spectacle we may have missed but for the knowledge of locals.