Deciding how much time to spend in Recife and whether to go there at all was a point of much debate when we were planning our trip. I've heard some positive opinions about Recife (though rarely comparable with opinions about Natal), but many people also described it as an ugly and violent city, quite unlike the rest of the Northeast which people describe as cool/mellow (tranquilo). Eventually we ended up with an impression that Recife must be quite “dangerous” compared to Natal, but probably won’t scare us too much coming from Rio. And everyone who has been to Porto de Galinhas, an hour south from Recife, was saying that there is nothing quite like it in all of Brazil. So, we decided to fly into Recife, stay there for a day or so, go south to Porto de Galinhas, then head north to Natal.

Being very much a visual traveller, I found Recife itself rather drab. We stayed in Boa Viagem which felt like a poor attempt at replicating Copacabana. (Though, the beach did get some extra style points for shark warning signs.) The hotel where we were staying was the cheapest yet terribly overpriced. The downtown buildings looked as if the city has recently gone through a minor civil war, though to give it credit there seems to be a lot of renovation going on, so in a few years perhaps it will look a bit better. The only visually exciting thing downtown was the Parque das Sculpturas which featured some work by Brennand. Had we seen this before we did a tour of Oficina Brennand (see below), I probably would have enjoyed it, but at this point it didn’t seem like anything to write home about.

Recife did have two attractions nearby, however. The first one was Olinda, just a few kilometers north from Recife. Olinda indeed was pretty, though eerly empty.

It couldn’t quite compare to Ouro Preto, however, or to Paraty.

There was one truly remarkable place in Recife, however: Oficina Brennand. Francisco Brennand is an artist from Recife who inherited a ceramic factory and has turned it into a most bizarre place. His sculptures are absolutely fascinating (if disturbing) even in isolation, and in such concentration as one finds them at Oficina Brennand, it’s trully an experience.

If anyone wants recommendations on what to do in Recife on a brief visit, I would say that Oficina Brennand really is something one has to see. (If you have time left over, go to Olinda.) Unfortunately, it is quite out of the way, and requires either a long taxi ride (we paid about R$25-30 to come back downtown) or a long bus ride until University of Pernabucu Campus (Cidade Universitaria) and then a short taxi ride. (We did this to get there and it was interesting as a chance to see lower-middle class Recife, but it did take close to an hour.)