Finding our Feet in Salvador

Our first 3 days in Salvador we embarked on a journey of cautious exploration, while consciously being very aware of ourselves and our belongings, while becoming familiar with the city's safety, or maybe I  should say lack there of. We want to ensure that our adventure unfolds with both excitement and peace of mind.

As we drive around in our ubers we can clearly see how beautiful so much of this city once was, with some incredible architecture, that sadly has just become extremely derelict. The class disparity is also enormous.  Most of the city is made up of favelas (slums) and in the middle here and there are these luxury little gems.

We have not yet walked anywhere as we are still heeding the wise advice of locals to take an uber door to door. As most of you know we pride ourselves in being very resilient, since we are South African born and raised after all and SA certainly has some very rough areas, but even so we can clearly see why this advice has been given.

We are very much foodies, so we usually make it our mission to search out the best restaurants while also looking for the best of local cuisine. On the day we arrived we ventured across to a local market called  Mercado Modelo a great market with loads of little stalls where you can buy souvenirs, cheap little dresses which are great for boat life and many more items. There is also a restaurant on the top floor over looking the bay, probably one of the nicest views in the area. Well the food left a lot to be desired, in fact I thought we would all loose some weight should the food be this poor.

As you may remember we have not had potatoes on the boat for a really long time due to not being able to get any on St Helena Island. So in my desperate need for potato I chose a crayfish that would be served with some kind of potato, well it was not very pleasant at all 😂 The crayfish was cold, as in out of the fridge, the potatoes were hot on a bed of iceberg lettuce. Sjoe no........ this kinda food is really not for me. However the bright side is that they served good beer and it was iced-cold.

The weather is extremely hot and humidity getting above 80% with big rain showers usually early evening which really does not do much for cooling it down, but atleast you can actually walk in it and not get cold. We are very grateful for having an air conditioner on the boat as we would never be able to sleep without it in this heat. My crazy husband and daughter trying to do their famous road photos in a down pour 😂 please note how sexy my husband looks carrying Makyla's hand bag.

For the weeks we were out at sea, we had been searching online for some of the higher end restaurants that have tasting menus in Salvador, so that we could make bookings in advance and we did indeed find a few gems, the particular one I will share with you today is Origem, this is rated among the 50 top restaurants in the world, the owner refer's to it as a "love letter to the Brazilian state of Bahia Salvador." That, it surely is. A gorgeous well decorated little bar where you can sit and enjoy a cocktail while waiting to be seated or a night cap if your not quite done yet.

What an incredible food experience of outstanding creativity and explosions of flavour in your mouth. You can certainly feel this food is prepared and plated with a huge passion and love for food. The wine is outstanding as is the service. The decor is minimalistic, as to high light and not distract from the beautiful designs on your plate.

In comparison to European restaurants of similar quality the price is an absolute steel at 320 RS or 55 USD per person for an incredible food experience of 15 outstanding courses. If you are a foodie and in Salvador,  you don't want to miss this one, we went back twice.