Sao Paulo Day Trip - Embu de Artes

About 30 minutes outside of Sao Paulo, just off the Bittencourt Motorway you'll find Embu - often referred to as Embu de Artes.  It's a tropical enclave of artists and craftsman representing some of the best of Brazilian culture.  And what is a day of travel and exploring without a couple of surprises.

 Embu is an old city with cobblestone streets and mature trees that provide shade to the thousands of tourists that visit each weekend.  The draw is the 900+ shops and vendors with their arts and crafts.  We viewed paintings, sculptures, hand woven rugs and blankets, artisanal cachaca (distilled sugar cane spirits), a variety of leather goods and beautiful items to brighten any home.

One of my favorite pieces was the life-sized sculpture of St. Francis of Assisi in the photo below.  My pasty, white legs quickly identifies me as a "Nord Americano".  

 A couple of logistical notes on visiting Embu.  The weekends are crowded

especially on Sunday and parking is sparse.  Be patient.  Also, we thought we had seen most of the shops and booths but on leaving Embu we saw another side of town with more shops that we missed.  Explore a bit more and push the boundaries.

As it came up on 1:30 it was time for lunch.  We found a small table outside with shade and ordered "dois chopp" - two draft beers arrived frothy and cold.  The food was traditional Brazilian; not bad but not necessarily memorable either.  The entertainment is another story and was our surprise from Embu.



"We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year, running over the same old ground.  What have you found?  The same old fears.  Wish you were hear."  Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here

Meet Nell Filho, struggling but very talented musician.

Just as we were sitting down I heard the music and did a double take - that can't be Pink Floyd?  In English no less?  Nell sings American classics mostly from the 70's but there was some Garth Brooks thrown in.  He performed songs from John Lennon, Elvis, Bob Seeger, Bob Dylan and Southern Cross by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young in impeccable English.  We spoke with him between sets to learn that he is native to Sao Paulo and has not travelled beyond Brazil.  We also learned that he does some nice accent work from south London and Dublin.  We would like to see him perform in the US one day.  We ended up buying his CD for R$10.

All in all, it was a successful side trip.  We bought some leather purses for our daughters and a handcrafted, leather map of the Americas circa 1640 that was beautifully reproduced.