February 20, 2015
Maceio, Brazil
My friend Eric Jordan wants me to post pictures of fishermen and how they fish. On Friday Prinsedam called at the city of Maceio. We only rode through the city to some villages (and I admit it, a beach, I wanted some beach time) north of Maceio. There I found some fishermen for Eric.
Maceio has a wide tidal range. North of town sit three large tidal lagoons. Off shore there are reefs. Fishermen work these lagoons to catch crab and whitefish. For whitefish they use monofilament nets. They set the nets at slack water and as the tide runs catch fish going into and out of the lagoons.
In Pontel de Barra the men fish and the woman make handicrafts that they sell to supplement fishermen’s income. The beach bus stops there so that people can buy the crafts. When it stopped I headed to the waterfront to watch fishermen mend their nets and clean fish with watchful cats at the ready. I have often wondered how cats acquired a taste for fish given that they hate water and do not seem like good candidates to jump in to catch them. Probably they acquired their taste for fish by hanging out around fishermen.
Barra de Sao Miguel is on another lagoon and fishing is carried out in much the same way. This town supplements its income through tourism. You can get a boat to run you out to Gunga Beach which sits where the sea meets the lagoon. We did this. We were there to swim but because the ship was late into port we arrived as the tide was running. There is a swift tidal current that pulls you north into the lagoon from the beach. Suzi and I, and several others, decided to walk out to the end of the beach and ride the current back to our towels.
At the end of the afternoon back at Barra de Sao Miguel we found we not only had high tide but also flood tide. Our dock was under several inches of water and boats that had been beached were floating.
