22.10.2008
Cabo Branco
All roads
lead to Cabo Branco at least for estrangeiros. All the estate agents want us to
buy in Joao Pessoa’s most expensive bairro. Known as an “area nobre” it can be
divided into two parts ie; north and south. Starting at Epitacio Pessoa and
moving south you will come across Joao Pessoas finest bars and restaurants.
Beach side has a fine and varied selection of beach bars some open 24/6. These
bars start to peter out around the Bikinis Beach Bar owned by the American
Harvey. After Harvey’s there are probably just one or two bars till you get to
the round-about at the southern most tip of CB.
Houses
which front the main road are few and expensive and tend to be towards the
quieter, southern end. You will find low rise, three storey blocks of flats
fronting the beach. Many are available for rent too. Outside the 500m limit you
will find taller blocks but none of the sky-scraper variety. The western border
of CB has a busy main road which serves as a return from the main beach road
and from the PB008.
A
curiosity of the beach road and its return from the round about is that for 3
hours in the morning (between 5.00am and 8.00am) they both change character.
The beach road becomes pedestrianised and literally hundreds of walkers march
down the sea front to the round about or on up to the Farol. There is also a
varied assortment of runners, skaters, cyclists all doing their thing.
The
return becomes a two way street. Time and time again people get caught out on
this road and there are accidents. At 8.00am the road reverts to one way, south
to north. At night the road becomes a service road for prostitutes who use the
lay bys and car parks to the rear of CB. Fortunately there has been a
successful lobby against this activity and it is also heavily policed.
There are
hardly any shops in CB though a notable exception is the mini mercado right on
the sea front towards the southern end. Perhaps there in lies the problem with
CB. Everywhere is a drive away or a long walk though there are plenty of taxis.
It seems that a lot of people are holiday makers, long term leasers etc so it
is difficult to build a community bond. Your neighbour may be a young family
one week, the next an old couple and so on.
Opportunities
to build are few and far between, due to the extremely high cost of land as
well as the scarcity of land in the area. However, the land is there especially
to the south. As an example, there is an abandoned sea front house with ample
parking going for R$1.5 million. Some of the slum areas to the back (western
edge) of CB are being cleared for apartments. Note that building a house in the
aforementioned area would be a waste of time if you wanted to take in the view.
Joao
Pessoa hosts many festivals and the main stage is usually at the bust of
Tamandare or junction with Tambau. Sometimes the stage is moved further down
the CB beach. As a consequence there is a big effect on mobility and parking in
the area. Sometimes it seems like every available space is taken up in CBs side
streets. Combine this with the normal restaurant parking (very few restaurants
have off street parking and when they have it is usually limited) and a grid
lock situation appears. You have the sound of cars slowly driving round looking
for a space (sometimes with the music system blasting away) and car doors
opening and closing all hours of the night. Coupled with this you have the
noise of revellers to-ing and fro-ing as well as people using the area as a
toilet. Garage doors and trees smelling of pee do not make for an area nobre.
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