Parque Nacional dos Lençóis Maranhenses
Parque Nacional dos Lençóis Maranhenses
Parque Nacional dos Lençóis Maranhenses
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5.0
5,072 reviews
Excellent
4,412
Very good
533
Average
106
Poor
15
Terrible
6
Zuly P
4 contributions
Feb 2020 • Friends
This national Park exceeded my expectations. Beautiful sand dunes with amazing lagoons. We got daily tours arranged by Pe n'areia ecoturismo, and a couple of days were with guides from Vale dos lençois. This park is very unique, jaw-dropping!
Written 15 February 2020
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
wayan55
Milan, Italy229 contributions
Nov 2022
One of the things to do in life is definitely a visit to lencois maranhenses. We visited, with sao paulo ecoadventures, lagoon prata in the morning and blue lagoon in the afternoon. Although the lencois weren't full of water the show is superb and I have to tell the truth difficult to describe. For a long time you can walk on white sand dunes and dive into crystal clear blue waters. The sunset, if you are lucky enough to see it, is exceptional. The jeep trip in the forest to get to the lencois is also very nice.
Written 4 February 2023
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Nicole B
Porto Alegre, RS980 contributions
Jan 2022
This review is for the park itself. The various ways of getting there leave a lot to be desired. However, the dunes are truly spectacular. The water is clear and warm. Sunset is picturesque and the lighting impressive. The constant breezes keep the sands from being too hot. Stunning white sand and aquamarine ponds.
Written 18 January 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
globaltrotter69
Treviso, Italy14 contributions
Jun 2024 • Couples
Amazing lunar scenarios. My suggestion is to prefer Santo Amaro Lencois than the Lencois near to Barreirinhas. Near to Barreirinhas the best is no doubt Lagoa Bonita while Lagoa Azul can be skipped.
Written 14 June 2024
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Mari T
Porto Alegre, RS17 contributions
Jun 2023 • Friends
There’s nothing like it… absolutely wonderful! An incredible experience! I’ve been to many places in the world and this is a unique one… beautiful scenery, white sand dunes with cristal water for bathing. You go around on 4x4 cars. Very safe place including the towns around, tasty food and kind people! You also can visit the “manguezais”, muddy forest with lots of crabs! Spectacular Sunset! Words don’t describe such beauty!!!
Written 8 July 2023
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
mikocot
200 contributions
Nov 2016
Incredible scenery of lagoons in the middle of the desert. You can walk around, swim, relax. Even getting there is quite exciting (or scary - depends on standards) - oldschool ferry + huge, modified pickups with crazy drivers. When you cross the last sand barrier, there are kilometers of desert with small lakes in front of you. It's also worth to take a boat trip to the place where desert meets the sea and the Top 1 attrationc is for sure an afternoon flight above the terrain with a Cessna plane. Contact local agencies to book one.
Sweetwater laggons are highly dependent on conditions so make sure they are actually filled with water and book you stay. It's not easy to access and typical accomodation won't be too cheap, but it's still a must see of the region.
Sweetwater laggons are highly dependent on conditions so make sure they are actually filled with water and book you stay. It's not easy to access and typical accomodation won't be too cheap, but it's still a must see of the region.
Written 13 November 2016
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
JetSetBabe2014
Miami Beach, FL22 contributions
Aug 2015 • Friends
Lencois Maranhenses (LM) is beautiful, but the immense amount of frustration it takes to get to it is not worth it. It's not THAT beautiful, believe me.
My husband and I love remote locations and non-touristy non-resourty places. After we read the reviews of LM and spent days on rough travel, we expected to be blown off by what we see. But we weren't. Also, nobody speaks ANY English or even Spanish in the area. Portuguese only. We used a translator app on our iPhones every time we could catch wi-fi (so inside the hotel only).
We have never felt so excited to END a vacation, as the one to LM/ Barreirinhas!
If you are still determined to visit LM, here's everything you need to know to plan your trip.
1) Pick the rainy season. September is considered the last month of the rainy season in Brazil, when the lagoons are still filled with water. After that they are pretty much dry, and LM consists of just sand dunes. We took our trip to Brazil August 25th - September 3rd, which was a good time to visit both Rio and LM. The weather was excellent in both locations, and the flight prices were at their lowest: this time is their “off” season (Miami-Rio-Miami $562 USD per person; Rio-Sao Luis- Rio $255 USD per person).
2) Book a hotel in Barreirinhas, a small town closest to LM. We also heard people choose the town of Atins as an alternative, but we do not have any experience with that town.
We picked Hotel e Pousada Beira Rio ($52 USD/ night including free breakfast, booked through hotels.com). It was pretty good. FYI: we heard from a couple staying at Hotel Pousada do Buriti (about $88 USD/ night) that their pousada was “excellent, simply excellent”, and that they had all kinds of food there (breakfast, lunch and dinner), including every type of cake imaginable.
3) Fly into Sao Luis. From the airport you will need to take a van that takes you to the town of Barreirinhas. Pick the flight dates that will allow you to spend 2 full days in Barreirinhas before flying back. Anything more than that is unnecessary, and anything less won't justify the torturous travel you are about to go through. You do not need to book a ride in advance – there are plenty of vans waiting outside the airport at all hours (even if you land at 2 AM like we did). They charge 60 reals ($19 USD) per person, and take you directly to your hotel. A few other people and us boarded our van at 2:30 AM and sat in it for an hour, so our driver could see if he could get more passengers. When by 3:30 AM he did not, he put us into another half-full van, where only the most awful seats were left (back row, 1 inch of leg room (literally), non-reclining backs because the suitcases were stuffed right behind that row, with people in front of us reclining into our already non-existent space). Sitting in such erect position for that many hours and over that many speed bumps was literally painful.
The ride lasted 5 hours, including numerous stops to drop off/ pick up passengers, and slow downs for the infinite number of speed bumps and potholes. It was the roughest and the least enjoyable ride of our lives. The first hour and the last one were the most intense with the highest amount of unnecessarily high speed bumps and potholes (every half a mile or so). We were being bounced up and down in our seats big time. Good luck with that nap you were planning to take.
If you luck out with a non-last-row seat, you probably won't hate it as much. The vans are air conditioned.
4) Book your tours. We booked ours 1 day before arriving to Barreirinhas via whatsapp. Use your translator app if you don't speak Portuguese. Our tour guides: “Costa Leste” / whatsapp +55 98 98307 4910 / email costalesteecoaventura@gmail.com ). The guides speak / understand zero English or Spanish, but get the job done.
We also saw this tour company's advertisement: pipa.com.br Lastly, we came across another group's tour guide who spoke great English! The company he works for is Taguatur (tel. +55 98 2109 6400 / www.taguatur.com.br ). We wish we knew about his existence in advance!
We booked two excursions, one for each day. Overall, we recommend both of them (if you didn't take my earlier advice and headed to LM anyway). The total cost was 140 reals ($44 USD) per person, including hotel transfers and both tours. We arrived to our hotel at 8:30 AM, caught the free breakfast/ coffee, and were picked up for our tour at 9 AM. The reception person allowed us to leave luggage behind the check-in desk (you can also do an early check in for 50 reals = $15.6 USD. The normal check in is at 12 PM).
Day 1 – Lencois Maranhenses. We were picked up and rode to the dunes on “4x4”s (Toyota trucks with approximately 6 rows of seats high of the ground, and no doors). It is our understanding that dune buggies and ATVs are not allowed into the LM national park, although they are advertised.
It took about 40 minutes to pick up everyone from their hotels and for us and our 4x4s to take a ferry to where the LM entry starts. After crossing the canal on a ferry, it took another 30-40 minutes to get to the dunes. Then the 4x4s dropped off our groups and we explored the dunes and lagoons for about an hour and a half by foot. We visited 3 lagoons (about 30 minutes in each). Bring your swimsuits, water and snacks. The water is warm enough to swim in. However, despite the fact that we were still within the rainy season, the lagoons we about 50% dried up. They had a “low tide” look, with sand around them looking wet and feeling hard. The deepest points of the lagoons were about 3 feet deep (up to our hips), and you could see the water lilies and algae everywhere. The pretty blue waters of perfect clarity that you see on the internet pictures must be there only during the peak of the rainy season. The water was blue-ish with a green tint, but still pretty. Overall, it was still as beautiful place. That hour and a half of exploring, plus the return to the hotels, was the entire excursion.
Day 2 – The tour of the Lazy River / Rio Preguicas. We were picked up at 8:30 AM by a motorboat that sat about 12-15 people. 30 minutes into the ride we made our first stop at the Vassouras village, where we got to interact with and feed super cute monkeys (about 10 of them). They were non-aggressive, but very skittish. Bring bananas or crackers to feed them. We spent 30 minutes in that village, then took a ride to the next village, where we visited a beautiful lighthouse. You get to go inside of it and to the top floor, where the views are very pretty. We spent another 30 minutes there. Then we took another 20-30 minute ride to our third and final stop. It was unclear what was the point of the third stop, so we were shocked when the guide said we were going to spend 4 hours at that village. There was a restaurant there with unhealthy overpriced food (breaded shrimp, french fries etc). We thought there was no way we would eat such junk food, especially at such unfair prices (and we do spend), but 30 minutes later, after literally killing time on a hammock, we decided to give in and have “lunch” because there was nothing else to do. I went to the waitress and pointed at one of 3-4 pictures on the menu, explaining that I want “that” (it appeared to be a baked seafood dish). She explained to me in Portuguese that that was not on the menu! She pointed at a seafood section, which al least was somewhat helpful, so I picked the first choice in that section (“Camarao a Milanesa”). I was prepared to receive pretty much a complete surprise at that point. For my husband we ordered loaded french fries (also from one of the pictures on the menu) and figured that it is even less likely they'll screw that one up. I received breaded shrimp with sides of white rice, beans, chopped tomatoes and onions, and some bread-crumbs-like side that Brazilians seem to serve with every meal. I don't eat wheat, so I peeled off the breading and ate the shrimp and rice. My dish cost 80 reals ($25 USD, which was the price of pretty much every other dish on that menu). My husband received his french fries non-loaded, but regular. After we showed our surprise with receiving not what we ordered, and asked where is the “queso” (“cheese” in Spanish), the two waiters nodded their heads, took away the fries, and brought them back 15 minutes later even more fried! We thought they were ridiculous for double-frying our fries, and I bet they through we were ridiculous for “wanting” that! The restaurant accepted major credit card. Their drinks were pretty cheap (caipirinhas and beers were 7-8 reals = $2.5 USD each). No wine though. So if you watch your figure like I do, and avoid cocktails and wheat, you may want to pack your own food and whatever that is you drink.
After we ate, we still could not understand what are we supposed to do for another 3.5 hours. We couldn't communicate to our guide that we wanted to get moving. After killing more time in the hammocks, we noticed that some other people from our tour group were renting ATVs and riding around that village's beach. We decided to do the same for the lack of other options. The cost is 100 reals ($31 USD) for 1 hour per ATV. We booked half the time for half the price (and paid with a credit card through the restaurant). We took off speeding alongside the beach, and 7 minutes into the ride ended up flying off of our ATV. 3 deep unexpected potholes in the sand came out of nowhere, and the ATV's breaks did not work. We ended up with scabs on our faces and were actually shocked we did not break any bones or cameras (the fall was really bad).
5) For the return to Sao Luis airport we booked a fancy bus through “Cisne Branco” company (tel: 999079913 Manoel / comercial@cisnebrancoturismo.com.br) for 44 reals = $14 USD per person. The bus was a nice air conditioned Mercedes-Benz with large reclining seats, a bathroom, and assigned seating. The departure from Barreirinhas is from their location (5 minute walk from the hotel we stayed at, and from pretty much any hotel in town). The drop off is not at the airport though, but near it. So when you see the planes sitting on the ramp out of the bus window, get out at the next stop. Grab your luggage and walk about 7 minutes towards the “passenger terminal.”
Like with any bus that has a restroom, the entire bus started smelling like urine about 1 hour into the 5 hour ride. The bus made many stops, just like the van did. All we could think of on the way to the airport is how much we can't wait to wrap up this part of our vacation, and were happy that we did not oversleep our stop (we thought it was going to be the bus's final destination).
6) You won't find anyone but the locals on these tours, which are pretty well booked. As the English-speaking guide remarked, Americans would expect nicer accommodations before even thinking of traveling to those places.
My husband and I love remote locations and non-touristy non-resourty places. After we read the reviews of LM and spent days on rough travel, we expected to be blown off by what we see. But we weren't. Also, nobody speaks ANY English or even Spanish in the area. Portuguese only. We used a translator app on our iPhones every time we could catch wi-fi (so inside the hotel only).
We have never felt so excited to END a vacation, as the one to LM/ Barreirinhas!
If you are still determined to visit LM, here's everything you need to know to plan your trip.
1) Pick the rainy season. September is considered the last month of the rainy season in Brazil, when the lagoons are still filled with water. After that they are pretty much dry, and LM consists of just sand dunes. We took our trip to Brazil August 25th - September 3rd, which was a good time to visit both Rio and LM. The weather was excellent in both locations, and the flight prices were at their lowest: this time is their “off” season (Miami-Rio-Miami $562 USD per person; Rio-Sao Luis- Rio $255 USD per person).
2) Book a hotel in Barreirinhas, a small town closest to LM. We also heard people choose the town of Atins as an alternative, but we do not have any experience with that town.
We picked Hotel e Pousada Beira Rio ($52 USD/ night including free breakfast, booked through hotels.com). It was pretty good. FYI: we heard from a couple staying at Hotel Pousada do Buriti (about $88 USD/ night) that their pousada was “excellent, simply excellent”, and that they had all kinds of food there (breakfast, lunch and dinner), including every type of cake imaginable.
3) Fly into Sao Luis. From the airport you will need to take a van that takes you to the town of Barreirinhas. Pick the flight dates that will allow you to spend 2 full days in Barreirinhas before flying back. Anything more than that is unnecessary, and anything less won't justify the torturous travel you are about to go through. You do not need to book a ride in advance – there are plenty of vans waiting outside the airport at all hours (even if you land at 2 AM like we did). They charge 60 reals ($19 USD) per person, and take you directly to your hotel. A few other people and us boarded our van at 2:30 AM and sat in it for an hour, so our driver could see if he could get more passengers. When by 3:30 AM he did not, he put us into another half-full van, where only the most awful seats were left (back row, 1 inch of leg room (literally), non-reclining backs because the suitcases were stuffed right behind that row, with people in front of us reclining into our already non-existent space). Sitting in such erect position for that many hours and over that many speed bumps was literally painful.
The ride lasted 5 hours, including numerous stops to drop off/ pick up passengers, and slow downs for the infinite number of speed bumps and potholes. It was the roughest and the least enjoyable ride of our lives. The first hour and the last one were the most intense with the highest amount of unnecessarily high speed bumps and potholes (every half a mile or so). We were being bounced up and down in our seats big time. Good luck with that nap you were planning to take.
If you luck out with a non-last-row seat, you probably won't hate it as much. The vans are air conditioned.
4) Book your tours. We booked ours 1 day before arriving to Barreirinhas via whatsapp. Use your translator app if you don't speak Portuguese. Our tour guides: “Costa Leste” / whatsapp +55 98 98307 4910 / email costalesteecoaventura@gmail.com ). The guides speak / understand zero English or Spanish, but get the job done.
We also saw this tour company's advertisement: pipa.com.br Lastly, we came across another group's tour guide who spoke great English! The company he works for is Taguatur (tel. +55 98 2109 6400 / www.taguatur.com.br ). We wish we knew about his existence in advance!
We booked two excursions, one for each day. Overall, we recommend both of them (if you didn't take my earlier advice and headed to LM anyway). The total cost was 140 reals ($44 USD) per person, including hotel transfers and both tours. We arrived to our hotel at 8:30 AM, caught the free breakfast/ coffee, and were picked up for our tour at 9 AM. The reception person allowed us to leave luggage behind the check-in desk (you can also do an early check in for 50 reals = $15.6 USD. The normal check in is at 12 PM).
Day 1 – Lencois Maranhenses. We were picked up and rode to the dunes on “4x4”s (Toyota trucks with approximately 6 rows of seats high of the ground, and no doors). It is our understanding that dune buggies and ATVs are not allowed into the LM national park, although they are advertised.
It took about 40 minutes to pick up everyone from their hotels and for us and our 4x4s to take a ferry to where the LM entry starts. After crossing the canal on a ferry, it took another 30-40 minutes to get to the dunes. Then the 4x4s dropped off our groups and we explored the dunes and lagoons for about an hour and a half by foot. We visited 3 lagoons (about 30 minutes in each). Bring your swimsuits, water and snacks. The water is warm enough to swim in. However, despite the fact that we were still within the rainy season, the lagoons we about 50% dried up. They had a “low tide” look, with sand around them looking wet and feeling hard. The deepest points of the lagoons were about 3 feet deep (up to our hips), and you could see the water lilies and algae everywhere. The pretty blue waters of perfect clarity that you see on the internet pictures must be there only during the peak of the rainy season. The water was blue-ish with a green tint, but still pretty. Overall, it was still as beautiful place. That hour and a half of exploring, plus the return to the hotels, was the entire excursion.
Day 2 – The tour of the Lazy River / Rio Preguicas. We were picked up at 8:30 AM by a motorboat that sat about 12-15 people. 30 minutes into the ride we made our first stop at the Vassouras village, where we got to interact with and feed super cute monkeys (about 10 of them). They were non-aggressive, but very skittish. Bring bananas or crackers to feed them. We spent 30 minutes in that village, then took a ride to the next village, where we visited a beautiful lighthouse. You get to go inside of it and to the top floor, where the views are very pretty. We spent another 30 minutes there. Then we took another 20-30 minute ride to our third and final stop. It was unclear what was the point of the third stop, so we were shocked when the guide said we were going to spend 4 hours at that village. There was a restaurant there with unhealthy overpriced food (breaded shrimp, french fries etc). We thought there was no way we would eat such junk food, especially at such unfair prices (and we do spend), but 30 minutes later, after literally killing time on a hammock, we decided to give in and have “lunch” because there was nothing else to do. I went to the waitress and pointed at one of 3-4 pictures on the menu, explaining that I want “that” (it appeared to be a baked seafood dish). She explained to me in Portuguese that that was not on the menu! She pointed at a seafood section, which al least was somewhat helpful, so I picked the first choice in that section (“Camarao a Milanesa”). I was prepared to receive pretty much a complete surprise at that point. For my husband we ordered loaded french fries (also from one of the pictures on the menu) and figured that it is even less likely they'll screw that one up. I received breaded shrimp with sides of white rice, beans, chopped tomatoes and onions, and some bread-crumbs-like side that Brazilians seem to serve with every meal. I don't eat wheat, so I peeled off the breading and ate the shrimp and rice. My dish cost 80 reals ($25 USD, which was the price of pretty much every other dish on that menu). My husband received his french fries non-loaded, but regular. After we showed our surprise with receiving not what we ordered, and asked where is the “queso” (“cheese” in Spanish), the two waiters nodded their heads, took away the fries, and brought them back 15 minutes later even more fried! We thought they were ridiculous for double-frying our fries, and I bet they through we were ridiculous for “wanting” that! The restaurant accepted major credit card. Their drinks were pretty cheap (caipirinhas and beers were 7-8 reals = $2.5 USD each). No wine though. So if you watch your figure like I do, and avoid cocktails and wheat, you may want to pack your own food and whatever that is you drink.
After we ate, we still could not understand what are we supposed to do for another 3.5 hours. We couldn't communicate to our guide that we wanted to get moving. After killing more time in the hammocks, we noticed that some other people from our tour group were renting ATVs and riding around that village's beach. We decided to do the same for the lack of other options. The cost is 100 reals ($31 USD) for 1 hour per ATV. We booked half the time for half the price (and paid with a credit card through the restaurant). We took off speeding alongside the beach, and 7 minutes into the ride ended up flying off of our ATV. 3 deep unexpected potholes in the sand came out of nowhere, and the ATV's breaks did not work. We ended up with scabs on our faces and were actually shocked we did not break any bones or cameras (the fall was really bad).
5) For the return to Sao Luis airport we booked a fancy bus through “Cisne Branco” company (tel: 999079913 Manoel / comercial@cisnebrancoturismo.com.br) for 44 reals = $14 USD per person. The bus was a nice air conditioned Mercedes-Benz with large reclining seats, a bathroom, and assigned seating. The departure from Barreirinhas is from their location (5 minute walk from the hotel we stayed at, and from pretty much any hotel in town). The drop off is not at the airport though, but near it. So when you see the planes sitting on the ramp out of the bus window, get out at the next stop. Grab your luggage and walk about 7 minutes towards the “passenger terminal.”
Like with any bus that has a restroom, the entire bus started smelling like urine about 1 hour into the 5 hour ride. The bus made many stops, just like the van did. All we could think of on the way to the airport is how much we can't wait to wrap up this part of our vacation, and were happy that we did not oversleep our stop (we thought it was going to be the bus's final destination).
6) You won't find anyone but the locals on these tours, which are pretty well booked. As the English-speaking guide remarked, Americans would expect nicer accommodations before even thinking of traveling to those places.
Written 1 September 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
SergioZwi
Washington DC, DC2 contributions
Aug 2018 • Couples
Lençóis Maranhenses National Park is a treasure! Something not seen anywhere else in the world, hundreds upon hundreds of dunes are created by non-stop winds blowing from the Atlantic Ocean, extending about 400 thousand acres inland. During the rainy season, from January to June, the valleys between the dunes fill-up with crystal clear rain water, forming hundreds of lagoons, a surreal landscape that truly seems other-worldly.
The best time to visit lençóis is from June to September, when the lagoons are full. There are different ways to explore the park. One is basing oneself in one of the two cities at the edge of the park and taking day or half-day trips to the many attractions. The other one is to do an actual trekking across the park, known locally as the “travessia”, or crossing. That’s usually a three or four-day journey, setting off from either Barreirinhas or Atins, and traveling west to Santo Amaro. This post is mainly about the latter, which was the experience we had. We travelled in early August, after a heavy rainy season, and the lagoons were still full. Following are some tips, as well as some personal takes from this most awesome trip:
First and foremost, you need a guide. That’s the most important part, don’t skimp on it. Don’t even think of attempting crossing without one, or your trip may end as a rescue. Get a good, experienced guide, with a track record of years if not decades guiding people across. Most travel agencies work with several guides, but with some research you can contact them directly. They much prefer that, which allows them to keep the full fee. Some (but not all) travel agencies offer their guides satellite equipment that can be used for life-threatening emergencies. From what I gathered from our guide, that’s very seldomly used. Rescues can be done throughout the park, using quadricycles that can go anywhere.
We contacted our guide after some research in TripAdvisor, looking for reports from people who had done similar treks. WhatsApp is the tool of choice for contacting guides. I will be glad to refer some, drop me a note if interested. Most guides require a 50% advance payment via a bank transfer to secure the dates (ours did). In general, I found the entire tourism ecosystem very fair and balanced, guides charge pretty much the same fee (300 reais or about $80 per day) and the same applies to other services, such as day-tours, transfers to/from São Luis, etc.
After the guide, the next important matter is the gear. I can’t stress enough how much easier is to walk with a backpack that has waist and chest bands. It should be a wide waist band, and you wear it around you belly button, and that way most of the weight rests on your hips. Then adjust the chest straps, which will carry the remaining weight, in a way such that the shoulder straps are actually loose on your shoulders – thus saving you from crippling back pains. The rule of thumb is to limit the backpack weight to no more that 10% of your weight, including water, which should be no less than 1.5 litter per full day of walk. We went over that limit and it was OK, I’m sure in large part because we had great backpacks. Something else we used that was super convenient were water bladders (the inside of a CamelBak) that fit neatly in our backpacks. That puts the water, easily the heaviest item you’ll carry, right near you center of gravity. It may not seem like much, but multiply it by 50+ kilometers and it makes a difference. If you don’t have the bladder, make sure your backpack has pouches for two water bottles, one on each side. As you travel, drink from both equally so you balance the load.
Another very important item is a flashlight. Head-worn ones seem to work best since they free up one hand, and they usually point to whatever you are looking at. Very useful when walking in the dark (most walks start before sunrise) and especially for the ladies, when going to the potty at night. Our guide had an amazing one with rechargeable batteries which lit-up the way like a Mack truck, but it was quite heavy. Prior to the trip, try yours for a while (half an hour or so) to make sure it’s not uncomfortable. The same goes for the backpack: fill it up with 10% of your weight and take it for a test-walk around a local park.
And talking of pre-trip preparations, here’s an important one: do exercise your calves. If you don’t regularly walk on sand, your calves will kill you. Walking on sand implies different dynamics than waking on a hard, flat surface. Your heel will dig a crater in the sand, as will your toes. You spend more than twice the energy waking on sand. And it all shows on your calf. A side note, I cut my big toe pretty badly just before starting the trip. Decided to go forward anyways, and ended up over-compensating with my other foot, which gave me a nasty blister. None of that bothered me, because the muscular pain in my calves was so great, it totally overshadowed anything else afflicting me. This is just to say, get in shape, and exercise those muscles you don’t much use normally. If you have a trainer, ask him/her for the proper exercise to emulate walking on sand. There are also plenty of web resources; search “sand walking exercises”.
About what to carry: this will be a one-way trip, from Atins or Barreirinhas to Santo Amaro. Unless you make previous arrangements, either to get your luggage from the endpoint to the beginning point, or yourself back to the beginning point, you will have to carry with you all of your stuff (as we did) on the travessia, and on forward to São Luis and wherever else your next destination will be. With that in mind, the motto is “less is more”. Cut down to the bare bones, and make sure whatever items you carry are the lightest possible ones. Shoes can be heavy, same as jeans and towels. Make sure everything you carry is light. For the journey itself, you’ll end up wearing pretty much the same day after day. You’d not need much - and nobody will notice you are repeating clothes!!! But do pack pants and long-sleeve shirt, as it can get cool at night. Microfiber towels are great, super light and dry up in no time.
Make sure to pack a first-aid kit. As I mentioned before, I got a nasty cut on my toe just before starting the travessia, and if weren’t for the kindness and preparedness of others, I likely would not finish it. Besides band-aids, gauze and tape, get an antibiotic ointment and if you can, oral antibiotics. Cheap insurance that may change the outcome of your journey.
Pack some protein bars, and anything else that will give you an energy boost if needed. Foods high in potassium are a great on-the-go snack. See if you can get your hands on some not-too-ripe bananas just before setting out for the trip, and eat them first, as they will not last long in your backpack. Apples are also a good choice, nutritious and resistant.
Needless to say, pack plenty of sun protection. Get a wide hat, to protect you from the sun, and make it sure has straps since the wind is always strong and you don’t want to chase you hat up and down the dunes. Bring good sunblock, and don’t chose the spray kind, as you will lose most of it to the wind. Water resistant is better: when you get to a lagoon with crystalline waters after walking for hours, and the guide allows time for a swim, you jump in. That’s one of the most enjoyable parts of the trip. You will love life then, more than ever. Make sure you have enough sun block on those often-neglected areas, such as your ears, the back of your neck and feet. Most guides wear long sleeves. If you have a light one, bring it.
We didn’t have walking poles, so I cannot judge now much easier those would have made our trip, but people that have them swear by them. Chose collapsible ones that are light and can be easily carried around.
About shoes: incredibly, most of the walking is bore barefoot. On the dunes, the sand, which in places is as white and as fine as table salt, is mostly free of anything else. And because of the non-stop winds, the top layer is being constantly revolved, so it’s never hot, staying the same temperature as the air. Nothing more pleasurable than walking barefoot, but you’ll need protection is some areas, such as dry lake beds, and also when entering trails with more vegetation. The locals, who have had a lifetime of training, all use Havaianas. I had some trouble with mine, and I regretted not bringing my Tevas. Whatever you bring, it should be designed not to trap sand (like Havaianas) but should stay firmly in your feet (like Tevas), especially when you wade on shallow waters. In any case, they won’t get a lot of use.
If you do bring a real camera, make sure it’s light and go easy on the associated gear. We took our pictures with cell phones, which take increasing better pictures, and some were awesome, but still nothing beats a real camera.
The travessia consists of three or four days of walking from a safe harbor, known as an oasis, to the next. These oases are inhabited by a handful of families that were there before the land became a national park, and who provide basic services to the trekkers. Don’t expect a 5-star hotel, or for that matter even a humble pousada. The hosts are very nice but very simple people, and the facilities are quite modest. Basically, rudimentary bathrooms, showers and hammocks. Some may offer an actual bed, but I do recommend the hammock. When trying to sleep on it, don’t lay straight alongside it. Instead, find the diagonal position that allows your body to be flat. Once you get the hang of it, it’s quite nice, and it’ll serve you well. Hammocks are everywhere. You will find out that many Restaurants in the cities adjoining the park give you a meal and a spot on a hammock. Eat and nap!
About the routes, they may vary according to where the guide is based off. Some leave from Atins, in the mouth of the Rio Preguiça, and some from Barreirinhas, ending in Santo Amaro or nearby Betânia. The way back, waking east, is not usually done. It’s much harder, going against the wind most of the way, which also means going up steep dunes and down their gentler side. If you don’t take part in Ultra-Triathlon or Ironman competitions, you are better off going the west route.
If your route leaves from Atins, as ours did, make sure you take half-day trips to Lagoa Bonita and Lagoa Azul, in Barreirinhas, as the route from Atins will not pass through those sites. If you leave from Barreirinhas, check if the route passes by any of those lagoons, and if not take the day trip. Those, especially Lagoa Bonita, are most definitely worth a visit.
If your trek starts from Atins, get there through a one-way trip by boat, alongside Rio Preguiça. If leaving from Barreirinhas, take a day before the trek for the round trip on the river. It stops along the way in Vassouras, where you can get a sneak-peak of the dunes in Little Lençóis, and also check out the cool monkeys. Be careful with your belongings, the monkeys will definitely carry them away. They will also open you bag if they smell food. Kind of scary, but it makes for great videos! Next stop is the lighthouse in Mandacaru, where you can go up 160 steps and enjoy a nice 360-degree view of the area. Last stop before Atins is Camburé, a good lunch spot on a sliver of land flanked by the river in one side and the Atlantic Ocean in the other. You can also rent quadricycles for a spin on the beach. Those are pretty much a motorcycle with four wheels, and they are easy to ride, but don’t get overconfident especially if this is your first go at one of these machines.
Then onto Atins. You may want to spend some time here and learn how to kite surf. We didn’t have the time to do it, but it looks super cool. There are a few kite surf schools, but make sure you have a reservation. We just hung out in one of the beachside kiosks watching the kite-surfers, befriending the locals and drinking coconut water while waiting for the sun to go down before the official start of our crossing. The travessia is about 52 km long (about 32 miles) but you end up doing over 60 km considering the detours here and there to go swimming on some remarkably beautiful lagoons, or side trips up high dunes for sunset-watching.
So much for the preparations. The following is a personal report of our adventure:
Day 1: Atins to Canto do Atins, less than 2-hours walk, just a teaser of what’s to come. We got there around 5pm, in time to climb a high dune and watch the sunset. Sunset watching is pretty much the default late afternoon activity. One would thing one would be tired of these, but every night is different, owing to different locations, surroundings and weather. Good time to experiment with different settings on your camera. Also great to video the sundown in time-lapse mode. Sometimes a cloudy sky covers the sun, but it will color the entire sky pink; hard to describe in words. This is just to say it’s worth climbing a huge dune at the end of a long day to the watch sunset. Make sure to wear good sunglasses, looking at the sun is kind of hypnotic.
After that, dinner (supposedly they have the best grilled shrimp in Canto do Atins), shower and bed, I mean, hammock. Early to bed because the next morning you’ll start quite early, like 2:00am.
Day 2: Canto do Atins to Baixa Grande. This is the biggie, about nine hours of walking, more if you fail to keep it a brisk walk. You survive this leg and the rest will follow naturally. We start early and walk alongside the beach in the dark. Flashlights come in handy here. There’s some debris, mostly driftwood brought in by the tides, but also some trash, so look at where you are stepping. At around 5:30 am or so start looking back every now and then, so you catch the sunrise. Not a bad time to sit and have a small snack. After a bit longer, depending on how high the tide is, your veer south away from the beach and into the sand. No dunes yet, but enjoy the landscape, the sand will be sculpted by the winds in amazing patterns. And the rising sun will project great shadows on the ripples sculpted on the sand by the winds. Slowly some dunes will appear, and then some lagoons. And then lots and lots of dunes and lagoons. Your guide will pick a nice one for a refreshing swim. Then onto more walking aiming at an arrival between 11 and noon. The sun will be very strong then, but the constant winds make it bearable.
Arriving at an oasis is just like what you read when you were a kid: in the immensity of the sands you see some green in the horizon, as you get closer, more green, animals here and there, a stream, fruit-bearing trees. You survived!!! I must confess, it wasn’t quite like that for me, our guide took pity on my bad toe and called for a rescue, so we rode the last kilometer or so on a quad.
Each guide will go to his or hers preferred base (ponto de apoio) but from talking to other people that stayed on other bases, they are all just about the same. You get a good lunch, which will be devoured as if you had been wandering in the desert for weeks instead of a day. We had cabrito (kid, or the goat equivalent of veal) and it was very good. It “handles” like chicken, with the small bones, but’s tastes like beef. Then a nice hammock nap and on to a lagoon for a swim and the sunset viewing. We climbed into one of the tallest dunes, about 70 meters high (over 200 feet!!) with an amazing view, and a fun time running down the steep side. More or less like fluffy snow, you fall and don’t get hurt. I’m surprised they don’t do sandboarding there yet. Then shower and dinner, and a good opportunity to meet other groups that may have arrived.
Day 3: Baixa Grande to Queimada dos Britos. This is the lazy day: wake up comfortably at 6am, breakfast and out by 7, with plenty of time to get to the day’s destination, after seeing some amazing views. You see thousands of dunes and lagoons, but there’s always something different. At Queimada dos Britos, accommodations are much more rustic than in Baixa Grande, but the food just as good. Same scheme, arrive, lunch, nap, swim and sunset, the dinner and bed, ehr, hammock.
Day 4: Queimada dos Britos to Betânia. Leave pretty early, around 3:30. Watch an amazing sunrise on the dunes. The walk gets a bit harder, lots and lots of dunes to go up and down, some pretty steep. After a couple of hours, we got to the most amazing lagoon of the trip, Lagoa do Junco. It had an unbelievable blue color, and was the deepest, reaching depts of over 3 meters, yet with water as clear as any. After that, on to Betânia, which is much larger than the stops on the previous days. The views changed from a desert environment to a much greener one, and the arrival in Betânia treated us with a magnificent view of the lake. A real village, Betânia has restaurants (two!), roads, running water, electricity (but no WiFi!). At this point we said goodbye to our guide - which at this point felt like saying goodbye to a member of the family - and hired a ride to Santo Amaro. Probably could have made if by foot, but I still had the excuse of a bad toe.
One thing about our guide, which I suspect is true for most: he was not the very talkative kind of person, although courteous and attentive. During our walks, he led the way, usually walking much ahead. I guess he had to keep the pace, lest the soft tourists delay the trip. But in the four days together, there were plenty of opportunities to walk side by side and start a conversation. We ended up knowing a lot about him, his life and work, as well as many local stories, all interesting, some more credible than others, some deeper than others, every one fun to hear. The point I’m trying to make is that a relationship develops between you and your guide, and if you work at it, it will be fruitful.
But walking is a lonely activity, which lends itself well to introspection. Take advantage of it, ask yourself questions you don’t normally do, all the while taking in some of the most beautiful views that will be forever imprinted into your memory.
This was an unforgettable journey.
The best time to visit lençóis is from June to September, when the lagoons are full. There are different ways to explore the park. One is basing oneself in one of the two cities at the edge of the park and taking day or half-day trips to the many attractions. The other one is to do an actual trekking across the park, known locally as the “travessia”, or crossing. That’s usually a three or four-day journey, setting off from either Barreirinhas or Atins, and traveling west to Santo Amaro. This post is mainly about the latter, which was the experience we had. We travelled in early August, after a heavy rainy season, and the lagoons were still full. Following are some tips, as well as some personal takes from this most awesome trip:
First and foremost, you need a guide. That’s the most important part, don’t skimp on it. Don’t even think of attempting crossing without one, or your trip may end as a rescue. Get a good, experienced guide, with a track record of years if not decades guiding people across. Most travel agencies work with several guides, but with some research you can contact them directly. They much prefer that, which allows them to keep the full fee. Some (but not all) travel agencies offer their guides satellite equipment that can be used for life-threatening emergencies. From what I gathered from our guide, that’s very seldomly used. Rescues can be done throughout the park, using quadricycles that can go anywhere.
We contacted our guide after some research in TripAdvisor, looking for reports from people who had done similar treks. WhatsApp is the tool of choice for contacting guides. I will be glad to refer some, drop me a note if interested. Most guides require a 50% advance payment via a bank transfer to secure the dates (ours did). In general, I found the entire tourism ecosystem very fair and balanced, guides charge pretty much the same fee (300 reais or about $80 per day) and the same applies to other services, such as day-tours, transfers to/from São Luis, etc.
After the guide, the next important matter is the gear. I can’t stress enough how much easier is to walk with a backpack that has waist and chest bands. It should be a wide waist band, and you wear it around you belly button, and that way most of the weight rests on your hips. Then adjust the chest straps, which will carry the remaining weight, in a way such that the shoulder straps are actually loose on your shoulders – thus saving you from crippling back pains. The rule of thumb is to limit the backpack weight to no more that 10% of your weight, including water, which should be no less than 1.5 litter per full day of walk. We went over that limit and it was OK, I’m sure in large part because we had great backpacks. Something else we used that was super convenient were water bladders (the inside of a CamelBak) that fit neatly in our backpacks. That puts the water, easily the heaviest item you’ll carry, right near you center of gravity. It may not seem like much, but multiply it by 50+ kilometers and it makes a difference. If you don’t have the bladder, make sure your backpack has pouches for two water bottles, one on each side. As you travel, drink from both equally so you balance the load.
Another very important item is a flashlight. Head-worn ones seem to work best since they free up one hand, and they usually point to whatever you are looking at. Very useful when walking in the dark (most walks start before sunrise) and especially for the ladies, when going to the potty at night. Our guide had an amazing one with rechargeable batteries which lit-up the way like a Mack truck, but it was quite heavy. Prior to the trip, try yours for a while (half an hour or so) to make sure it’s not uncomfortable. The same goes for the backpack: fill it up with 10% of your weight and take it for a test-walk around a local park.
And talking of pre-trip preparations, here’s an important one: do exercise your calves. If you don’t regularly walk on sand, your calves will kill you. Walking on sand implies different dynamics than waking on a hard, flat surface. Your heel will dig a crater in the sand, as will your toes. You spend more than twice the energy waking on sand. And it all shows on your calf. A side note, I cut my big toe pretty badly just before starting the trip. Decided to go forward anyways, and ended up over-compensating with my other foot, which gave me a nasty blister. None of that bothered me, because the muscular pain in my calves was so great, it totally overshadowed anything else afflicting me. This is just to say, get in shape, and exercise those muscles you don’t much use normally. If you have a trainer, ask him/her for the proper exercise to emulate walking on sand. There are also plenty of web resources; search “sand walking exercises”.
About what to carry: this will be a one-way trip, from Atins or Barreirinhas to Santo Amaro. Unless you make previous arrangements, either to get your luggage from the endpoint to the beginning point, or yourself back to the beginning point, you will have to carry with you all of your stuff (as we did) on the travessia, and on forward to São Luis and wherever else your next destination will be. With that in mind, the motto is “less is more”. Cut down to the bare bones, and make sure whatever items you carry are the lightest possible ones. Shoes can be heavy, same as jeans and towels. Make sure everything you carry is light. For the journey itself, you’ll end up wearing pretty much the same day after day. You’d not need much - and nobody will notice you are repeating clothes!!! But do pack pants and long-sleeve shirt, as it can get cool at night. Microfiber towels are great, super light and dry up in no time.
Make sure to pack a first-aid kit. As I mentioned before, I got a nasty cut on my toe just before starting the travessia, and if weren’t for the kindness and preparedness of others, I likely would not finish it. Besides band-aids, gauze and tape, get an antibiotic ointment and if you can, oral antibiotics. Cheap insurance that may change the outcome of your journey.
Pack some protein bars, and anything else that will give you an energy boost if needed. Foods high in potassium are a great on-the-go snack. See if you can get your hands on some not-too-ripe bananas just before setting out for the trip, and eat them first, as they will not last long in your backpack. Apples are also a good choice, nutritious and resistant.
Needless to say, pack plenty of sun protection. Get a wide hat, to protect you from the sun, and make it sure has straps since the wind is always strong and you don’t want to chase you hat up and down the dunes. Bring good sunblock, and don’t chose the spray kind, as you will lose most of it to the wind. Water resistant is better: when you get to a lagoon with crystalline waters after walking for hours, and the guide allows time for a swim, you jump in. That’s one of the most enjoyable parts of the trip. You will love life then, more than ever. Make sure you have enough sun block on those often-neglected areas, such as your ears, the back of your neck and feet. Most guides wear long sleeves. If you have a light one, bring it.
We didn’t have walking poles, so I cannot judge now much easier those would have made our trip, but people that have them swear by them. Chose collapsible ones that are light and can be easily carried around.
About shoes: incredibly, most of the walking is bore barefoot. On the dunes, the sand, which in places is as white and as fine as table salt, is mostly free of anything else. And because of the non-stop winds, the top layer is being constantly revolved, so it’s never hot, staying the same temperature as the air. Nothing more pleasurable than walking barefoot, but you’ll need protection is some areas, such as dry lake beds, and also when entering trails with more vegetation. The locals, who have had a lifetime of training, all use Havaianas. I had some trouble with mine, and I regretted not bringing my Tevas. Whatever you bring, it should be designed not to trap sand (like Havaianas) but should stay firmly in your feet (like Tevas), especially when you wade on shallow waters. In any case, they won’t get a lot of use.
If you do bring a real camera, make sure it’s light and go easy on the associated gear. We took our pictures with cell phones, which take increasing better pictures, and some were awesome, but still nothing beats a real camera.
The travessia consists of three or four days of walking from a safe harbor, known as an oasis, to the next. These oases are inhabited by a handful of families that were there before the land became a national park, and who provide basic services to the trekkers. Don’t expect a 5-star hotel, or for that matter even a humble pousada. The hosts are very nice but very simple people, and the facilities are quite modest. Basically, rudimentary bathrooms, showers and hammocks. Some may offer an actual bed, but I do recommend the hammock. When trying to sleep on it, don’t lay straight alongside it. Instead, find the diagonal position that allows your body to be flat. Once you get the hang of it, it’s quite nice, and it’ll serve you well. Hammocks are everywhere. You will find out that many Restaurants in the cities adjoining the park give you a meal and a spot on a hammock. Eat and nap!
About the routes, they may vary according to where the guide is based off. Some leave from Atins, in the mouth of the Rio Preguiça, and some from Barreirinhas, ending in Santo Amaro or nearby Betânia. The way back, waking east, is not usually done. It’s much harder, going against the wind most of the way, which also means going up steep dunes and down their gentler side. If you don’t take part in Ultra-Triathlon or Ironman competitions, you are better off going the west route.
If your route leaves from Atins, as ours did, make sure you take half-day trips to Lagoa Bonita and Lagoa Azul, in Barreirinhas, as the route from Atins will not pass through those sites. If you leave from Barreirinhas, check if the route passes by any of those lagoons, and if not take the day trip. Those, especially Lagoa Bonita, are most definitely worth a visit.
If your trek starts from Atins, get there through a one-way trip by boat, alongside Rio Preguiça. If leaving from Barreirinhas, take a day before the trek for the round trip on the river. It stops along the way in Vassouras, where you can get a sneak-peak of the dunes in Little Lençóis, and also check out the cool monkeys. Be careful with your belongings, the monkeys will definitely carry them away. They will also open you bag if they smell food. Kind of scary, but it makes for great videos! Next stop is the lighthouse in Mandacaru, where you can go up 160 steps and enjoy a nice 360-degree view of the area. Last stop before Atins is Camburé, a good lunch spot on a sliver of land flanked by the river in one side and the Atlantic Ocean in the other. You can also rent quadricycles for a spin on the beach. Those are pretty much a motorcycle with four wheels, and they are easy to ride, but don’t get overconfident especially if this is your first go at one of these machines.
Then onto Atins. You may want to spend some time here and learn how to kite surf. We didn’t have the time to do it, but it looks super cool. There are a few kite surf schools, but make sure you have a reservation. We just hung out in one of the beachside kiosks watching the kite-surfers, befriending the locals and drinking coconut water while waiting for the sun to go down before the official start of our crossing. The travessia is about 52 km long (about 32 miles) but you end up doing over 60 km considering the detours here and there to go swimming on some remarkably beautiful lagoons, or side trips up high dunes for sunset-watching.
So much for the preparations. The following is a personal report of our adventure:
Day 1: Atins to Canto do Atins, less than 2-hours walk, just a teaser of what’s to come. We got there around 5pm, in time to climb a high dune and watch the sunset. Sunset watching is pretty much the default late afternoon activity. One would thing one would be tired of these, but every night is different, owing to different locations, surroundings and weather. Good time to experiment with different settings on your camera. Also great to video the sundown in time-lapse mode. Sometimes a cloudy sky covers the sun, but it will color the entire sky pink; hard to describe in words. This is just to say it’s worth climbing a huge dune at the end of a long day to the watch sunset. Make sure to wear good sunglasses, looking at the sun is kind of hypnotic.
After that, dinner (supposedly they have the best grilled shrimp in Canto do Atins), shower and bed, I mean, hammock. Early to bed because the next morning you’ll start quite early, like 2:00am.
Day 2: Canto do Atins to Baixa Grande. This is the biggie, about nine hours of walking, more if you fail to keep it a brisk walk. You survive this leg and the rest will follow naturally. We start early and walk alongside the beach in the dark. Flashlights come in handy here. There’s some debris, mostly driftwood brought in by the tides, but also some trash, so look at where you are stepping. At around 5:30 am or so start looking back every now and then, so you catch the sunrise. Not a bad time to sit and have a small snack. After a bit longer, depending on how high the tide is, your veer south away from the beach and into the sand. No dunes yet, but enjoy the landscape, the sand will be sculpted by the winds in amazing patterns. And the rising sun will project great shadows on the ripples sculpted on the sand by the winds. Slowly some dunes will appear, and then some lagoons. And then lots and lots of dunes and lagoons. Your guide will pick a nice one for a refreshing swim. Then onto more walking aiming at an arrival between 11 and noon. The sun will be very strong then, but the constant winds make it bearable.
Arriving at an oasis is just like what you read when you were a kid: in the immensity of the sands you see some green in the horizon, as you get closer, more green, animals here and there, a stream, fruit-bearing trees. You survived!!! I must confess, it wasn’t quite like that for me, our guide took pity on my bad toe and called for a rescue, so we rode the last kilometer or so on a quad.
Each guide will go to his or hers preferred base (ponto de apoio) but from talking to other people that stayed on other bases, they are all just about the same. You get a good lunch, which will be devoured as if you had been wandering in the desert for weeks instead of a day. We had cabrito (kid, or the goat equivalent of veal) and it was very good. It “handles” like chicken, with the small bones, but’s tastes like beef. Then a nice hammock nap and on to a lagoon for a swim and the sunset viewing. We climbed into one of the tallest dunes, about 70 meters high (over 200 feet!!) with an amazing view, and a fun time running down the steep side. More or less like fluffy snow, you fall and don’t get hurt. I’m surprised they don’t do sandboarding there yet. Then shower and dinner, and a good opportunity to meet other groups that may have arrived.
Day 3: Baixa Grande to Queimada dos Britos. This is the lazy day: wake up comfortably at 6am, breakfast and out by 7, with plenty of time to get to the day’s destination, after seeing some amazing views. You see thousands of dunes and lagoons, but there’s always something different. At Queimada dos Britos, accommodations are much more rustic than in Baixa Grande, but the food just as good. Same scheme, arrive, lunch, nap, swim and sunset, the dinner and bed, ehr, hammock.
Day 4: Queimada dos Britos to Betânia. Leave pretty early, around 3:30. Watch an amazing sunrise on the dunes. The walk gets a bit harder, lots and lots of dunes to go up and down, some pretty steep. After a couple of hours, we got to the most amazing lagoon of the trip, Lagoa do Junco. It had an unbelievable blue color, and was the deepest, reaching depts of over 3 meters, yet with water as clear as any. After that, on to Betânia, which is much larger than the stops on the previous days. The views changed from a desert environment to a much greener one, and the arrival in Betânia treated us with a magnificent view of the lake. A real village, Betânia has restaurants (two!), roads, running water, electricity (but no WiFi!). At this point we said goodbye to our guide - which at this point felt like saying goodbye to a member of the family - and hired a ride to Santo Amaro. Probably could have made if by foot, but I still had the excuse of a bad toe.
One thing about our guide, which I suspect is true for most: he was not the very talkative kind of person, although courteous and attentive. During our walks, he led the way, usually walking much ahead. I guess he had to keep the pace, lest the soft tourists delay the trip. But in the four days together, there were plenty of opportunities to walk side by side and start a conversation. We ended up knowing a lot about him, his life and work, as well as many local stories, all interesting, some more credible than others, some deeper than others, every one fun to hear. The point I’m trying to make is that a relationship develops between you and your guide, and if you work at it, it will be fruitful.
But walking is a lonely activity, which lends itself well to introspection. Take advantage of it, ask yourself questions you don’t normally do, all the while taking in some of the most beautiful views that will be forever imprinted into your memory.
This was an unforgettable journey.
Written 27 August 2018
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Anglobrazny
New York City, NY7 contributions
Jul 2014 • Friends
It's a real effort to get to, but that's one of the intriguing things about it, and it probably prevents the place from getting too crowded. You fly to the state capital, São Luis, and then go by road. 4.5 hours by bus or 3.5 by car, which is what we did. And then the fun begins. The road has almost no signs, but it does have hundreds of speed bumps, many of which will scrape the bottom of your car. When you pass through the town of Rosario, the road seems to end. Turns out it continues about half a mile to your right (over a bridge), but there aren't any signs to tell you that. We had to drive down all kinds of backstreets before figuring it out. Well, we finally got to Barreirinhas, and a guy on a motorbike asked us where we were staying and led us to the hotel. Which I was resistant to at first, but he was legit, and hooked us up with a tour to the park which was leaving in 10 minutes, as the one he initially suggested for the following day would have been too late for us. So we just had time to freshen up before a dune buggy came by with a few other tourists already on board, and we drove out of town, over the river via a ferry, and over the burgeoning dunes. Takes about 40 minutes to get there, I think.
This was early July, so the lagoons were full. I believe the rainy season ends in June. How to describe it? The sand is very comfortable to walk on; the swamp underneath keeps it cool. The lagoons are warm and pleasant to swim in. But the whole landscape is unique, otherworldly. And it goes on as far as the eye can see. It's one of mother nature's oddest and most magnificent practical jokes. Hundreds of lagoons formed by the rain, year after year, framed by huge dunes that change shape every day via the wind. It's like nothing I've ever seen or ever will see. It's in the middle of nowhere in one of the poorest states in Brazil. It's more "other" than any place I've seen. It's wonderful. And on the way back, all the buggy drivers raced each other, laughing whenever any of them got stuck. So we got a carnival ride thrown in!
This was early July, so the lagoons were full. I believe the rainy season ends in June. How to describe it? The sand is very comfortable to walk on; the swamp underneath keeps it cool. The lagoons are warm and pleasant to swim in. But the whole landscape is unique, otherworldly. And it goes on as far as the eye can see. It's one of mother nature's oddest and most magnificent practical jokes. Hundreds of lagoons formed by the rain, year after year, framed by huge dunes that change shape every day via the wind. It's like nothing I've ever seen or ever will see. It's in the middle of nowhere in one of the poorest states in Brazil. It's more "other" than any place I've seen. It's wonderful. And on the way back, all the buggy drivers raced each other, laughing whenever any of them got stuck. So we got a carnival ride thrown in!
Written 4 December 2014
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
IndyLoyola
19 contributions
Feb 2015
Today I went to Lençóis Maranhences. It took 5 hours to get to the park by bus. We rode on a 4x4 for about 30 minutes. Arriving there we just saw sand. There was only one dirty lake. I couldn't believe it. Everybody was disappointed. We stayed in this dirty smelly lake for about 40 minutes and left. It was terrible.
Written 17 February 2015
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Gabriel Reyes
Goiania, GO
Boa noite, gostaria de saber se de noite é possível ver o céu estrelado incluindo a via láctea
Written 25 March 2023
deborah hong
Seoul, South Korea
I am planning to go to Lencois park from Santo amaro. How much does it cost by taxi? Are there enough tour companies at Santo Maro region?
Written 8 May 2022
Pega celular em Barreirinhas ? E nos lençóis? Agradeço antecipadamente.
Written 19 April 2022
Alguém conhece a empresa Barreirinhas Passeios? Lá em barreirinha que faz traslado para o Parque nacional dos lençóis Maranhense?
Written 8 July 2021
Ola, hoje é possivel chega a Queimada dos britos de 4x4?
Ou somente andando?
Written 22 April 2021
Tenho uma Criança de 4 anos e um bebê de 6 meses... Consigo fazer o passeio para Lençois, saindo de Barreirinhas?
Written 13 December 2020
Sim, nós temos disponibilidade de carros cabines dupla, que permite que as crianças vão com segurança. insta agencia_talisma_turismo.
Written 25 August 2021
Hi , looks like Parque Nacional dos Lençóis Maranhenses is very big. i want to know the information on how to roam all places inside the park. can we go by walk or we need to book a tour package. People who visited this place, please reach me in my mail rajeshsapbi451 at gmail . How many days required to see this park . and what are the other attractions present near this.
Written 9 December 2020
Galego guia trekking lençóis
Santo Amaro do Maranhao, MA
Sim.
Pode deixar o carro no estacionamento.
Written 3 August 2020
Joelcio G
Varzea Grande, MT
Gostaria de saber como estão as perspetivas para reabertura do turismo no Maranhão, no segundo semestre do ano?
Written 26 July 2020
Hi. Has anyone been in April? Is it rainy as they say or the parks are closed?
Written 26 January 2020
The best season to visit Lençóis Maranhenses is between May and September. Send me a message on whatsapp and I can give you more tips. +5519996398696
Written 7 February 2020
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