The Girl From Ipanema: A Cruise to the Muse

Accordingly, I wandered inland a few blocks, looking for the Rua Montenegro, the street Pinheiro once owned, where when she passes, each one she passes goes -- ah. This proved difficult; they've changed the name to Rua Vinicius de Moraes, after the "Ipanema" lyricist. I looked in vain, too, for the famous Veloso Bar, where he'd first caught sight of his Muse. Yep, it's the Garota de Ipanema (Girl From Ipanema) bar now. In fact, looming high above the beige facade is a huge reproduction of de Moraes's original napkin scribble of the "Ipanema" lyrics. Inside, another oversize facsimile hangs from the wall, as do photos and newspaper clippings featuring Pinheiro et al over the years. Oh, and they have T-shirts with that damn napkin scribble selling for 30 reals. The only thing missing in Ipanemaland is FastPass.

Soaked to the bone, I couldn't have walked any more slowly back to the ship. Suddenly I was seeing the American Way everywhere. Even all those skinny, gorgeous passengers on the boat began to look different. Huddling with the masses who'd sought refuge at the indoor pool in the Pompei spa, I saw paunches cascading over Speedos and kids sucking Cokes while their moms worked the treadmills with the identical hopelessness of treadmillers everywhere.

Melodies of Brazil

But then, the following morning, the Victoria slowly approached the lush garden isle of Ilhabela, 150 miles southwest of Rio. Thickly planted trees glowed a Kelly green, clung for dear life to steep mountainsides and leaned uncertainly over the sea. A few cars cut through the vegetation from time to time, but all roads led to pastel-tinted colonial architecture and raucous sidewalk cafes and not a single franchised anything.

Best of all, though, was the sound coming from a bandstand just off the docks, a sound I'd given up thinking I'd ever hear in Brazil: samba. A quintet of white-shirted men strummed and sang while shoeless kids tapped their feet and a few showoff couples swayed with the palm trees in the breeze.

Suddenly I felt my hopes surge. Here it was -- the Brazil I needed now, a place cordoned off from cultural imperialism -- and oh, wait: Every beach umbrella on the island was sponsored by MasterCard. Really. Every one. There must be some kind of law. Oh, and just across the street, the secret ingredient in Cafe Atlantico's signature appetizer turned out to be Nacho Cheese Doritos.

But still, but still: Just a few steps off the main drag you entered a forest primeval where candy-apple heliconia flowers dripped from the trees and natural water slides wound their way to chilly lagoons. In another direction lay powdery beaches and the chance to snorkel for sand dollars the color of blood. And everywhere was another person with whom you could only communicate via hand gestures. Paradise regained, you understand.

Back on the ship, they seemed to be taking a tip from Ilhabela. Sure, there was the obligatory poolside game (win a prize if you can kick your flip-flop into a garbage can 30 feet away!). But as night fell and the Victoria steamed south to Porto Belo, Melodia Brasil once more mounted the stage and at last began to conjure some actual melodies of Brazil. In response, the dance floor quickly flooded with geriatrics and teenagers alike, all of them gyrating through an endless variety of line dances, none of which I'd ever seen.

The beat was relentless, the lines five or six deep. Soon the ship itself seemed to be dripping with sweat. Here it was -- oh, man, here it was-- an unending Dionysian parade of gleeful Brazilians, the same ones as not yesterday but the day before.

Into this spectacle crept the midnight buffet, but even that old cruise ship staple had lost its heart to Brazil. From a balcony overlooking the dance floor, I watched goggle-eyed as parched dancers attacked mountains of papayas, achingly sweet pineapples, golf-ball-size grapes, mandarin oranges. And out of the corner of my eye, gently slicing open a passion fruit and digging for its green meat, was an old, very old, woman. A portrait of her -- a look of utter satisfaction as a trembling spoon reached her mouth -- ought to be hanging in some museum of anti-globalization somewhere.

What about that other older woman, though, the one I was cruising to? Somewhere out in the wavy darkness sat Pinheiro, who had forgone fame and self-promotion and countless American overtures, forgone them all so she didn't have to leave this glorious place. Now I really couldn't wait to meet her.

But I had to wait, as Porto Belo beckoned. An overnight sail south from Ilhabela, the little town on the Emerald Coast is notable mainly for its proximity to Ilha de Porto Belo, an island just off the mainland, and secondarily for its unequaled collection of Sao Paulo's beautiful people, for whom the island is a cherished weekend destination. Not being one of these, I decamped for the hiking trails, where I chased mauve-dotted butterflies with my camera as enormous black vultures hovered overhead.

Farther and farther from the beach I climbed, finally reaching a place where bromeliads grew in the notches of every tree and Adventureland's Imagineers obviously make pilgrimages for inspiration. Verdant, pristine and -- wait, that was a five-foot iguana, right? Maybe it wasn't. I think it was. In any event, gravity wouldn't have gotten me back to the beach faster. If this was what the jungle was like without Disney, I'd take my chances with the beautiful people of Sao Paulo.