Barreirinhas

Reference to those visiting the Lençois Maranhenses, Barreirinhas is 39,000 people town, 13,000 of which in urban area - considered the entrance gate to Lençois - and receiving most of the tourists in view of the infrastructure it offers.

It is the best place of Lençois to get hold of a boat, a 4x4 vehicle or an airplane in order to get to know the region. From there boats leave towards the Rio Preguiças estuary where are the villages of Atins, Cabure and Mandacaru and crossing through hamlets such as Alazão, Espadarte Vassouras and Morro Boi, a region also known as Barra of Rio Preguiças, or shortly Barra.

There are several inns to lodge all visitors arriving from all parts of the country and the world.

Barreirinhas is as well, the starting point of the Toyotas, Jeeps and other 4x4 vehicles that explore the region through moors, crisscrossing igarapes and several hamlets on the way to the lagoons, such as Azul, Bonita, Do Peixe or Esperança, Santo Amaro, etc.

Rambling along the streets of Barreirinhas, walking downtown up to the Workers Square (Praça dos Trabalhadores), visiting the exquisite meal market, roaming the quiet alleys of the town with its tall mango trees, tasting a wine-palm fruit, or any of the regional fruit juices such as cupuaçu with milk, custard apple, hog plum among many others, sitting at the riverside by the sunset and having an ice-cold beer or coconut water served, forgetting life and troubles while watching the shifting of the boats that come and go, those are some of the good options for getting to know better the town. At nights, the riverside banks are not recommended because of the crowd and the excessive mixture of sounds coming from the several existing bars and parked cars.

Town folks are plain and friendly, love chatting and have always a ready tale to tell. They are always hospitable with tourists. Make one feel quite at home and happy with the awareness that this is part of Brazil too.

Most of them are fishermen and field workers, or have a small business, bricks manufacture and arts & crafts mostly out of wine-palm straw. As a matter of fact, make a note to have a look at the women working with weaving the wine-palm straw, which you can see visiting the Marcelino community, near Tapuio, or even in some of the Barreirinhas surrounding neighborhoods.

Of course we are not going to tell you everything, lots of other things are there for you to discover by yourself.