Although it is Brazil's fourth largest city, Recife hasn't lost its traditional and cultural attractions to commercial development. The capital of Pernambuco state in northeast Brazil, Recife is a fluid mix of new and old.

It's a busy seaport, a commercial and trading center, with high rises, busy streets and business deals. It's also known for its artistic and folkloric traditions, music and dance.

Protected by the reef that gives the city its name, Recife is built around a number of inlets, canals and bridges, living up to its name as the "Venice of Brazil." It offers walkable tours, great beaches and lively arts and entertainment.

The city puts on a great carnaval so you might want to schedule a visit to the Recife and Olinda carnivals in February/March, or to the off-season carnival, called Recifolia, in October. Either occasion means thousands of visitors, so make your reservations early.

Olinda is a few kilometers north of Recife. Olinda was founded in 1535 (a few years before Recife); ever since, both cities have maintained a history of afinities and differences. The afinities between recifenses and olindenses are seen everyday, everywhere in both cities: there is no remarkable difference in friendliness, culture, language, culinary or other habits.

One distinction between the cities is clear to the eyes: Recife is predominantly flat, while most of Olinda was built on hills or in the valleys between them. The Dutch saw in Recife, with flat low lands and plenty of rivers and channels, a piece of Holland (and, like the old Amsterdam, Recife developed a propension to trading); the Portuguese saw in the high hills of Olinda a good means to look further into the sea and protect the city against invaders (from the Portuguese, Olinda heired the many churches built in almost every corner of the city - the religion was, besides all, a good way to keep the fidelity of the colonial inhabitants).

Another visible difference is in the architecture. As necessity came, Recife occupied new spaces (just 100 years ago, the Boa Viagem area was nearly desert), but Olinda had a much more limited space to grow. As the economy of Recife grew, new businesses and buildings were installed there; today, Recife, has a much more modern aspect, with densely occupied residencial and commercial zones, whereas Olinda maintained its more colonial aspects. In 1982, UNESCO included Olinda among the World Heritage cities (click here to read the reasonings of UNESCO); so, from now on, drastic changes in the archictecure lines of Olinda are even more unlikely.