Unfortunately the moto taxi pool had moved on after the large Carnaval parades ended, so we hailed a standard taxi and puttered over to Pelourinho near the port area of Salvador on the south side of the Bahian peninsula.
Salvador da Bahia served as Portugal's New World capital from 1549 to 1763. In 1558, Salvador became the first slave market in the New World. More than four million slaves were brought from Africa in chains through this port to work the sugar plantations and serve their Portuguese masters. The massive slave trade made Salvador the major port city of Brazil through the 18th century. Brazil was the last country in the Americas to abolish slavery in 1888.
Since then, the peninsula has blended African, European and Brazil's indigenous cultures to create today's vibrant Afro-Brazilian style rich in music, art, architecture and food. More than 80 percent of metropolitan Salvador is of Black African origin. It's the third most populated city in Brazil, after Rio and Sao Paulo.
Salvador is divided by a cliff into Cidade Alta, upper town, and Cidade Baixa, lower town. Since 1873 an elevator has connected the two. At the top of the elevator overlooking the shipping port sits historic Pelourinho. The word Pelourinho is Portuguese for "pillory", a wooden device once used to imprison and publicly punish offenders. The barrio of Pelourinho is centered around the former slave auction area and was also once home to the stone whipping post where slaves were tied and whipped.
Pelourinho was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985 and many of the older buildings have been revamped and repainted.