Heat & Soul : Bahia’s unique African-Brazilian sensibility, a legacy of brutal slave trade, has left behind a mesmerizing mix of passionate spirituality and exotic sensuality.

It took two buses and three more hours of bouncing travel after our Saturday morning flight from Rio de Janeiro to the northeastern Brazilian city of Salvador, but we decided to push on to Cachoeira that same day. We wanted to be sure we wouldn’t miss that evening’s service of Candomble, in the town where it is most devoutly practiced.

An African-Brazilian cult developed by black slaves forced to mask their Yoruba religion in the cloak of Catholicism, Candomble is still widely practiced throughout Brazil’s Bahian region. During all-night ceremonies, shaman priestesses, spun into frenzied trances, serve as conduits between worshippers and their African orixas or deities.

Perhaps more than anything else, Candomble evokes for me the passionate soulfulness and exotic sensuality of Bahia.

The Brazilian state of Bahia is where Portuguese explorers landed at the turn of the 16th Century. They stayed for more than 300 years, turning this coastal region and its capital city of Salvador into a wealthy commercial hub and a slave trading post. Today, industrial development has not kept pace with that in the nation’s southern states, leaving the vast majority of its black-skinned residents in dire poverty. Still, Bahia’s African connection has left a cultural legacy that causes even its often condescending neighbors further south to consider it the soul of Brazil.

That sensibility is what drew me and my friends Miriam and Ruth to northeastern Brazil in late August for an eight-day trip. And Bahia delivered on its promise of of spiritual and cultural intensity. I tasted it in the fragrant stews spiced with dende palm oil and coconut milk and heard it in pulsating African rhythms that pounded my lungs and eyes as much as my ears; I read it in the magical lyricism of Bahian novelist Jorge Amado and saw it in the grotesquely carved wooden statues depicting proud Africans in chains, a reminder of Bahia’s brutal history of plantation slavery.

That first night in Bahia, I also felt it at the enigmatic Candomble ceremony we found, with the help of a cabdriver, across the river in Cachoeira’s sister village, Sao Felix.

As we made our way up a dirt path that wound around shabby matchbox houses, I heard a steady drum beat and a piercing chant that managed to simultaneously pique my sense of adventure as well as my anxiety. One look inside the crowded, steamy house at the top, however, and rapt wonder shoved aside my discomfort. Two women, heads shaved, lay face down in the center of the floor, their white lace petticoats ballooning around them like parachutes that had just hit level ground.

Slowly they rose to their feet, joining three other women in a sensuous dance-like movement. Suddenly one woman went rigid, her cocoa-colored features collapsed in on each other as if her face were compressed in a painful vise. The fevered intensity of the trance lasted only a few moments before her body slumped and the other women gently led her out of the room. Although the ceremony usually continues till dawn, after only an hour I was already drunk with the throbbing rhythms and ritualistic movements that we were welcome to quietly watch but failed to fully understand.

We awoke the next morning determined not to spend another night in the dirty, bug-infested pousada , or pension, we had happened upon the evening before. So we moved to what every guidebook seemed to agree is the only place worth staying in Cachoeira, the Convento do Carmine, an old Franciscan monastery that has been converted into a charming hotel. We stayed in one of the blessedly clean, high-ceilinged rooms with dark mahogany floors that are located around the perimeter of a lush, open-air square of green at the center of the monastery.

Although barely anyone spoke English, nearly everyone we ran into patiently waited until we made ourselves understood, using a blend of phrase-book Portuguese and hand signals. The town, designated a historical landmark by UNESCO, boasts 18th-Century churches and municipal buildings that date back to the days when Cachoeira was a busy trading post between the vast sugarcane plantations and the rest of Brazil. But that morning, we opted to leave our guidebook in the room and just wander through the sleepy colonial town.

We passed the delicate, scalloped facades of row houses, some crumbling away from years of neglect. Yet their chipped and fading pastels lent the town an aura of authenticity that the studied prettiness of historical reconstructions couldn’t hope to match.

It was winter in this country below the Equator, and by afternoon a chilling rain drove us back to the convent where we decided to indulge, Brazilian style, in a langorous two-hour lunch that cost less than $10 each. We had the convento’s entire dining room to ourselves and watched the rain as a sweet-faced waiter served us a thick, steaming soup made of potatoes, carrots and rutabagas. Then we moved on to a moqueca , a heavenly sizzling, spiced Bahian stew usually made with shrimp or fish.

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After Coachoeira’s spiritualism, we opted for the sensuousness of the deserted beaches of Praia do Forte, about a two-hour bus ride away. We decided to forego the luxurious but pricey Praia do Forte resort in favor of a quiet, inexpensive inn called Pousada des Artistes, that had suprisingly good paintings by its Spanish owner and small balconies strung with hammocks.

Although I’m not sure which Candomble divinity granted our wish, by morning the previous day’s steel-wool sky was replaced by a dazzling sun that warmed temperatures to the 80s. Ruth slept late, so Miriam and I set out to explore the sea turtle sanctuary that sits right off the beach, before sitting down at our pousada to a breakfast of fried cinnamon bananas, fresh rolls, and thick slices of mangoes, pineapples and papaya. As with most hotels or inns in Brazil, breakfast was included in the room rate.

We immediately fell into our own routine of activities at Praia do Forte, which primarily consisted of lying on the deserted beach (seven miles long), eating pungent moquecas , and drinking smoldering sugar-cane alcohol at the restaurants and bars along the village’s main road.

The rest readied us for our plunge back into the energetic swirl of Salvador.

The capital of Portuguese-ruled Brazil until 1763, Salvador has never regained the wealth that flowed in as sugarcane, tobacco, and gold flowed out. But Brazil’s fourth largest city, situated on the tip of a jutting peninsula that looks out on All Saints Bay, manages to retain joyous vitality.

Since there was a music festival occuring in Salvador during our visit, we decided for once to make room reservations. We chose a simple, Italian-run hotel recommended by my guidebook and located in a section near the beach called Barra, a center for restaurants, hotels and nightlife. But while we slept there, we spent our days in Pelourinho, the city’s historical district which contains the best examples of colonial architecture on the continent.

Pelourinho, which means whipping post, also has a darker notoriety as the auction block or punishment site for many of the estimated 5 million slaves shipped to Brazil to work the sprawling plantations and gold mines owned by Portuguese colonists. Now a UNESCO-protected historical area, Pelourinho is in the midst of a $30-million restoration project that has spawned an angry debate between those who believe it will protect Bahia’s cultural legacy and those who fear gentrification will squeeze out poor black Brazilians who embody that heritage.

Though entire blocks are often swarming with workmen, the triangular center of Pelhourinho swarms with tourists weaving in and out of a succession of shops selling handsewn lace, strangely shaped musical instruments and even intricately carved coffins balanced upright in a row like soldiers at roll call.

Ruth and I had stopped inside one of the brightly painted, baroque storefronts when Miriam came running back to fetch us. A tall, well-muscled teen-ager had beckoned her into one of the capoeira schools to watch a demonstration. If Bahia’s African spirit finds a religious outlet in Candomble, its vent for artistic impulses is capoeira.

Part-martial art, part-dance, capoeira was developed by slaves disguising their combat techniques from their masters’ watchful eyes. Performing to the tinny plink of a berimbau, a one-stringed gourd instrument, capoeiristas manage to blend fierceness and grace in thrilling, rapid-fire acrobatics. Mesmerized by the stunning choreography, we ended up following the troupe like capoeira groupies as they performed through the cobblestone streets for tips.

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In true Bahian style, we spent our last day in Salvador mixing the sensual and the spiritual. In the morning, we walked along the beach in Barra, watching the rows of thong-bathing-suited sunbathers drinking out of split coconut shells. In the afternoon, we made a pilgrimage to the 18th-Century church of Nosso Senhor do Bonfim in the western part of the city. Though other churches outdo it in architectural brilliance and ornate decor, Bonfim is unmatched for the intensity of its religious devotees.

The most striking testament to faith in Saint Bonfim’s power is off the sanctuary in the Sala dos Milagres, Room of Miracles, where white translucent plastic arms, heads, feet, lungs and hearts hang from the ceiling as in a ghostly meat locker. Suppliants offer the waxy body parts to ask for help or give thanks for a successful lung operation or to speedily mend a broken arm. Below, the walls are plastered with letters, photographs, momentos and ribbons thanking Bonfim for rescuing a missing child, for help on a test, for blessing a marriage.

On the approach to the church, scrawny children ran after us, throwing ribbons in the hopes of getting a tip in exchange.

Legend has it that by tying a ribbon or fita around your wrist and allowing it to fall off naturally, your wish will come true. Although not particularly superstitious, we had sufficiently fallen under Bahia’s spell to be wary of courting bad luck by prematurely cutting off the ribbon. So we all tied our fitas in loose knots that would undo at the slightest movement. Yet our cab driver, who credited Bonfim with helping him buy his taxi, was so moved by our apparent faith in the saint’s power that he insisted on properly securing the fita around Miriam’s wrist.

Indeed, his handiwork is still remarked upon by our friends, who three months later, rarely fail to comment on the graying, ragged ribbon that is still tightly wound around her wrist.

GUIDEBOOK

See Ya in Bahia

Getting there: American Airlines, and the Brazilian carriers Varig and VASP, fly direct LAX-to-Rio de Janeiro for about $875 round trip, seven-day advance purchase. Service out of Rio to Salvador on Transbrasil Airlines costs $252 one way. Bus fares from Salvador to Cachoeira or Praia do Forte are about $5; an airport taxi about $50.

Money: Due to the nearly 1,400% annual inflation rate, many establishments have stopped taking credit cards and travelers checks. Be prepared with plenty of cruzeros or American dollars.

Where to stay:

Cachoeira: Convento do Carmine, no listed phone number. Anyone in this tiny town can tell you where it is; around $40.

Praia do Forte: Pousada dos Artistas, no listed number; about $22 off-season. The larger Alameda do Sol, tel. 011-55-71-876-1088; about $75 suite.

Salvador: Villa Romana, tel. 011-55-71-247-6522; $35 double. Two big hotels are Meridien Bahia (011-55-71-248-8011) and Bahia Othon Palace (011-55-71-247-1044).