PIERRE CONSTANT has paid a visit to the island of Fernando de Noronha, east of Brazil, to sample its unique atmosphere and, more especially, its scuba diving
If you were a South American seabird, you could fly 525km from Recife or 350km from Natal on the north-east coast and alight on some minuscule specks of land. Fernando de Noronha is to Brazil what the Galapagos Islands are to Ecuador on the other side of the continent.
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The two archipelagoes are, in a way, very similar. Lying slightly south of the Equator, both are volcanic hotspots born out of fracture zones in the ocean, and prolific refuges for seabirds. And in both, scuba diving is one of the most popular activities.
The 21 Noronha islands are much older than Galapagos. They lie on the South American Plate, with a series of volcanoes including Rocas Atoll extending away to the west.
The archipelago was discovered on 24 July, 1503 by the Portuguese explorer Gonçalo Coelho, financed by Fernao de Noronha but, as the story goes, credited to Americo Vespucci, an Italian member of the expedition who first described the islands.

It was later occupied by the Dutch before falling to the French and was finally taken over by the Portuguese in 1737. They built several fortifications, including the fortress of Nossa Senhora dos Remedios, and Fernando de Noronha became notorious as a destination for political prisoners.
Charles Darwin dropped in on HMS Beagle in 1832, and in the early 1900s Italian and French settlements were established for trade and the laying of submarine cables. Aeropostale’s commercial flights linked South America to Europe and Africa, and during WW2 Noronha became a US Air Force base.
National marine park
The Brazilian military administered the islands from 1942 to 1988, when the islands were declared a national marine park, and today tourism fuels the economy. Noronha has become a dream holiday island for wealthy Brazilians.

Fernando de Noronha was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001 and is managed by the Chico Mendes Institute for Conservation of the Biodiversity (ICMBio), attached to the Department of Environment. Rocas is administered separately as a biological reserve prohibited to visitors.
A sustainable development plan was put in place for the marine park, aided by the local population. Tourist sites and infrastructure are strictly controlled.

The GOL flight from Recife takes an hour. On arrival you pay the TPA (Permanency Tax), which is charged at 76 reals (about £10) a night but increases the longer you stay. The marine park office charges non-Brazilians an entrance fee of R$222 (£30), valid for 10 days.
Most lodgings are in pousadas or guesthouses. Life and food are expensive on the island.
Three dive-centres operate out of Porto on the north-east coast, and dive-shops are also located in the colonial Portuguese town of Vila dos Remedios, with its historic buildings such as the Palacio Sao Miguel and the church of Nossa Senhora dos Remedios.


The imposing fort of Nossa Senhora dos Remedios, on a bluff overlooking the town, offers good views of Porto, Praia do Meio (Middle Beach) and the iconic thumb-shaped rock Pico de Meio, an attraction at sunset.
The islands are exposed to the east-west South Equatorial Current and south-east trade winds. The “Inner Sea” on the north coast is calm between April and November, but at other times of year the north-east trade winds assume control.
The “Outer Sea” on the south coast is usually rough but visibility is clearer, so diving operations choose their sites according to the time of year.
Water temperature is 28°C year-round, with visibility ranging from 25-40m. With its 25 dive-sites, Noronha’s diving is considered the best in Brazil.
Essentially composed of black volcanic basalts, the underwater landscape is rather dull, with its boulders, ridges, sometimes canyons, swim-throughs and caves. Where currents flow in the channels, sponges cover rocks that turn very colourful, often bright red. Otherwise, beds of green algae and sea grapes are the norm.

Diving days
Trucks pick up divers at their pousada at 7.15am and the guides deliver a briefing about the boat facilities and dive-sites. Some speak English or Spanish, although Brazilian is the norm. Dive-sites lie anything from 10-30 minutes away.
During my stay in December, most of the diving was in the Inner Sea between the east and west points of Noronha’s north coast.
Cordilhieras, near the north-eastern tip, is a submerged ridge with lots of algae. A common sight there is a small school of blue and gold striped grunt (Haemulon chrysargyreum). Brazilian parrotfish (Sparisoma amplum) are green on the back and red on the belly for females, while adult males turn light blue with a red crescent on the tail.


Grey Bermuda sea chub (Kyphosus sectatrix) move in small packs, as do black margates (Anisotremus surinamensis), high-bodied with a steep head and silvery with a black patch behind the gills.


I come across a hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata) oblivious of the divers, and a blue tang (Acanthurus coeruleus), one of the rarer species of surgeonfish around.

Ilha do Meio (Middle Island) lies between Ilha da Rata (Rat Island) and Porto. The idea there is essentially to explore caves and swim-throughs in shallow water, sneaking in and out behind the dive-guide while the All Angle company’s underwater photographer waits for you on the other side. The photos are available at the dive-shop in the evening at $30 apiece (about £4).
The caves are alive with copper sweepers (Pempheris schomburgki), small coney grouper with blue spots and yellow bellies (Cephalopholis fulva), pairs of French angelfish (Pomacanthus paru) and blue tangs. Back at the surface, black noddies and yellowtail tropicbirds are flying about happily.



At the western tip of the island, Ponta da Sapata is a nesting site for red-footed boobies. Caverna da Sapata, an underwater arch with a sandy bottom, provides a refuge for Southern sting rays (Dasyatis Americana), with pepper-coloured spikes on their back. Undisturbed by the divers, they maintain a Zen attitude.

“Some turtles get lost in remote corners of the cave and end up as skeletons…”, confirms Julio, happy to pose all smiles next to a skull. Good visibility favours good pictures. A mini wall on the outside reveals three scrawled filefish (Aluterus scriptus) and white-spotted orange filefish (Cantherhines macrocerus).


Cagarras, on the eastern side of Noronha, west of Rat Island, is a nesting site for masked boobies. A deeper dive in the 32m zone, it is also a spot for Cape Verde spiny lobsters (Panulirus charlestoni), black jack (Caranx lugubris), French angelfish and the conspicuous Brazilian parrotfish.

In the channel
Buraco das Cabras, 20m deep, is more productive for photographers. A wandering nurse shark (Ginglymostoma cirratum) creates a stir, eventually approaching me without fear. Big sting rays covered in sand watch divers go by.
A frantic display of Brazilian ‘youpie’ divers make a show of exuberance with open arms behind a turtle and in front of the official photographer. I wait patiently for my turn to approach the creature grazing between the rocks.
An ocean triggerfish (Canthidermis sufflamen) sails past and Bermuda sea chub burst out in small clouds. At the end of the dive inside the channel, between Rat and Middle islands, a big old Portuguese anchor encrusted in red sponges grabs my eye. Drifting in the current, I fly over a lovely peacock flounder (Bothus lunatus) carpeting a rounded rock.

Cabritos, on the north-eastern tip, starts in the Outer Sea’s clear waters to enter the channel. A shallow, colourful site, it boasts many mushroom-shaped rocks covered in sponges.
Black jack and a school of doctorfish (Acanthurus chirurgus), horse-eyed jack (Caranx latus) with their forked yellow tails and yellow-band goatfish (Mulloidichthys martinicus) complete the show. A second old anchor, even bigger, leaves me mouth agape.

My wish for the last dive day will be granted by Leo and Julio. Off the western tip of the island, the underwater pinnacle Cabeço da Sapata is usually subject to strong currents and water movements, but we experience only a gentle swell.
A large nurse shark passes like a shadow over the white sandy bottom. A little school of horse-eyed jack swirl by. Dog snapper (Lujanus jocu), silver with bars on the back, drift like peaceful Zeppelins.

Clouds of yellow chromis (Chromis multilineata) sway with the current over the pinnacle while schools of black triggerfish (Melichthys niger) hover in the blue.

Trinta Reis in the Mar de Fora is located in the middle of the south coast between emerging rock islets. The ocean is as choppy as expected, but under water all is serene. The white sand is carved by ripple marks over a vast expanse to good photographic effect.
We cruise into a swim-through and enter a canyon with southern sting rays and black jack. Emerging, I witness a reef shark (Carcharhinus perezi) wandering majestically over a vast expanse of white sand.


It’s an atmospheric environment with a lot of light, making one forget that Fernando de Noronha was a place for extensive artisanal shark fishing between 1992-1998. Black gall, reef, silky, lemon, nurse, tiger and hammerhead were all, sadly, targeted.
Life on land
Wildlife on oceanic islands is extremely limited. Mammals are virtually non-existent in Noronha, except for rats and the moco, a chestnut-coloured rodent introduced by the early settlers for food.


The black and white Teju lizard found primarily in the forest was introduced from Brazil’s north-east in the 1950s to take care of the rats, and grows to about 40cm. It has a pink forked tongue, like a monitor lizard, but because it attacks local birds it’s an unwanted predator on the island.
When Charles Darwin came ashore on Noronha on 20 February, 1832 (three years before visiting Galapagos), he marvelled at a lush tropical forest with magnolias, laurel trees adorned with delicate flowers and trees bearing fruits.

These original forests ceased to exist after Noronha became a penal colony, and by the end of the 19th century the island was almost completely deforested, but a slow recovery began in 1988 with marine national park status.
Conservation projects are managed by ICMBio. Besides the biological reserve of Rocas Atoll there is the Tamar Project for conservation of the five species of marine turtle known to visit the islands: the green, hawksbill, loggerhead, olive ridley and leatherback, though divers generally see only the first two.
The other project concerns spinner dolphins (Stenella longirostris), which have a resident population in secluded Baia dos Golfinhos in the north-west. Visitors come early in the morning to watch the dolphins playing in the bay.

A number of trails are available, though some require advance booking because they are led at specific times by a licensed ICMBio guide. Most lead to beaches or viewpoints and can be anything from 15 minutes to three hours long.
A number of agencies also offer private tours with their own transport, or even cruises for snorkelling or watching dolphins.
Independent travellers on a low budget can catch the free ‘Coletivo’ bus that runs back and forth between Porto in the north-east and Sueste in the south-west along BR-363, providing access to the start of all trails and exotic beaches. Fernando de Noronha is a truly Brazilian experience, where the foreigner is most welcome yet certainly an oddity!
Towards the end of my stay, I pass a house with a colourful signboard on the gate that read “Sorria voce esta na paraiso” – “Smile, you’re in paradise”.


PIERRE CONSTANT runs Calao Life Experience. Other features by the author on Divernet include DIVING LIFOU, A FOSSIL ATOLL, FLORES, GATEWAY TO KOMODO, HELL’S BELLS AND OTHER YUCATAN CAVE SPECIALS, VANUATU BEYOND THE COOLIDGE and DIVE-TRIP: MUSANDAM TO MUSCAT