Five remarkable corners of Brazil to disappear to – far from the spotlight, and all the better for it.
Brazil has no shortage of big hitters – Rio, Iguaçú – but some of its most interesting places sit well off the main tourist trail. Think colourful cities alive with African culture and music, quiet gold-rush era towns set amidst rolling green hills, enormous sand dunes that fill with crystal-clear lagoons for a few months each year.
If you’re looking to get away somewhere that still feels like a discovery, these are the places we love.
1. Bahia
Bahia gives a clearer sense of the country’s cultural backbone than nearly anywhere else. Begin in Salvador, the country’s first colonial capital, where Africa meets the Americas. The legacy of the Atlantic slave trade is still palpable here, in its capoeira schools, Candomblé rituals, and cooking.
From there, head inland to Chapada Diamantina, a former diamond-mining region now known for its hiking – expect dramatic plateau landscapes with deep canyons, caves, and towering waterfalls you can swim beneath.
Finish on the coast in Trancoso. Stay at UXUA, where everything is beautifully considered and the pace is mercifully slow; their latest project, UXUA Maré, was named one of Time’s top destinations for 2025. This is a place for switching off and remembering how it feels to have nothing in your diary.
2. Minas Gerais
Brazil’s colonial heartland, Minas Gerais is a landscape of rolling hills, small towns, and a long history tied to the 18th-century gold rush.
Begin at Ibiti Project, a privately-led rewilding initiative spread across a vast reserve, with a beautifully-restored farmhouse at its heart. Spend your days walking or riding through regenerated forest, swimming in rivers and natural pools, and visiting working gardens with the project’s wonderful guides and conservationists. The lodges are simple but deeply comfortable, and much of the food is grown on the project itself.
From there, head to Inhotim, Brazil’s extraordinary open-air art space, spread across 140 hectares of land and botanical gardens. It houses 24 galleries, with dozens of monumental works dotted through the grounds – from mirrored cubes deep in the forest to monumental sculptures beside tropical lakes. Rest your head at Clara Arte, the institution’s long-awaited museum hotel that opened in December 2024, and is the only place worth staying for miles around.
Pair both with a few days exploring Tiradentes and Ouro Preto, two towns shaped by the 18th-century gold trade, home to steep cobbled streets and baroque churches.
3. Lençois Maranhenses
Imagine a desert that floods. That’s Lençóis Maranhenses: a vast, hallucinatory stretch of white sand and freshwater lagoons.
Stay at Casa Oía, a brilliant hideaway that feels like staying at the home of a friend with immaculate taste. There are only a handful of rooms, with whitewashed walls, weathered wood and handmade ceramics, created by São Paulo-bsed designer. Days here are for swimming in clear lagoons and eating grilled fish with your feet in the sand. Ask, and they’ll set dinner on the dunes.
From there, strike out east across the sands to Atins, a weathered little village on the coast, where dirt tracks lead to the sea and kite surfers drift past grazing donkeys. It’s the end of the road in the best possible sense – just a few pousadas, some very good caipirinhas, and an excellent French baker. Book dinner at Anacardier, even if you’re not sleeping there. And for those drawn to something rougher round the edges, there’s the Emotions route: six days on foot through the dunes, sleeping in fishing huts and hammocks.
4. Fernando de Noronha
If the mainland still feels a little too reachable, there’s Fernando de Noronha, a UNESCO-protected volcanic archipelago that sits a few hundred kilometres off the northeast coast.
This is protected territory, with visitor numbers capped to ensure its preservation – and it’s all the better for it. The diving is some of the best in the hemisphere, with near-perfect visibility and abundant marine life – reef sharks, sea turtles, rays. Its beaches are often cited amongst the world’s finest.
Stay at Pousada Maravilha, the island’s most spoiling address, with just a handful of private bungalows and suites positioned to face the sea. Swim, dive, eat well, and forget where you put your shoes.
5. The Amazon
The Amazon is vast, fluid, and indifferent to schedule. Enter, and let the scale of it blow your socks off.
A few days here is enough to paddle through flooded creeks, walk slow forest trails, and listen to the rain fall like static; time stretches, and amidst its vastness you begin to feel wonderfully irrelevant.
For those not keen on hammocks and tarpaulins, there are ways to experience the Amazon without suffering for it. One, Tupaiu, a 60-foot yacht on the Tapajós River, offers an unhurried way through the blue-water reaches: paddle-boarding, swimming, torch-lit dinners and long, empty stretches of river, all without the need to pack and unpack. Another: stay at Anavilhanas Jungle Lodge, a well-run, considered base near the Anavilhanas Archipelago, where expeditions are led by people who’ve spent their lives navigating these waters.
Brazil is far too large to experience all at once; it’s a country you can return to time and again, never feeling quite done.
These five places show Brazil at what we feel is its best: wild, artful, slow. They suit the curious and the unhurried, with a disregard for crowds and a love for discovery. If you’re after a Brazil that surprises in all the right ways then they’re a very good place to start.
CONTACT US
Speak to our specialists about our tailor-made adventures into Brazil’s lesser-known corners.
Conde Nast Traveler Specialists every year since 2017
