Cururupu · BR

Ilha dos Lençóis

On the wild western coast of Maranhão, a long way from the postcard crowds of the Lençóis Maranhenses National Park, Ilha dos Lençóis turns the same trick on a smaller, more intimate scale: enormous sweeps of chalk-white dunes, mirror-bright freshwater lagoons cupped between them, deserted beaches and a hush of mangrove where the scarlet ibis roost at dusk. Part of the Maiaú archipelago in the municipality of Cururupu and set within the marine Cururupu Extractive Reserve, this is a working fishing village first and a nature preserve second, where you sleep in simple wooden pousadas, walk barefoot along sand streets and trade in something far rarer than resort comfort: genuine remoteness. The island draws travellers who want landscape and culture in equal measure. Its dunes cover roughly 70% of the land and fill with lagoons in the rainy months; its birdlife anchors it inside a Ramsar wetland of international importance; and its fishermen still tell the story of the enchanted King Dom Sebastião, whose golden realm is said to lie beneath these shores. Reach is by boat, the stay is deliberately basic, and the reward is a slow, luminous corner of Brazil largely untouched by mass tourism.