Fortaleza’s top attraction is its seafront, the wondrous Avenida Beira Mar, Northeast Brazil's most impressive urban attraction. Backed by modern skyscrapers, lined with attractions and busy round the clock, this is where it’s happening in the capital of Ceará. Safe, clean, brightly lit at night and busy with runners, cyclists and strolling families, there’s no more pleasant a spot on the whole north coast.
Praia de Iracema
At the far western end of Beira Mar is Fortaleza's top beach, Praia de Iracema. This is the Cearán capital's tourist epicenter, with street food, facilities and attractions galore, day and night. The sands here are incredibly wide, around 200m in some spots, and there's always space for everyone who turns up. Dominating the scene is the Statue of Iracema the Guardian, the namesake character of José de Alencar's eponymous novel. It's a dramatic piece of sculpture, a gilt abstract female figure tensing something that looks like a bow. Around sunset, the food and drink stalls are rolled out, games of beach football and volleyball strike up and the crowds emerge into the cooling air – it's the best time to hit Ceará's most famous strand.
Feirinha da Beira Mar
Although held for years, Feirinha da Beira Mar, the evening craft market roughly halfway along Beira Mar, has undergone a complete revamp and now has 699 gleaming, brightly illuminated stalls. Though many of them sell the same things, there's incredible variety here and few leave empty handed. Whether you are in the market for a bag of local cashews, Brazilian beachwear, a local football top, a fish-scale dreamcatcher or a locally-made leather belt, you'll find it and myriad other gift and souvenirs here. Prices are around the same as at the Mercado Central.
Meireles & Mucuripe
The neighborhood of Meireles is Fortaleza's top address and it's here you'll find the most luxurious condominiums and flashiest shops that extend for several blocks back inland. The beach and seafront promenade run seamlessly from Iracema into these two neighborhoods, but the further east you go, the thinner the crowds and the beach become. This stretch is where you'll find most of the sports facilities and lots of stalls selling coconuts, corn on the cob, mixed drinks and popcorn. There are also a couple of restaurants that sit almost on the beach.
Fishers haul up their boats and the catch at Praia de Mucuripe, the closest point to the fish market. The cycling and running track comes to an abrupt end at the Iate Plaza Hotel.
Mercado do Peixe
One of Fortaleza's most memorable experiences is a meal at the lively, open-air Mercado do Peixe, a seafood market set along the sea break at Praia do Mucuripe. How it works here is that you first buy your shellfish, shrimp and fish at one of the many stalls, then head to the three or four restaurants out on the seaward side and ask for it to be cooked in the way you like. Waiters take your seafood or fish away and return with its prepared, normally with salad, rice and chips. The cooking is priced per kilo. This place is madly popular and packed out from lunchtime until late at night (don't even think about parking a hire car in the woefully inadequate car park). Tables are tightly packed and it's a noisy, colorful and 100% authentically Fortalezan experience.
