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Guarujá is a beach resort city on Santo Amaro Island on the coast of São Paulo state in southeastern Brazil, famous as the Pearl of the Atlantic for its string of beaches, from busy Praia de Pitangueiras and Praia da Enseada to the Blue Flag Praia do Tombo. It lies in the Baixada Santista region, across a narrow channel from the port city of Santos.
The city receives well over a million visitors a year, most of them in the summer season. Urban beaches with kiosks and seafront promenades line the centre, while quieter beaches such as Praia de Pernambuco, Praia do Perequê and Prainha Branca lie further out, and some of the city's 27 beaches can be reached only by trail or boat.
History is close by too. The Fortaleza da Barra Grande, begun in 1584, still guards the channel into the port of Santos, and the Forte dos Andradas, inaugurated in 1942, stands on the Munduba headland. The Acqua Mundo aquarium and the rocky Morro do Maluf round out a stay, and ferries cross the channel to Santos.
Praia de Pitangueiras is the central beach of Guarujá, lined with tall apartment blocks and one of the city's most visited stretches of sand. Its seafront promenade gathers restaurants, bars and the Shopping La Plage, and surfers favour the corner by the rocky Morro do Maluf.
Praia da Enseada is the longest beach in Guarujá, with 5.6 kilometres of fine white sand. Building heights along its seafront are limited, so it feels more open than the centre, and its kiosks, restaurants, boat trips and lively evenings make it one of the most popular beaches in town.
Praia do Tombo is a 900-metre beach in Guarujá that has received the international Blue Flag award for clean water and good management many years in a row. Its strong waves make it the favourite beach of local surfers, and it regularly hosts national and international surf contests.
Praia do Guaiúba is a small beach of fine, pale sand about 790 metres long in Guarujá, set in the upmarket Jardim Guaiúba district next to Praia do Tombo and Praia das Astúrias. Lined with holiday homes rather than tower blocks, it is a quieter alternative to the central beaches.
Praia de Pernambuco is a 1.8-kilometre beach in an upmarket residential district of Guarujá, known for its clear water, green hills and elegant holiday homes. With almost no shops along the sand it feels calm and exclusive, and it is often called one of the most beautiful beaches in the city.
Praia do Mar Casado is a beach in Guarujá beside the hill known as the Ilha do Mar Casado. At high tide the water from this beach and from Praia de Pernambuco meets over the sandbar and the hill becomes an island again, the meeting of the seas that gives the beach its name.
Praia do Perequê is a 2,400-metre beach in the east of Guarujá, beyond Praia de Pernambuco, home to the city's largest fishing colony and a stronghold of caiçara culture. Fresh fish and seafood are sold here, and longboard surfers wait for its long right-hand wave.
Prainha Branca is a beach in Guarujá whose caiçara village, started around the 1840s by fishing families from the island of Montão de Trigo, was listed as heritage by CONDEPHAAT in 1992. About 500 people live there, and inns, campsites, bars and restaurants sit near the sand.
The Fortaleza da Barra Grande is a fortress begun in 1584 on Santo Amaro Island in Guarujá to guard the Barra Grande channel into the port of Santos. Its main wall was finished in 1721 and its chapel in 1742, and the complex was listed as national heritage in 1964.
The Forte dos Andradas is a coastal fort on the Munduba headland in Guarujá, built from 1938 and inaugurated in 1942 during the Second World War to defend the port of Santos. Still an army base, it is named after the Andrada brothers, leading statesmen of Brazil's independence era.
Acqua Mundo is an aquarium on Praia da Enseada in Guarujá and one of the largest in Latin America, covering about 5,775 square metres. Its big tanks of fish and other marine life make it a good plan for a rainy day or a break from the beach, especially for visitors with children.
The Morro do Maluf, properly called Morro da Campina, is the rocky hill between Praia de Pitangueiras and Praia da Enseada in Guarujá and one of the city's main landmarks. It is named after Edmundo Maluf, a São Paulo industrialist who had a house on its slope and threw memorable parties.
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