When you design lighthouses, even though their architecture is very varied, you sometimes end up, in the long run, recognizing the nationality of a lighthouse by its style. We look for exceptional lighthouses, those that can be classified as "plus". I stopped at the Cabo Branco lighthouse because it falls into the latter category: to within 800 metres, it's the easternmost cape in Brazil and the Americas, they say. It is said to be one of the most visited places in the capital of the Brazilian state of Paraiba, João Pessoa, but it is more of a bitter than a lighthouse.
But apart from telling you that this construction is the work of a professor from the Department of Architecture and Urban Planning of the Federal University of Paraiba who died in 2007, Pedro Abraão Dieb. And that this 18-metre high triangular turret was commissioned in 1972. Apart from telling you that it has a very special and almost unique style with these three triangular concrete spikes 3.50 metres from its base. Nothing more to know, or perhaps two shipwrecks off this cape: a Spanish brigantine, the Gulezon in 1640 and the Ceres in 1903 (ship whose name I only know).
However, there are more monumental lighthouses in the vicinity, such as the Calcanhar lighthouse located in "l'Esquina do Brasil".. ...otherwise known as the "Brazil Corner". That is to say, at the extreme north-eastern tip of this country. At 63 metres high, this tower ranks among the top twenty tallest lighthouses in the world, the second highest in Brazil.
In any case, it will most likely be the last lighthouse on the Brazilian coast that the competitors in the 2020 Vendée Globe will cross paths with as they hook onto the trade winds, which should carry them all the way to Europe.
