I think he was trying to kill us and Snr was certainly not feeling comfortable as our cab driver flew into traffic, mumbling and cursing under his breath as we took our taxi into the city centre. Snr implored the driver to slow down and then incorporated G's help to convince him that we weren't just ready to meet our makers, particularly since we'd hadn't even a chance to make ourselves presentable after our long and tiring bus journey.

He didn't care, but, being mindful of how important tourists are to his city, he did reduce his speed noticeably from 130kph to about 125kph. I cared less than him, I was buzzing with anticipation about seeing the city again I have always said is my favourite in S America.

Of course, this was tempered with a caution, honed over years of experience of revisiting places, when invariably the second time pales beside the memories of the first but still I had high hopes.

On our first night, we went for dinner in the main square of Pelourinho, followed the sounds of music and stumbled upon a free concert, left there and were invited in and watched a Condomble ceremony (a local religion here) that we were passing on the street and finished it up having beers in the bar owned by a guy from Norwich! And all of this in the space of three hours......on a Monday night.

The next day was a little overcast but we still went for the walk. After the recent passing of Michael Jackson, I was keen to just walk the nearby streets where he had shot his famous video, 'They don't really care about us.' Now, when you think about it, almost anywhere you walk in the developed world, you will be following in the footsteps of somebody that graced the place when they were famous or walked it in obscurity, before their path reached their destiny, but it was still cool to be exactly where MJ had been.

Almost in honour of the man, that evening we heard the sound of drums below our window so we looked out to investigate. A troupe of drummers were playing their distinctive sound followed by 200 people, following along pied piper style in a choreographed dance, flinging their arms around while twirling dervishes. It actually seemed impromptu although I am sure it happens every week.

The street kids are everywhere, moaning and holding their stomachs as they approach you. You have to be quite firm with them by all accounts because if you give them any money at all, they spend it on drugs. Even buying them food is pointless as they sell it to others and use the money for their hit.

But I had higher hopes for Jakison, who spoke French, English, Spanish and obviously Portuguese. He said he was 18 but he looked 13, so malnourished was he. I asked him why he didn't get a job with all of his languages but he said you needed an ID card to get 'proper' work but his parents were dead so he didn't have a birth cert. I gave him 4 Reals (US$2) to buy us sandwiches but he ran off and I didn't see him again that night. The next night he said he had come back but he didn't say it with much conviction, he knew I had waited for over an hour for his return. The night after, he was running through the streets shouting at everyone, clearly strung up...

In fact, as soon as any of the kids had stung you (G had bought a kid 6 mini breads to feed his family but he too had gone off and bought drugs), they left you alone the next day, there was always another gringo that they could tap off.

We met Nivia, my friend that I'd made the last time I came here to Salvador and we enjoyed some local drinks in a really cool bar that I had somehow missed that was in the main square. Any word starting with 'r' in Portuguese is pronounced 'h' so for example 'Ronaldo' is 'Honaldo', 'Radio' is 'Hadio' etc etc but even I had to smile when she said we were going out that night to listen to some 'Hock and Holl', ah yes, Rock and Roll had never sounded so good!

The city centre is wonderful but certainly very touristy. Cobblestoned streets, artists peddling their wares, wafts of Bahian food and the ever present music (I had woken most mornings to hearing kids singing in nearby schools.) They are doing everything they can to keep the music alive here and we stumbled (again I know, but you really don't need a guide book when you walk these streets, you just follow your senses) on a class for kids of Olodum, the most internationally famous band to come from Salvador. Kids as young as 5 were beating away in perfect co-ordination, I was incredibly impressed and jealous of my own musical shortcomings.

I went to visit my old mate Russell, the proprietor of the hostel I'd stayed at last time and we caught up like old war veterans over caiparinhas and beers. It was great to see him and it reminded me how much I missed catching up with friends from home, one of the sacrifices you make when you go on the road.

The next day was our last, so we ran around and took all the snaps that we had put off until this moment. We went to see a Baile Folklorico (local dance) which was simply excellent, spiritual, moving, athletic, acrobatic and in places violent which was clearly evident on one of the dancers face!

I was hypnotised by his evident anger, he was mightily pissed off with one of the other dancers and he was struggling to keep it under wraps. Everyone else was smiling when they were supposed to but his lips were sown shut like a Guantanomo bay detainee. His eyes were fiery with pure hatred and my mind was rampant with possible explanations. So much so, that it almost distracted me from the performance but my attention was brought back into the here and now in a flash.... a flash of a sword!

One of the dances was a particularly violent dance where the dancers, dressed in ancient tribal threads (they left nothing to the imagination), brandished swords and sparks literally flew as they flung themselves at each other with perfect coordination, choreographed clashes of the swords in time with the music.

I stared with my eyes wide open as I actually thought that my man, feeling tribal and persecuted, with a captive audience and a deadly instrument of war in his hand, was going to exact his revenge in a very terminal way.  Fortunately for us,  and presumably his would be victim, he was restrained in his movements and when the curtains came down, and they came out for their final bow, I looked along the line of dancers to see who was most relieved.

My man barely bowed, eyes glistening over as the spirits of vengeance were taking over his body and I strained my ears to try and hear any altercation behind the descending curtain. He had to cool down a bit and he could have done worse than accompanying us, we had to take another ice box of a bus, this time to Lencois and a return to nature...