Serra da Capivara is the least visited WHS in Brazil. The reason is the relative inaccessibility of this place - from southern Piaui, where the park is located, everywhere is far away, and the nearest WHS is Sao Francisco Square, about 900 km away. It's best to get to Petrolina by plane (by the way, the name of this place has nothing to do with crude oil), which is about 5 hours away from the park by car (I covered this route in 4 hours in the early morning - but be warned, there are plenty of holes in it).

Me and my family got to the park in November 2020 from Chapada dos Veadeiros, and the 1300-kilometer route took us about 15 hours net with a stop for the night in Barreiras. The road, apart from the last leg in Piaui, is quite nice and very picturesque, especially the first part from Chapada dos Veadeiros do Barreiras. It was absolutely worth the effort - Serra da Capivara is definitely my number one place among the rock art WHS.

In preparation for the trip, I looked at the list of obligatory guides available on the icmbio.gov.br website (currently, however, the site has been unavailable for a long time) and contacted one who was supposed to speak English. It turned out, however, that the declaration of the guide was not true. According to the locals, the only guide who speaks good English is Waltercio Torres Correia - tel./whatsapp + 55898131-5923, who, however, takes up to 400 reais from foreign tourists for his services. Waltercio was unavailable, but the locals found us another guide - Rafael Moraes (tel. + 558998129-0151), who spoke basic English but was professional and sympathetic and took the standard rate of 200 reais.

The park itself is very extensive and picturesque, but as it was inscribed solely on the cultural criteria, we were mainly interested in places with rock art. Most are concentrated close to the main gate, near Pedra Furada - a picturesque rock with a hole in the middle, which is a symbol of the park. The art is wonderful - made with different techniques and different colors of paints, it presents not only ‘standard’ animals and hunting scenes, but also scenes of gymnastic exercises and dancing. There are surprisingly many references to sex and reproduction - one of the symbols of the park is the drawing of a kissing couple, but there are also drawings of men with erect penises (see photo) and the sexual acts themselves. The most spectacular drawings are a few kilometers away from Pedra Furada, but the whole standard route can be visited within 2-4 hours.

All this can be admired in the surroundings of wonderful nature - monumental rocks, lizards, large rodents (the name of the park comes from the capybara, the largest rodent in the world) and birds.

The entrance to the park is just near to Coronel Jose Dias, a small town that has a decent accommodation base. We slept in Casa Barreirinho, owned by a German who has lived in Brazil for several years. Right next to it, there is another, larger Albergue e Pousada Serra da Capivara, which has many more rooms, a restaurant and a huge factory of pottery decorated with motifs taken from rock drawings. You can also buy T-shirts and other souvenirs there. It turns out that Serra da Capivara in 'normal' times is a very popular place among local tourists and Coronel Jose Dias is often visited by school trips from such distant cities as Fortaleza, Recife or even Salvador.

A visit to the park should be enriched with a visit to two museums - Museu da Natureza in Coronel Jose Dias and Museu do Homem Americano in Sao Raimundo Nonato. At the time of our visit, unfortunately, both museums were closed due to the pandemic. Nevertheless, we enjoyed the visit very much, especially since in Coronel Jose Dias we met by chance a local priest from Poland who took us to the Polish bishop of the diocese of Sao Raimundo Nonato, Edward Zielski.