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Second only to Rio in the magnificence of its natural setting on the mouth of the enormous bay of Todos os Santos, SALVADOR is one of that select band of cities which has an electricity you feel from the moment you arrive. Its foundation in 1549 marked the beginning of the permanent occupation of the country by the Portuguese , though it wasn't easy for them. The Caete Indians killed and ate both the first governor and the first bishop before succumbing, and Salvador was later the scene of a great battle in 1624, when the Dutch destroyed the Portuguese fleet in the bay and took the town by storm, only to be forced out again within a year by a joint Spanish and Portuguese fleet.

Much of the plantation wealth of the Reconcavo was used to adorn the city with imposing public buildings, ornate squares and, above all, churches. Today, Salvador is a large, modern city, but significant chunks of it are still recognizably colonial. Taken as a whole it doesn't have the unsullied calm of, say, Olinda but many of its individual churches, monasteries and convents are magnificent, the finest colonial buildings anywhere in Brazil.

The other factor that marks Salvador out is immediately obvious - most of the population is black. Salvador was Brazil's main slave port, and the survivors of the brutal journey from the Portuguese Gold Coast and Angola were immediately packed off to city construction gangs or the plantations of the Reconcavo; today, their descendants make up the bulk of the population. African influences are everywhere. Salvador is the cradle of candomble and umbanda, Afro-Brazilian religious cults that have millions of devotees across Brazil. The city has a marvellous local cuisine , much imitated in other parts of the country, based on African ingredients like palm oil, peanuts and coconut milk. And Salvador has possibly the richest artistic tradition of any Brazilian city; only Rio can rival it.

A disproportionate number of Brazil's leading writers and poets either were either born or lived in Salvador, including Jorge Amado, the most widely translated Brazilian novelist, and Vinicius de Moraes, Brazil's best-known modern poet. The majority of the great names who made Brazilian music famous hail from the city - Joao Gilberto, the leading exponent, with Tom Jobim, of bossa nova; Astrud Gilberto, whose quavering version of The Girl from Ipanema was a global hit; Dorival Caymmi, the patriarch of Brazilian popular music; Caetano Veloso, the founder of tropicalismo; the singers Maria Bethania and Gal Costa; and Gilberto Gil, who was at one time secretary of culture in the city government. The city's music is still as rich and innovative as ever, and bursts out every year in a Carnaval that many think is the best in Brazil.

Salvador is built around the craggy, fifty-metre-high bluff which dominates the eastern side of the bay, and splits the central area into upper and lower sections. The heart of the old city, Cidade Alta (or simply Centro), is strung along its top, linked to the Cidade Baixa , below, by precipitous streets, a funicular railway and the towering Art Deco lift shaft of the Carlos Lacerda elevator, the city's largest landmark. Cidade Alta is the administrative and cultural centre of the city, Cidade Baixa the financial and commercial district.

In the last century the city expanded into the still elegant areas of Barris and Canela , to the south of Cidade Alta, and up to the exclusive residential suburb of Barra , the headland at the mouth of the bay around which the city is built. From Barra, a broken coastline of coves and beaches, large and small, is linked by the twisting Avenida Oceanica (also known as the Avenida Presidente Vargas), which runs along the shore through Ondina , Rio Vermelho and Pituba , the main beach areas. Further on is the one-time fishing village of Itapoan , after which the city peters out.

Most of Salvador's 26 museums and 34 colonial churches are concentrated within a short distance of each other in Cidade Alta, which makes sightseeing fairly straightforward. A single meandering walk from the Praca da Se, taking in all the highlights, but not stopping at any of them, would take no more than an hour; more realistically, you'll need at least two days, and possibly three, if you want to explore the city in depth.