Santos shares the Baixada Santista coast with several other towns worth a day's visit. Guarujá, just across the estuary, has the more dramatic open-ocean beaches and is connected by ferry. São Vicente, immediately to the west, is the oldest Portuguese settlement in the Americas (founded 1532) and has its own modest historic centre.
The natural inland excursion is São Paulo, an hour or so up the Serra do Mar — South America's biggest city, with its own fierce identity and dozens of museums, neighbourhoods, and restaurants. Closer at hand, the green wall of the Serra itself offers fine hiking and the colonial road of the Caminho do Mar, which traces an old mule track up into the Mata Atlântica.
