Praia da Cachoeira do Bom Jesus

At the entrance to the North Bay of Santa Catarina Island, Praia da Cachoeira do Bom Jesus holds a few species of fish and crabs near its rock formations. The beach stretches for 2,800 m, with a strip of sand 5 to 30 m wide. It is influenced by both the open sea and the bay waters, and its water is a bright green.

Despite the name, it is not a waterfall: the name comes from a small waterfall on Morro da Cachoeira, whose stream rises on the hill and flows out onto the beach. Because the local church is consecrated to Senhor Bom Jesus, the locality came to be called Cachoeira do Bom Jesus, and the beach only received this name in the 1960s.

The beach's history is tied to that of the neighboring district of Canasvieiras, where the Vila de São Francisco de Paula das Canas Vieiras was founded in 1835. In the region, the economy first revolved around livestock farming and subsistence agriculture, with sugarcane, cassava, corn, beans and coffee, and only later did fishing become established. From the 1970s onward, Praia da Cachoeira became a tourist destination: with the construction of the SC-401 and the growth of tourism, its infrastructure was modernized and began to attract more tourists and land subdivisions.