Brazil · Rio de Janeiro
Where to Stay in Saquarema, Rio de Janeiro
Saquarema lies 73 km east of Rio de Janeiro on the coast, a surfing town whose Museu do Vôlei records a second sport.
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Where to stay in Saquarema
Where you base yourself shapes the visit — here's the character of each area.
The town has two faces. One is the surf coast, where the beaches that earned Saquarema its name as Brazil's surfing capital carry most of the rooms and most of the reason anyone books a night. Rooms on that side sit close to the sand.
The other is the old centre around the Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré, where the town gets on with its own business away from the sand. It is a large municipality. Saquarema spreads across 357 km2, so a room away from the water means a drive to the beaches and to the Museu do Vôlei alike, and the trade is quiet against access. Rio de Janeiro lies 73 km away, with Saquarema east of it along the coast.
Nossa Senhora de Nazaré gives the parish its name, and the church that carries it stands as the fixed point of the older town. Surfers want a bed near the beaches, while the centre near the Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré suits a stay built around the town rather than the water. The Museu do Vôlei is the town's indoor stop.
About Saquarema
Two sports mark the town.
What is Saquarema known for?
Saquarema has been called Brazil's surfing capital, and the Museu do Vôlei gives volleyball a museum of its own in the same municipality of 357 km2 on the coast east of Rio de Janeiro. Beyond the sport, the Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré carries the town's older history. Beaches take the rest of the attention.
What are the main landmarks in Saquarema?
Saquarema's roster of landmarks runs to two. Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré is the parish church, and the Museu do Vôlei is the other entry on the list, a museum given over to volleyball. Beaches do the rest of the work.
What draws people to Saquarema is the coast that earned it the surfing capital name, not a stock of monuments.
What is the history of Saquarema?
The parish came before the surf. Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré stands as the town's oldest named landmark, the matriz that gave the settlement its parish and its patron, Nossa Senhora de Nazaré. Saquarema sits on the coast 73 km east of Rio de Janeiro, and the municipality it governs runs to 357 km2.
The Igreja Matriz gave the older town its centre, and the streets around it carried the settlement long before any board reached the water. The state around it is Rio de Janeiro, and the coast it sits on runs east from the capital. Then the waves brought the fame.
Saquarema came to be known as Brazil's surfing capital, a reputation built on the beaches rather than on any monument, and it is what the town is identified with outside the state. Volleyball took hold too. The Museu do Vôlei records that side of the town's sporting life, the only museum on its landmark list.
Two threads run through the record, the parish church on one side and the sport on the other, and between them they account for almost everything Saquarema is known for.
Where is Saquarema?
Saquarema runs along the coast. The municipality covers 357 km2 of the state of Rio de Janeiro, 73 km east of the capital, and the beaches take its seaward edge. Surf breaks along that shore.
Inland the ground belongs to the same municipality, so a good part of Saquarema lies away from the water altogether.
What is the climate of Saquarema?
The ocean sets the terms on this coast, keeping Saquarema's air damp and its swings narrow through a year that never leaves the tropical band. Seasons flip against the north. The warm stretch runs from December into March, and the cooler months fall in the middle of the year.
Rio de Janeiro, 73 km along the same coast, shares the pattern.
How do you get to Saquarema?
The road from Rio de Janeiro covers 73 km east along the coast, which is the approach nearly everyone takes to Saquarema. Beaches are spread along that shore. Inside the municipality's 357 km2 the distances are real ones, so reaching the Museu do Vôlei or the Igreja Matriz de Nossa Senhora de Nazaré from an outlying room takes a vehicle.
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Updated August 2026