Blogs from Botafogo, Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, South America - page 4

The flight to Bolivia was eventful and by that I mean Bolivian belly had caught up with me. I was hunched over in a ball most of the flight with stomach cramps, not a good start. We eventually got to Sau Paulo in one piece and waited on the arrival of our friend Ray from New Zealand. His flight ended up being delayed so he didnt get there until quite late. It really was lovely stuff seeing him after a year and a half, unfortunately I spent the whole of our time in Sau Paulo in bed with flu. Doug and Ray said it was just a concrete jungle anyway and I hadnt missed much. We put off our depature to Rio by a day while I recovered and then headed north for twelve days in ... read more

Day 9-14th September Well after 2 days of doing sweet f all, we were bright eyed and ready to head back out. Our time in Rio is nearly at an end and we had to start organising our next stop as we leave on Thursday. We have decided to head south to Foz Do Iguaçu to see the Iguazu Falls. We have heard a lot about how amazing they are and the wildlife is also meant to be pretty spectacular, excellent opportunity to use our lovely SLR! It’s approx 1500km from Rio but the flights are a little out of our financial reach so the bus it is! We’d been on the old internet to find out how to get there and decided that we’d use a company called Pluma, however we could not for the ... read more

Arrival in Rio On the 5th of August we arrived in Rio de Janeiro. It was dark, it was raining and we could not find a place to stay. Eventually we pitched our tent in absolutely the most awful campsite I have EVER been in, and the most expensive: about R 270,-- for one night in a place where there was no WiFi, cold showers only and no campers we could see. The place was littered with large structures (tents?) covered with large blue pieces of plastic sheet, giving the place the appearance of a refugee camp. Going all the way back to San Salvador in Bolivia, where we finally got our fridge back (unrepaired), we moved for a couple of weeks from campsite to hostel to camping somewhere in the bush, with few real ... read more

We arrived into Buenos Aires and once again we split up. The other boys having had booked their room parted at the Airport with the intention of getting to Rio as quick as possible where we wanted to get their just at a slower pace maybe seeing more on the way. We got into a taxi at the airport and asked to be taking to a cheap hotel. The taxi driver brought to a place that was a lot more upper class than we had been used to in recent times and we settled in to two shared rooms. Mully and myself shared a room with an African guy who was apparently from Canada and the US and seemed a bit weird but nothing more was thought about it. We stayed in the hotel for the ... read more

Saturday the 20th of feb we say not goodbye but a big catchya later to Santiago. We are off to Rio de Janiero! Woo Hoo. First thing realise on our way over on the plane is that we now have to start learning portuguese. Dammit i was just starting to get the hang of spanish. We breezed through the airport and got a bus to Botofogo beach where we stayed. The bus ride told us a lot about this exotic city of which we had previously only seen glamorous footage of. The motorway in showed favela upon favela lining the road. I wasn´t expecting poverty like this. As we drove through the city, that poverty was hidden behind the sun, beach and mountains that is Rio. Definately 2 sides to the city. The next morning we ... read more