Rio a city to fall inlove with- The attractions

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Rio de Janeiro.I love this city😊

A visit in Rio cannot be completed without a visit to the top attractions in Rio. The Christ,the Sugarloaf,the Metropolitan Cathedral and the Sellaron Steps,and lets not forget the Santa Teresa neighborhood.

I need to say this, before i start writing about the sights. We had a camera,joanna fell of the horse-result the camera is malfunctioning, bought a new smaller one, charged it but forgot toput amemory card in. Great start to the Tour, we realised that on the way to the Christ,but thank god to some really nice Irish girls😊

So we picked up all of the passengers which were mostly Irish and Scottish, we had 2 Argentinians one New Yorker and one native Brazilian grl.Wemade our way to Corcovado which is where the Christ is, a sculpture made of Soapstone that is found only in Africa,it has been imported to make the scultpure because it can withstand the natural elements and the weather changes.You can see the sculpture from variousplaces in the city but one of the most impressive is from Botafogo, because you can see the Christ from one side and theSugarloaf from the other. To get to the actual place where the Christ is you have to go through the Tijuca Natural Parkwhich is gorgeous but a bit nauseating to go up because its full of turns.We also had to switch buses and we were named byour guide as theG-Force group, because i think the majority was girls.

Anw so we got up to Corcovado where the Christ is situated and we had half an hour there to take our pictures and enjoy the view from up there! Luckily for us we had great weather the whole day which meant that the place was quite packed but we got to take some pictures, we had to be really choosy because of the camera situation but we managed to get some good ones.

After the Christ we descented to Santa Teresa neighbourhood, which is where the artists and to be honest the more bohemian crowd reside.It had some really cool stuff there but we just passed through the area, which did not give us a lot of time for browsing, but we planned to come back there, which we did not eventually because we gave priority to the Lapa Steps an attraction that will follow.What we learned about the neighborhood is that several celebrities stayed there at the hotel in S.T. but also that they rely a lot on the tram which is currently out of service - something that causes a lot of protests because the neighborhood is polluted with a lot of cars at the moment. The guide informed us that they will be able to have it back on on 2013.

So my of my favourite attractions comes next! The Lapa Steps!! to be honest the area might seem somehow intimidating but it makes up for it.Ok so to get to the story behind the steps, this Chilean artist has been collecting tiles from all over the world and he loved Brazil so much that he decided to decorate the steps of Lapa.Its an ongoing process apparently and he might change part of it , if he wishes to but its amazing, the main colour is read with undertones of green and yellow but its such a playground, makes it fun for all the people to search for the tiles of their country, and some other fun ones. there is one of the 101 dalmatians and even tom and Jerry, so its safe to say that its a crowdpleaser!😊 Unfortunately when we came back to take pictures, it so happend that they stole my glasses that day but at least it wasnt something of greater value!

So next on the list, and close by, is the Metropolitan Cathedral, which is a pretty funky buidling for a church but really thoughtful and impressive once you get over the first impression. Its sort of a conical building that has skylight on the top that lets the light in, the only source of light i think comes fromthere and the stained windows.So in my religion . at the ceiling in the middle of the church you have the Christ. but the difference with this one is that the light comes through the cross creating a magical effect, and then the stained windows feature different colours which makes it all the more magical. Suprisingly it can host about 20 thousand people inside, something that did not seem possible in the begining but after you take in how big the space is, its ok.

So the cherry on the cake was destined to be last, and its the Sugarloaf. To be honest , io wasnt really excited about going up, because of the height but it wasnt at all bad, we even managed to stand at the window ngoing up which was really cool. Even the first stop was amazing, , they look so small but then you go up and then the space thre is vast. We went up to the top immediately after the first one , think to be thre when the sun sets, and it was breathtaking. we were lucky to see a function going on there, the reception of a brazilian to an australian was held and it was an all white theme, or so it seemed. but as the guide explained they were white for new years , basically to celñebrate happy events.



with that the tour ends😊

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