Rio de Janeiro

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(Andy says)

Well we landed on Brazilian soil after a 12 hour flight from London. We stayed in Rio hostel which is situated in the hillside of Santa Teresa over looking the city of Rio de Janeiro. The views were brilliant although the walk, to and from the centre (centro) were very tough in the sweltering heat (over 30 degrees Celsius)..i would consider harder than a good session in wheelo's gym with the hurlers. The first day we took things easy as Janette and i were both shattered after all the trekking the day before.
So we decided to take a taxi to the famous Copacabana beach and walked the length of it The beach is about 4 km long and is packed with people from morning till night fall. i got a serious scalding for my trouble and needed a couple of the local's tipple (Caipirinha's) to numb the pain that night.

We thought it best to get on the tourist sight seeing end of business the following day. Up the Corcovado by tram to see the main man in Rio, Christo Redentor...He can be seen from most places in rio but is absolutely massive when up close....he looks down on all of the city and directly at the sugar loaf (pao de acucar). I nipped in to the little church beneath him and said a prayer for all you sinners back home. Back down by tram and got a big feed into us....

we went up the sugar loaf the day after by cable car..it is done in two trips, first up to the top of pao de morro which is 220 metres high and then up to the top of the sugar loaf by another cable car (396m high)...i later found out that part of the james bond films was done here...the one with jaws in it. Absolutely class and we decided to chill on ipanema beach after we got down.

(j says)

Next day we booked to go hang gliding over Tijuca forest (called hang gliding as you can see in the pics we hung there like plebs while the instructor did the steering bit) What an amazing experience ... but seriously we had about two minutes of pre flight training! The views over the forest, beach & city were breathtaking. In conversation with some other tourists we found out that not all hang gliding experiences that day had been as successful as ours! Anyway we both agreed it was a lovely & had a good 'ol laugh at the on flite pics that evening!

Went to the Maracana. Really nice stadium, 60 years old but its no Croker! (haha as if i'd know). It holds between 90, 000 - 120, 000 spectators although I do think it'd be fairly wedged at full capacity. Like all big venues the size is pretty awesome, its quite low, seats are really close together so i could imagine an amazing atmosphere at big games or whatever. Got to tour around the dressing rooms ... these are appalling for professional standards i think, nicer showers in finnstown gym! Anyway back into the blistering heat after this and chilled by the rooftop pool in our santa teresa hostel. Massive thunderstorm later that evening ... quite cool to watch.

Ready now for the next leg of our brazilian journey. Tickets booked, bags packed ... just an 18 hour bus journey between us and Florianopolis! We'll chat on the other side. For now check out the pics ..... laters j & andy

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