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Published: December 11th 2007
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Downtown Rio
at Prca 15 de Novembro Today we decide we have had quite an adventure and wonder if we can change our tickets to fly out a few days earlier than originally planned. We find the offices for Aerolinas Argentinas are in Cenro and decide to head there. After some lenghty discussion we discover that is not a possility without extra costs being incurred and decide to stay and enjoy the last few days in Rio.
As we are already in Centro, we decide to explore it and soon find ourselves in Praca 15 de Novembro - awesome imposing large colonial buildings all around. Centro (or Downtown) is the historic centre of the city, as well as its financial centre. Sites of interest include the Paço Imperial, built during colonial times to serve as a residence for the Portuguese governors of Brazil; many historic churches, such as the Candelária Church, the colonial Cathedral and the modern-style Rio de Janeiro Cathedral. After exploring for a while we stumble quite by chance on a place with ferries going to Neteroi - this is fantastic because the bridge from Rio to Neteroi can be seen from the air and many other places around Rio, we even saw it from
Statues
on one of the building in Centro. Sugarloaf mountain and thought it was exceptionally long and just wanted to get a better view of it - didnt really know anything about Neteroi and had no idea what we were going to do once we got there.
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INTERESTING FACTS -
Niterói is a city in Brazil, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, founded on November 22, 1573 by a Tupi Indian named Araribóia. It is the only Brazilian city to have been founded by an indigenous Brazilian.
The Rio - Niteroi bridge is 13,290 m (roughly 14kms) long.
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So we caught a ferry to Niteroi. Started by looking for lunch and found a KFC not too far from where we landed. Sat and had some lunch. During lunch we had a look at our very handy "Lonely Planet" book and found something we were interested in seeing - Niterói Contemporary Art Museum and Icaraí beach, so we headed in that general direction. Judging by the map the walk there should have taken us roughly 30mins max - we had already walked for two hours and were not seeing anything in the horizon to encourage us that we were in the right direction.
Decided to take what looked like a short cut but ended up at the Niteroi Uni!!!! By this time Anshu was pretty fed up and wanted nothing more than to go back the way we came. I on the other hand wanted to find these elusive places and wasnt going anywhere until I had done so. This resulted in a battleof will and tempers were rising again (but that some of the joys of life =)) Finally we found someone that spoke a bit of English and informed us we were on the right track and it wasnt too much further, we turned a corner and there was Icarai beach and Niterói Contemporary Art Museum. Sat on the beach for a while - enjoying the views, catching our breath and apologising for the near fist fights we had earlier (looking at the photos you would never have guessed we were fighting).
Then we headed over the rocks to the Museum - not really wanting to go inside, only wanted to get close to have a look at the amazing flying saucer shape of the museum. Wicked building!! Walked to a bus stop near the Museum and caught a bus
Inside
one of the state buildings back to where the ferries were, we did not have the energy to walk back in the heat. Bus ride was 5mins, jumped back on the ferry and headed back for Centro. Centro back to Botafogo.
Another night of partying and this night none of managed to sleep with the noise. This being my second night - I was starting to get pissed off with the situation. Anshu went down and requested the consider other people. The noise level went down a notch. Decided to move out of here tomorrow.
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