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Published: February 25th 2007
Arrive in Rio slap bang in the middle of Carnaval! From the moment you leave the airport you can feel the buzz of the city and the atmosphere. Thanks to our F1 approved taxi driver we get to our hotel in speedy time and are relieved to find that it does exist and it´s quite nice too - Bonus!
Wasting no time whatsoever we head down to Copacabana beach......What a sight, never seen anything like it before!! The beach is enormous and stretches for about 2 miles. There are literally thousands of people drinking and dancing to the ever present Samba rhythm. Every other street corner has a samba band playing live music - hooked up to the biggest speakers you have ever seen!! Being pretty tired from the journey across the atlantic, however, we decide to get a quick meal in one of the many restaurants along the beachfront (getting a churrasco misto - a plate of grilled steak, chicken, pork and sausage - washed down with the local beer) then head back to the hotel for a reasonably early night.
Monday morning we buy our tickets to the Sambadromo parade for that evening then walk along Copacabama beach and
onto Ipanema beach (yes the very same one that ¨that girl¨ comes from!). Again, it´s a packed beach (since it´s holiday time for the people of Rio, the Cariocas) but we find a spot near the sea. Attempt to go for a dip, but it´s way too cold for Suzanne, so Av goes it alone - and almost gets swept down the coast to the next beach as the currents are so strong!
Eat out again, trying yet more grilled meats, then get a coach to the Sambadrome.
And WOW!!!! The parade starts at about 9pm and is made up of 7 different samba schools from the various shanty towns (or favelas) around Rio parading for about an hour each, with up to 8 floats, a band of 300+ and 1,000´s of dancers in amazing costumes dancing down a street that is about half a mile long! The crowds include locals obviously supporting the favela they are from, waving flags and banners, and singing and dancing to each school´s song (which is repeated over and over again until their parade has finally come to an end). Several hours later and with extremely numb backsides and sore feet, we head back
to the hotel - and we only managed to last for half of the show!! Apparently the last school´s parade didn´t finish until some time around 6.30am the next morning!
Tuesday is yet another lazy day spent on the beach, but this time we try the local shrimp dish for dinner - Av liked it, Suzz didn´t. We also try out the famous Capirinhia, which is lethal! Again, Av loves it, Suzz not so much!
Wednesday we take a tour to see the huge statue of Christ the Redeemer, on top of Corcovado mountain (Corcovado means hunchback - or ¨hoonch-baack¨as the guide kept repeating to us!). It´s not quite as impressive up close as it looks on the postcards, but it´s still some feat to have carried all that soap stone up a mountain 710 meters high! We also stop by the Maracana football stadium (although we aren´t allowed inside the grounds themselves) and the Sambodrome arena - where some of the other tourists try on the costumes and we get to have a quick boogey along the parade road itself - we picked up some great moves from the people in front of us on Monday night!!
Thursday is
again spent on the beach, as is Friday and Saturday, but in the evening we have a meal in the restaurant where Tim Jobim and Vinicius Moraes wrote the famous Bossa Nova song, The Girl From Ipanema (otherwise know as La Garota de Ipanema).
Eek! And now it´s Sunday. This afternoon we braved the cable car that takes you to the top of Sugarloaf Mountain and were rewarded with spectacular views across Rio and a stunning sunset behind Corcovado Mountain and Copacabana Beach. We then spent our last evening in Rio at a very swanky restaurant at the top of Copacabana Beach before packing up again, ready for the 17 day tour to Buenos Aires.
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Routundus
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Hello!
Sounds like you're having a wild time of it!!(get it) Lovely jubbly...