Life is a Carnaval

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Sitting in this dark basement of our hostel in Madrid, it is an effort to forget the freezing cold and rainy weather that is waiting for us outside, in order to retell a tale of 2 girls, one sweltering sun and an amazing 8 days in Rio De Janeiro.

TRAVELLERS LESSON : I'm an not learning a lesson, I am on Vacation. After what now seems to be a routine horrible transit (Yes Chilean Police it is appropriate to ask for our facebook at 3am in the morning and we are nearly in tears at the idea of having to pay a $61 entry fee to Chile just to collect our bags from the conveyerbelt which should have been transfered in the first place) we eventually hauled our bags out into to the blinding sun of Brazil, and even though we were sweating horribly, hair plastered to our faces and jeans suffocating our legs, we were already having fun. The thing we found with Rio is that even though there are so many things that we hated about it, there were so many more great things that outweighed the bad - One main factor being the amazingly hot weather. The fact that you burn yourself so many times (regardless of how much you applied your spf 150+) in the sun and are constantly bathing in your own sweat, really doesnt seem to matter when you are in Rio, Because A) we now have fabulous tans hiding behind our thousand layer Madrid survival wear and B) You are in Rio everyone is looking as attractive as you are with your red face and stringy wet hair.

Perhaps it would be easiest to describe our daily routine and build on it from there to explain the ups and downs ins and outs of our new favourite place. We had the pleasure of staying in a hotel which didnt look anywhere near as horrid as what we had imagined after seeing the skewed photo (yes one) on the internet, so with it we had the luxury of buffet breakfast (our wallets liked that) and a rooftop swimming pool and deck. So everyday we would rise earlyish, travellers time, and saunter into the buffet picking the the items that were in full supply, didn't look like yesterdays buffet and foods that were classified as breakfast rather than dinner - so not the best of buffets, but FREE so no complaints here.
After our leisurely meal we would laze about the pool until our stomachs demanded lunch, then usually we would set out to tick off our RIO'S MUST DO's list, usually followed by a nap and then sushi for dinner, like 5 nights in a row.

So after this everyday exhausting routine of eating and tanning and napping we managed to squeeze in a visit to Cristo Rendentor with a beautiful view looking over Rio, A death trip (in my eyes) on a cable car up to Sugar Loaf mountain for another amazing view, A tram ride on the ancient tram through Santa Theresa (it was so ancient it broke down whilst we were on it) and a romantic valentines date in the Botanical garden together. Each destination was frustratingly hard to get to, considering we cannot understand one wink of portugese and English wasn't as prevalent as we had hoped, nor is it anything close to Spanish (which we can get by on). People will just lie to you, or misunderstand you or shrug their shoulders or use the opportunity to hit on you when you ask for their help, usually resulting in missing the bus, missing the bus stop or getting to said destination and finding it closed. In the end we gave up and forked out a small fortune to catch taxis everywhere. The buses were deadly - driving ridiculously fast and then breaking even faster, after receiving what I swore was minor whiplash, the small fortune for an airconditioned smooth sailing taxi was worth every Real.

But there are of course many sides to Rio, the most notorious being the nightlife... Enter 'The Lads'.
We made new friends on the rooftop of our hotel - Michael, Luke and Andreas who had come all the way from London to show us just how to play drinking games you will regret in the morning. We went out 3 nights in Rio, which is probably more than our entire trip put together, and each night was spent with the Lads, and later on The QLD girls. The boys taught us that you cannot go to Rio without A) drinking Caiprinhas to the fastest drinking games in existence and B) going to Lapa. Oh Lapa. The boys were a godsend really, because without them there to protect us, we surely would have been eaten alive by the Brazillian men. Lapa is the part of Rio where all the locals (and smart tourists) go to drink the bars and clubs dry. So the Bars and clubs are packed and spilling out onto the streets, if you look out of a window from the clubs you see a sea of heads, all shining with sweat and wildy moving up and down in waves as the legs under the surface dance all night in puddles of dirt and spilt beer and other contents you try not to think about. In short Lapa is AMAZING.

I think that after many a night out in Rio, we will be spending the next few days in Madrid consuming Tapas, Chocolate dipped Churros and drinking red wine (smallest of portions) and coffee to restore our energies back to their former selves. I don't think any amount of blogging could truly describe Rio in all its splendour, with the sun and the beaches and continual fiestas on the streets, but I have tried my hardest.
There is now less than two weeks until we have to haul ass back to Australia and we are excited and depressed about having to do so. I hope all is well back home and I cant wait to catch up with everybody when i get back.

Sorry I havent been able to put photos up but its too tricky when we move around so much and have to share or pay for computers.

x

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