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  Rio de Janiero, Brazil
Thursday, February 22, 2007

Well, my time in the beautiful town of Rio has ended.  I did manage to see the sights and do some tourist things while I was here.  Tuesday night was going to be a light one because we were going to see the statue of Jesus at 9 in the morning.  I was hanging out drinking at the hostel and the next thing I know is that Pat O is waking me up on the lobby couch and asking me if I~m going with the to see the statue.  I said sure and got up and my shorts were soaked and I figured I had pissed on the lobby sofa (something not so out of the ordinary as some of you might know first hand).  Later I was told that the Irish guys had poured beer on my crotch.  Well hung over and a few bottles of water later we made it up to Corcovado and saw Cristo Redentor.  There were 5 of us that ended up going from the hostel Craig and Pat O and two Aussie girls.  The views were amazing!  You could see the entire city from there.

Wednesday there was a local soccer game that I wanted to hit up.  We ended up getting a little crew together and went.  It was Jacky and Jared (the guy who was selling hats), Ben the English guy, and a couple of younger Aussies.  The Maracana is the largest stadium holding 120,000 and has held up to 160,000 during the World Cup (which is why they built it).  The local team, Flamengos were playing so it was a rather packed house, but not full by any means.  We were bombarded by scalpers when we got there, but ended up buying tickets at the gate.  We got seats behind the goal.  For the first half of the game we were on the opposite side of all of the mayhem, but when the second half rolled around everyone came to our side and it got pretty crazy.  The Flamengos ended up winning 3 to 1.  There was quite a bit of traffic leaving the stadium so we just bought beer off of people that just walk through traffic selling beer and food.  We got back to the hostel around 1 or 2 and things were jumping.  We partied pretty hard and went to a beach party until the sun came up.  We got back to the hostel and ate breakfast and went to bed.  This was the first time I've had breakfast there.

The last day or so was just spent lounging around licking my wounds and trying to catch up on some rest.  I had to go to a travel agent to get a flight out of town.  I'm heading to Florianopolis which is a beach town southwest of Rio.  The bus ride was 18 hours so I opted for the plane.  I think I'm just going to head down the coast to Montevideo and on into Buenos Aires and meet up with Matt Morgan in one of those cities, but who knows my plans changed a couple of days ago.  I was initially going to go to Sao Paulo, but everyone I talked to told me it wasn't worth going.

Looking back on Rio, I have to say it is a great city.  The people are beautiful and friendly.  Everyone seemed to take care of themselves and stay in good shape.  It felt like a town in Spain to me.  Nice buildings and you walk everywhere, the only thing is that a few block and up the hill you have the favelas (the slums) which are rough.  The food was alright though a little bland for me.  The deserts were amazing and so were the juice bars.  You can get any type of fresh fruit juice almost everywhere.  Brazilian beer is pretty good.  I've tried at least 6 different brands and they all pretty much taste the same.  I did buy some vodka to drink at the hostel to save some money (the $1us beers add up after awhile).  The vodka here isn't as cheap as TAAKA back home, but the fruit juice mixers we buy make the drinks much tastier than with the Fresca or Diet Rites that we use at the Bellefontaine House.  I still haven't found out when people sleep here though.

Well I'm off to catch my plane and hopefully get some rest.

Jondell

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Post your own travel photos for friends and family More Pictures

Copacabana at Dusk	Corcovado view 01	Corcovado View 02	Cristo Redentor
Lagoon and Horsetrack	My room	Soccer Game 01	Soccer Game 02
Soccer Game 03	Soccer Game 04	Sugar Loaf	Sunset
Sunset on Ipanema	The Gym at Copacabana	The Hostel Courtyard	View

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