It's Rio baby!
Trip Start
Feb 10, 2010
1
31
Trip End
Ongoing
Rio de Janeiro, State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
The 30-odd hour transit went smoothly at least until Aerolineas was
involved. Should have know i wouldn't get into BA on time after being
told that an international airline had 'forgotten' about the existence
of daylight savings...A four hour wait became 5 then 6 then 7... Only so
much window shopping can be used to fill in time. Luckily for my
singular piece of foresight probably for the entire trip, the hotel I'd
booked took 5 mins to pull up at the airport and whisk me off to my
air-conditioned, private room. Bare basics but the ones that i needed...
Thursday 11/02/2010
Transit from BA to Rio, pretty faultless... Not even a wait to get through 'customs'. I've never seen such lax security measures at a border as in BA and Rio. No X-ray, one security guard, declaring something means you skip past the queue without even eye contact with the officer, just a quick scan of the passport and a visa stamp and you're through.
Getting into Rio was a little surreal. Even through the plane windows you could see the dramatic distinction between poor and rich. Shanties and make-shift buildings almost topple over each other and sprawl into any centimeter of vacant land if gravity won't let them build further up. These almost butt up against three story houses with pools and manicured gardens.
Took the shuttle bus into Botafogo where my hostel is located with another Melbournian Jess who’d done the same flight routine as me, dropped off my stuff and continued on to hers. But it's so hot in Rio the sweat doesn't have time to bead on your skin it just leaves a sticky residue and so hot that the exertion of carrying a pack 500m made my new friend almost pass out on the train. After a bit of a rest literally at the side of the platform as hundreds of commuters shuffled past, we made it to her hostel and grabbed bathers for a trip to Copa - Copacabana.
Copacabana is exactly what i would have expected, large stretch of sand, beautiful people and lots of coconut stands. But the water was filthy; i can't decide whether it's more green or black. Struggling with the Jetlag, we wandered back to through Copacabana searching for food. We stumbled upon a tiny little restaurant called Aratca. We pulled up a chair and peopled watched. Ordered a Shrimp curry and chicken hot pot. Both were delicious! The shrimp curry was almost Thai styled, coconut, little bit of lime, absolutely delicious, big fat grains of rice. Such a good start to my expectations of Brazilian food.
Headed back to Botafogo and stopped off at a local bar for a beer, this by the way is excellent, really light and refreshing, perfect for the constant heat. Not even at night to you get much of a respite. Jess and i fought with ourselves about whether to go out, (It is Rio after all) but as we had a big 5 nights ahead of us, trying to get past some of the jetlag would be a good idea.
Friday 12/02/2010
First full day in Rio... excited. First stop... Sugarloaf for the view of Rio!
The drivers are crazy here, not enough traffic lights mean that you constantly have to play chicken with up to three lanes of oncoming traffic. I swear Brazilian drivers don't know how to use the break, you never know whether they're just going to keep on driving straight through you. Took the two stage cable cars and the whole landscape of Rio opened up to us. Botafogo, in front, Central and Lapa to the North, Copacabana and Ipanema with their long stretches of beach down to the south, and the amazing scene of Christ directly in front. Standing with his arms outstretched to the sprawling city beneath. The landscape of Rio is striking, long flat beaches butt up against the sheer cliff faces of the mountains that surround. Beautiful houses with pools contrast with the sprawling favelas that cling to the side of the mountains. With the breeze taking us away from the heat below and the view I think I could have stayed up there all day.
We headed out into the centre of the city looking to get to suburb of Santa Teresa, just our luck, the trams weren't working. But it meant we had more time to explore Centro. We came across and amazing Cathedral, 4 huge glasses stained windows that met at the top of the conical church to make a cross. The silence in there was such a nice rest from the buzz of the rest of Rio. Heading back towards the station we found ourselves in Lapa, the notorious party zone, where there were stalls set up and a huge stage, all in preparation for the start of Carnival. If we couldn’t be part of the official Carnival we were determined to at least act like a local and get something to make us stand out. Heather headdresses it was.
Back into the city we got changed and we had dinner at the local bar near my hostel. Dinner was great, good beer with a huge plate of fried manioc root, which is like potato but sort of softer and with a more fibrous texture, grilled beef and delicious chorizo. I think i could really get used to this...
We headed back out into Lapa where there were thousands of people all standing in the square overlooking the arcs of Lapa, we got ourselves a strawberry daiquiri from a vendor ($6R = 2.75 AUS) which were so potent i think i spent the next hour trying to get it down. Not sure the vodka was the mixer or the soda... We had all intentions of heading around the party but quickly made friends with the locals and spent the entire night chatting. Before we knew it was 4.30 and the party was rapidly dying. Great start to Carnival.
Saturday13/02/2010
Rio’s Hottest summer in 20 years, in a 12 bed dorm with one fan and no windows = sleepless night. Not even the 5am bedtime meant that sleep could continue longer than 9am... At least I wasn’t as my nanna would say, "wasting the day in bed". I caught the metro down to Copacabana to meet the girls for a beach day. Two days In Rio meant I got a little cocky about my navigational skills… Walking in the vague direction in wanted to go in may not have lead me straight to their hostel but it did mean I bumped into at least two random neighborhood street parties! Speakers on trucks, people drinking Skol at 11 in the morning, guys dressed in diapers... Carnival is everywhere! Tearing myself away from the people watching I finally made it to the hostel, for a bit of beach action, we wandered along Copacabana towards Ipanema in search of the street parties we’d heard of (and I do mean hours here...). We walked onto Ipanema just as the sun was about to set. It was stunning! The crowd that had gathered on the rocks actually cheered as the sun met the water. Ipanema is so much nicer than Copacabana, the water was clearer and calmer, the stretch of burning hot sand between the pavement and water shorter to run across and the lifeguards... well... enough said. After an hour of wandering along the main pavement stopping at all of the stalls and gawking at the get ups of some of the partiers we walked into the backstreets of Ipanema. Again, randomly we stumbled into a huge street party. Thousands of people crowded into this one street, dancing on top of each other, guys having to dance with each other... no wait, that’s wasn’t due to lack of girls.. One of the many gay parties in Ipanema that night. We were jammed in like Sardines, shoving wouldn’t do anything, bodies sticking to each other in the 35C heat and 80% humidity, what felt like half an hour later we finally made it though, luckily all intact, this time. A quick freshen up and we were off back to Lapa to see how the street party was going that night. We caught the Metro and literally just walked out of Carioca station and found ourselves in the middle of an armature Samba parade, hundreds of dancers, drummers and street floats coming down the main street, with no security to keep us back. We jumped straight in and started dancing with the locals. Rachel’s samba attempt so good that she had a local teenager try to do a samba off with her. Then had one of the drummers give her his costume to put on while we all danced down the street to the heavy drum beat. Honestly, one of the best five minutes of my whole Rio stays... Samba schools kept coming, with floats and elaborate costumes. The dancing was infectious. Our plans of getting into Lapa were superseded by the overwhelming need to stay and party till the wee hours of the morning. Hours later we made it back on the metro and back into the safe bed of the hostel, only 4.30am not too late... I can sleep in...
Sunday 14/02/2010
Again 5 hours sleep and out again, another stop off at Copacabana for a juice and yoghurt, sombrero in hand. (Learning to protect, the suns not as bad as back home but the burning is starting...). Rio is inundated with juice bars, sandwich bars and one of my favorites, natural yoghurt bars. Choose your own fresh fruit toppings on an enormous serve of frozen natural yoghurt. Yum! Yet another dose of people watching at Copacabana beach. I think really equal parts people watching and bikini fashion critiquing... Not that there’s much to assess... After asking a local the night before why the water at Copacabana was so green and having the go ahead (apparently the pollution isn’t at harmful levels...i’ll believe that...) I went in. The water was rough, dirty and super salty. Needless to say I didn’t stay very long. We headed back for a shower just in time for the pickup... Hangliding! We jumped in the back of an open air truck and drove through Rio to Leblom. Hours of waiting at the beach followed. Brazilians are so relaxed it can be frustrating, whether it’s waiting 20 mins for them to slowly cut the lime to make your Caprihina or in this case 2 hours to take you up the mountain for a 10 minute Hang Gliding ride, there’s just no rush. But then again, why rush when you can spend your time waiting relaxing at the beach I guess. Eventually we were taken up into lush rainforest to await our jump. We watched each one of us nervously put on our overalls and be strapped in. I watch Priyah jump off with a ˙eahhh!" I wasn’t nervous at all until our one line of instructions were given, when running off the side of the cliff "just don’t stop!”. What happens if I stop!! “Just don’t”... OK. It was my turn, focused on keeping my legs moving, running towards the launch pad (which is literally a 5 meter squared wooden deck angled towards the earth below) my legs came up from underneath me and I was in the air! We glided through the air as I tried to enjoy every second of it. I was honestly one of the best things I’ve done, the view was incredible!
We all met at the bottom, exchanged stories and grabbed a beer for the ride back. Somehow, only in Carnival of course... we drove straight into the middle of an Ipanema street party. Music blaring, huge surging crowds and 7 Gringos in the back of an open air truck meant party. All of the locals started calling out to us, trying to get us to dance, and sing along to the music. That’s what I’ve loved about Carnival so far, everything has been so unexpected, so much bigger and inclusive.
Big day, bigger night. We headed back to Ipanema with the hopes of searching out a Samba club, but yet again the Lapa street party lured us in. The beats of the open air performances, the Carprihina stalls and the excitement of the crowd kept us there until the wee hours of the morning. Even a speedy cab ride home didn’t save us from seeing the sun rise.
Monday 15/02/2010
Exhausted from the night before, I spent the day wandering around Botafogo and reading by the beach... such a hard life really. After, a couple of drinks, some card games and a huge meal I headed in to meet up with the girls near the Sambadrome. It was incredible, thousands of samba dancers slowly making their way up the walkway, surrounded by 60,000 spectators all cheering and sambaing in the stands. The floats are so elaborate, not just the detail of the costumes but the mechanics that go behind them. My favourite was definitely a tiger that not only snarled and tried to grab the dancers in front but also blinked! Each samba school takes 1.5hours to show the audience the best of their technique and style. We got there at 12 and didn’t leave til 5am, but it was still going…
On the way back there were dancers from the night trying to sell off their costumes, so tempting but I wasn’t sure how they’d get into my backpack…
Tuesday 16/02/2010
Today was the favela tour. I felt really voyeuristic in principle doing this tour. We were taken into the slums of Rio to see how the poor side of Rio lives. At first I felt like the rich kid who wanted to feel like they were giving back to the community for just a second, but the whole time we were there people were really warm to us. I suppose they’d gotten used to it by now. Having hoards or tourist walking through their lives. I felt a little better knowing that the money we paid for the tour trickled down to the community itself. The bike ride we took up (scariest ride ever!) The bike was really comfortable but as I’ve said before... Rio drivers are crazy. This tiny probably 200CC bike loaded up with two people, zipping around tight corners with overcoming traffic, overtaking enormous buses, first time I’ve been scared on a bike. . Walking down through the favela it was amazing to see how all of the houses are just extended one on top of another, up and up. Tiny walkways function as main streets with shops lining them.
After the tour, I quickly changed and headed off again... last day of Carnival! We were determined to make it to a Samba club this time. So yet again emboldened by the first Caprihina of the night we headed off into Lapa. We managed for the first time not to get distracted by the partying in Lapa and got to Scenarium... only we hadn’t heeded the advice, huge line... A little bit of distraction and some cheeky maneuvering and we were in the line. I was honestly a little disappointed… Scenarium is meant to be the best samba club in Rio (the 100 people in the line outside should testify) but none of us were feeling it. The beat wasn’t consistent, almost impossible to dance to. But it was a really cute club. Heaps of kitsch furniture literally nailed to the walls, and a really old school feel. We made the best of it but I think we were all more excited by the popcorn man waiting out the front than anything else.
Wednesday 17/02/2010
Today I was off to meet Christ… Relatively early night (4.30am) and i was finally up in time for breakfast at the hostel... mm... more cheese and bread.. never thought I’d be craving vegemite so quickly...
We caught the bus up to Christ leaving us plenty of time to get up and back in time for the Soccer... hmm... maybe not with the entire tourist population swarming on it. We bought a ticket and nearly two hours later we were chugging up the mountain in a little train, we had exactly 20mins to sightsee and get back on the train to go back down. The doors opened and we bolted. Up the flights of stairs and into the crowds posing in front of Christ, obligatory crucifixion pose, check. Back down the stairs and onto the train. Not exactly how I’d pictured seeing the most famous of Rio’s landmarks but honestly, the number of people up there was claustrophobic, I think another ten mins and I would have been done anyway. We jumped in a cab and were back in Copacabana in no time. Perfect for our footy pick up. Basically the entire hostel was coming to the match tonight so we had a minivan to ourselves. After a sneaky beer on the bus (maybe not so sneaky, I’m not sure if there are any restrictions at all about alcohol in public) we were all in good spirits until the constant stopping and back tracking at possibly every one of Rios hostels made the bus ride time to catch up on much needed sleep. Once we got to Maracana stadium though the enthusiasm of the crowd was enough to bring anyone back to life. It was crazy! Every time the ball got close to the goal, the entire crowd would jump up and scream, waving banners and singing. , the Botafogo supporters even had flares they’d shoot off, I kept expecting someone to catch alight. It was a great night... Not just because Botafogo beat Flamengo in the last few mins.
Thursday 18/02/2010
My last day in Rio, a little sad to go actually. I walked around Copacabana in the morning. It was the first drizzly day in Brazil and I wasn’t surprised to see that the beach was basically deserted. A few fanatics doing their exercise, but no swarms of umbrellas and people selling their wares or posers making for good people watching.
Headed over to Santa Maria, the bohemian precinct of Rio. We took the little yellow cable car up the hill and jumped off at the top. Santa Teresa used to be the affluent area or Rio so there are hundreds or elaborate mansions overlooking the centre of town. Strolled back down through the cute facades of the houses and into what felt like 100 hippy shops and back down.
My final must see of Rio was sadly completely commercial... The steps of lapa, where Pharell and Snoop Dog shot Beautiful. A little wandering though the dodgy part of town and we found them. Just needed to again follow the gringos around. Some gangster poses (obviously not pulled off by me) later we headed off to Botafogo for a final dinner in Rio.
Again we found ourselves with Obama and a plate full of meat and Manioc Root chips followed with beer. Spent the night talking with Pina Coladas... why I’d never really discovered them before I’ll never know. Delicious. I said goodbye to the girls and we headed off.
