Rio de Janerio- Day one

We arrived in Rio at 8 o´clock this morning, immigration was a nightmare, then the geezer in the booth laughed at Cailin´s passport picture - she wasn´t pleased!

cable car fight.

Then we walked out into sweltering heat to a man holding a card saying "Mr Ireland". Sweeeeet. His name was Wilson, his english was better than mine, and when he was a kid, he used to hang about with Rednecks in Texas. We liked him immediately. By 11 this man had us hiking up a mountain. We didn´t like him any more. Also we were partnered up with a South African couple who i don´t think were human - they didn´t even break a sweat!! Sugarloaf mountain is the big pointy one in the bay. You take a cable car up to it (the same one from Moonraker wer* 007 and Jaws have a fight on the roof) and from the top you can see practically all of Rio. The hike up to the first mountain nearly killed us, but it was certainly worth it. After that Wilson took us on a little tour of Rio; Copacobana & Impanema beaches, futher south of the city, and then we went for lunch. We drank something called Ahsieed (which came out the same as it went in), then it was off to the Botanical Gardens. They weren´t as good as Belfasts (Aye right!) but worth seeing.

Our street in Rio!

Wilson dropped us back off at the hostel which was very nice. The staff included 3 beautiful, young, nubile, dark, sexy Brazilian girls who worked on reception. So I was happy. The men who worked there looked like Hobbits. So Cal was happy too. That night we went out for something to eat. After looking at a few places, we decided that our Portuguese wasn´t good enough to order, so ended up in a McDonalds type place. I never considered the fact there might be a place actually worse that McDonalds, but I was proved wrong. One bonus is that we got our recommended yearly allowance of salt from our small portion of chips. Back to the hostal were Cal decided to be grumpy and sleepy, then pass out. I can´t wait for the rest of the Dwarves to appear.

View from Sugarloaf

*NB Cal and I just argued for 5 minutes about how to spell in this case. She thinks it´s where, and I can see where she´s coming from, but I think it´s were because I´m refering to the fight itself rather than the place it happened. We´ve come to the conclusion that wer would be best (even though it´s not a word at all) as it saves possibly months of arguing.