Rio de Janeiro

  Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Tuesday, June 5, 2007

We were in Montevideo, Uruguay and we got bored!!! After working out our finances we  realised that we were beginning to struggle... no bobs left... nada dinero!! Therefore we had to work out our options:

Option 1: Work our way up to Rio de Janeiro by bus from Montevideo.... total journey time on buses.... 38 hours... doesn´t that sound nice!!!!!
Option 2: Go back to Buenos Aires and get a budget airline flight to Rio de Janeiro.... eh... SCORE please!!!

Believe it or not... Option 2 was also the cheaper option.... it was a no brainer really!

So, we went back to our beloved Buenos Aires and spent another 5 days there.... loving it even more. 

We landed in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil on 5th June... let the countdown begin!

Rio was all about building up to the 9th June.... Mike´s 30th Birthday!!!
Once again we rented an apartment. This time we were overlooking the beach.... Copacabana beach!!

19 1st walk on beach..we´ve had no sun in so long!

We did nothing but chill on the beach for the first 3 days. What a beach!!! Everybody here is exercising, its incredible. On the beach there are volleyball courts, football pitches, exercise areas, running tracks... Inchadoney beach has a long way to go to reach these standards!!! The sand is gorgeous... no stones, no shells, no dead fishes, no nappies... lovely!!!

On Copacabana beach you can buy everything and anything from the hawkers that work the beach. You can buy suncream, beer, towels, shrimp sticks, sunglasses all without moving from your spot on the beach. Of course Mike, as he has in EVERY country we´ve been in, got offered drugs, that would be a "no thank you very much."

So... to the big day!
Sarah woke me up at 8am....
     Sarah: "Get up, my love, I´m sending you to jump off a mountain".
     Mike: "Ok, anything for you, my darling"

35 ´For I´m a jolly good fella...yipeee!´

One hour later and sure enough I was jumping off the side of a mountain... hang-gliding over the city of Rio de Janeiro..... AWWWEESOME!!!! I flew out over the sea for a bit before eventually landing on the beach..."Like how flamin cool is that."
So, what next! Next thing I knew we were in a taxi going to the world famous "Maracana Stadium". Sarah´s plan was to buy tickets to a game for Sunday... sure enough we got the tickets but we also had our scariest travelling moment.... EVER!!!!!!!

We had just bought our tickets and were heading back to Copacabana via the underground system. We came into the worst and scariest moment in all our travels...ever!!! We basically came the closest EVER to being mugged. There were 2 guys... it was either flight or fight..... the plan was to corner us but we split up...confused them...they got cold feet & split...Thank God+ !! So, that was the next adrenaline rush for the day!! Phew! Get us back to Cork!!

58 wooo hooo What a cool way to start my b-day!

Anyways, we got our tickets to go and watch Fluminense vs Sporting Recife in the Maracana!! Cool!!! The rest of Saturday was spent chiling, drinking beer on the beach. We then went to a really cool restaurant and had a fantastic meal in the famous area of Ipanema!!! Sunday rolled around and we made our way to the stadium for the match!! We both have been to many sporting occasion but NOTHING will ever be like this. It was absolute mayhem!!!! Fluminense had just won the Brazilian Cup Final and the fans were in party mood. They were singing from 2 hours before the game and they were still singing in the tunnels after the game! To top it off the team won 3-0 so the excitement and the buzz was amazing! At times, the atmosphere was more enthralling than the actual game... a really awesome birthday was had!

So.... lets wrap this one up guys....

The final entry to follow .....final??....mmmmm??!!