Cidade Maravilhosa
Trip Start
Dec 06, 2005
1
27
80
Trip End
Jun 17, 2006
Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Day 1: Arrived in Rio in the afternoon following a long bus ride, checked into hostel, then went straight into the biggest concert I will ever see. The Rolling Stones, live and free, on Copacabana Beach for one night only. Crowd estimates were over 1.2 million. Atmosphere was phenomenal, some people had camped out on the beach all day to get prime standing spots. They put on a great show despite being old bastards! They played on this immense stage set up right on the beach, complete with temporary pedestrian bridge for the Stones to walk across from their hotel
01 Flares at the Maracana
! All the classic songs had the crowd going nuts, and some new ones weren't too bad either.Day 2: Relaxed on some really famous beaches, then went to the largest stadium in the world - the Maracana - to see a futbol match between Botafogo (Rio team) and Nova Iguacu, which was a fairly uninspiring match (1-1 draw) but the atmosphere was wicked. This stadium has once held around 200,000 people, but today only around 20 or 30 thousand went, but we were in the middle of the loudest part of the crowd, chanting, lighting flares, waving massive flags the whole duration of the match. After this I had my best meal so far in Brasil, at an all-you-can-eat buffet with waiters offering to cut you yet another delectable slice of meat off a small sword every couple of minutes!
Day 3: Went hang-gliding! For the first time, I thought what better place to do it than overlooking one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Seriously, it seems that the founders of this city just found one of the most scenic places and plonked a city right in the middle of it. Started hang-gliding from the Tijuca NP, the world's largest urban forest, and flew for at least 25-30 minutes, it was breathtaking. Perfect clear day, cool breezes to carry the glider around, perfect landing on a beach
02 Ipanema Beach
. After this, I went up to the famous Sugar Loaf Mountain, with a few hundred other tourists, but once you get past the fact that every second person speaks english, it's a really beautiful view from the heart of Rio, and the view of the massive Christ the Redeemer statue overlooking the city from above the clouds was great. That night I went out with some guys to see a crazy 20-odd-piece Samba Orchestra. all in crazy costumes, at a venue inside a big-top in a suburb called Lapa. This was heaps of fun and my first real taste of Brasilian music culture in preparation for Carnaval.Day 4: Met a friend downtown and checked out an area called Santa Tereza, by quaint little bumpy tram with people hanging off the sides, being squeezed between the tram and parked vehicles. Also saw the metropolitan Cathedral, which was pretty impressive, not that I'm a big fan of that kind of stuff, but worth the 5 minute visit!! Went out again in the Lapa area to a similar but smaller kind of gig to last night, drank way too many caipirinhas though...which didn't lead to good fortune the next day - Slept in and missed my plane to Salvador. Crap. Luckily I could get on the next one for free so all was good, apart from the large hangover :(
