Rio de Janeiro: Part 2

“When are we going to the beach?”. “Can we go to the beach yet?”. “Take me to the beach”.

Relax, dear. Good things come to those in wait. And wait we most certainly can.

Admittedly it took me a while during my 2015/16 travels to understand both in notion and reality that time works differently when you’re in a travel bubble. Besides, I think she’s forgotten that the UK isn’t particularly welcoming of us right now just like other South American visitors and neither is it easy to move on due to the ever growing and varying requirements list each country is imposing.

When I first hinted that we could likely be in Rio for a couple of weeks, she wasn’t sure how to take it. I later understood that she’d always thought it to be expensive down here but having proven it doesn’t have to be, I’m hoping now she can now fully embrace her second week.

As you can imagine, it’s looking harder and harder to look to move on from Brazil so we are taking it day by day. Yes, we’re enjoying ourselves but it also feels like we’re ‘winging it’ a bit as we don’t know what is next. Like, legitimately we honestly have no idea whatsoever the plan is for next week. A first for me. Stay tuned and wish us luck in the week ahead…

We’ve been out in full force this weekend folks. Oddly, for a city such as this, a city that I assumed “never sleeps” – well it does. On Saturday, the streets were so deserted we honestly thought to ourselves the city was in tier 1 lockdown and that we’d missed the memo!”. But no, normal for a Saturday apparently.

Remember that aqueduct from last week? I did track down the tram I saw cruising along above it and discovered they named it after my Mother, Santa Teresa 🙂 Even a semi-tourist tram tram is yet to bring us an encounter with another English speaking person and we’re at one month and counting!

Estação de Bondes de Santa Teresa

A strange but enjoyable experience this was, the tram. Strange in the sense random cars can just be parked blocking the road/rail track and enjoyable in the sense this offered wind in your hair relaxation and the chance to stop off to grab views like this!

On Sunday we visited a museum intriguingly named The Museum of Tomorrow (Museu do Amanhã). We sat through a short 3D “immersive experience” showcasing space and time, which I’d seen before back home so I was accepting of the Portuguese-only commentary as gracefully as I could.

It’s a cracking looking building though and it offered some great views of the bay.

And lastly we got to see one of the natural focal points, albeit from a distance. Sugarloaf mountain. To get from Rio Centro to a neighbouring district such as Botafogo or Urca that offers the following scenery on its doorstep as backdrop was approximately £1 one-way (for two people) via Uber. We actually walked back and it took us, excluding a refreshment stop, 40 minutes that was largely in the shade.

I think that confident look above to Sugarloaf mountain in the distance is a hint. Time for us to take on that beast.

In fact, we write to you from the Botafogo district having now moved here earlier on from downtown. Botafogo happens to be bang in the middle of Sugarloaf and Christ the Redeemer that are situated east and west of here respectively and in relatively short distance. Definitely a great spot to have come to also backed up by initial observations of the area being pleasant with the streets cleaner, it’s less busy, the buildings offer more character and variety. Even the pigeons look in better health and have an airs and graces vibe about them. #poshbirds

Prices are slightly higher although bargains can still be found. We are currently in a hostel, private room, though it’s nothing to rave about. £15 per night is agreeable (although no breakfast).

Vivi has hinted she’ll get a post out in this next week so stay tuned folks.

That, then, means less of this then Vivi-Voo…. 🙂