Rio in a nutshell

So we love Rio, but it really does stink, the carnival has finished and it still stinks of rubbish, not so much wee anymore. Might be something to do with the incredible heat out here mixed with rubbish!

Getting food is also proving difficult with the language barrier. After 30 mins the waiter finally came over and we ordered a pizza and a bottle of coke, the coke turned up straight away. After 80 mins of waiting for the pizza we finally decided to give up on it and left without paying for anything. Wasted time but a free bottle of coke at least!


We had a look at the step thingies, I forget the name but they are in the Snoop Dogg video `Beautiful`. Dead colourful and are the setting for some quality nightlife. Everyone just sits all over them and drinks away chatting to anyone and everyone. Got a free shot off some old drunken chap who was introduced to us by one of the hostel staff we went out with, not sure I would have accepted that if the hostel dude didn`t know him!






The sambadrome was something else! We were recommended to arrive there early to get a good seat (by good seat, it was just on concrete steps which were super uncomfy). So we got there about 7 and grabbed a seat, and waited for over 3 hours for it to start. It was defo worth the wait though. You`ve never seen anything like it in your life! So noisy, so colourful, everyone in the stands partying. Seems like the whole of Rio is just one big party! Well, it is carnival! And check out the guy who was standing in front of us!

Over the next few days we checked out sugar loaf mountain and the Christ Redeemer. The Christ Redeemer was awesome, had to wait 3 hours to get up there after getting our ticket but again, well worth the wait. The rickety old tram took us up there with some stunning views of the city. The top was unsuprisingly rammed and everyone found it hard to get a photo without having loads of other people in it (hence the random back of a head).

We checked out Sugar Loaf mountain after, had to get there via 2 cable cars, good job we weren`t scared of heights! The view from here was even better than the one at the Christ Redeeemer. We could see the whole city and luckily got up there just before the whole mountain was swallowed in cloud.

We obviously partied whilst here, it is the carnival afterall! After the hostel guy mocked us for being dead pale, we applied some facepaint, the yellow colour didn`t show up hence the mocking. We met some cool people, some Brits, an American and an Aussie here, and we bonded the only way we knew how....drinking games!

We are now heading to an island called Ihla Grande to do some beach chilling and fishing.