Carnaval in Rio - Brazil Part I

Hello.  I'm Audrey.  I feel that it is, perhaps, appropriate to re-introduce myself after such a long hiatus.  It's been a busy second half of the year, full of lots of fun, but with little time for documenting it.  I'm happy to say that I'm sitting at my desk in a quiet classroom with all my grades and comments turned in!  Javier and I have are in the last week of school and then we're boarding a plane for HOME!

But since I'm done with work and still have this week of school...I thought I could use this time to catch you up and finish documenting our South American adventures before our arrival in the USofA.  Starting with an amazing trip we took back in February to RIO!!  We were not only excited for visiting Brazil, but to see JESSICA and BRIDGET who agreed that a trip to the city of Carnival was well worth the effort!

I'll preface my posts with some advice regarding any potential trips to Rio.  If you are interested in visiting Rio because of Carnival, thae by all means, GO!  Rio will not disappoint.  I have never seen such a party in my life.  However, if you are interested in visiting Rio and happened to be considering going during Carnival...I would caution you.  Rio is 100% Carnival during the festival.  During the day.  In the evenings.  On the beach.  In the city.  Everywhere.  All the time.  It was certainly entertaining, but did mean that we missed out on some of the tourist attractions that were closed for the festival party.  That said, we still had an absolutely AWESOME time!

We landed early in the morning after an all night flight and met the ladies after their similar journey.  We decided that a good start to our visit would include a walk through the city's botanical gardens.  The complex was huge and truly gorgeous!

Check out those lily pads.

Busts and bushes

There are some toucans living in the gardens!!

We found a large orchid house.

Truly beautiful.

Lots of different colors!

There were lots of bromelias too, including this pineapple plant!

Check out this bamboo.  It is insane.  You can see how large it is when you notice Jess casually walking by it on the left.

Beautiful tree-lined paths.

Our first evening, we headed to a typical Brazilian steakhouse to celebrate Jess' upcoming birthday!  I can't believe I didn't capture any photos, but as many of you have probably experienced, waiters continued to travel around with skewer after skewer of meat to offer our table.  We tried them all.

The next day we planned to do some sightseeing on our own.  We mapped a route that would take us through downtown and to the Escadaria Selaron.  The Carnival party was raging here as well, but we waited for a quiet moment to snap our pic along the beautifully tiled stairs.  Some of our other stops were shortened a bit after several museums, churches, and libraries were closed for Carnival.

Our evening activity was on though...a Carnival parade at the Sambodromo!  The parade is actually a competition between several samba schools that bring out their best dancers and costumes for the Carnival celebration.  Our tickets were not cheap, but guaranteed us a view of the elaborate floats as they passed by on the private street.  We bought some flare and headed out into the crowds at 8pm.  The parade started late and was scheduled to go through the night. *Cue my old lady shocked face*

That glowing line above the big lights is Christ the Redeemer looking down on the debauchery city. 

Here we are, bedecked in our own Carnival décor and enjoying the colorful floats!

The costumes and floats were unimaginable.  So colorful and either very large (i.e. the sun skirts above) or very tiny...

I tried to include some pictures here to give you a feel for the celebration.  These are alligator surfers.  Duh.

Beach balls!

If you tilt your head to the left you can see that I'm trying to give you a view of the length of the Sambadrome.  We were towards the beginning of the road, so as you looked down, the path appeared like a long stretched out rainbow.

This dragon periodically opened his mouth to breath fire and smoke!

This float was blowing bubbles.

This soccer ball would deflate and then inflate...

complete with a soccer player dancer on top!

This float had swings!!

The performers in this group would come scurrying out of the whales mouth to do their little routine and then return whence they came.

At 3am I decided we needed to start documenting the hour to prove that we old folks party animals were making it!

What South American party could be complete without a conquistador...(and half-naked native women...)

They speak for themselves...

Javier was too cool for 4 am.

Eagle

But everyone is pumped for 5am!

As we were heading out we found this costumed fella and decided he was picture worthy.  We were also interviewed by a report about Zika virus.  I'll save you the story, but let's just say that my 5am answers were not stellar.

This photo was taken to document both: 1) that we made it home safe and sound and 2) stayed awake until 6am...all. night. long.

Shockingly, we slept in a bit the next day and enjoyed an expensive lunch before continuing our sightseeing.  Believe it or not, our group decided to spend the afternoon hiking to Christ the Redeemer.  Along the hike we ran into a band of monkeys.  

The hike was TOUGH.  Including this portion that required the climber to hold on to the chains attached to these large rocks and hoist themselves up along the path.  TOUGH.

But Christ the Redeemer was pretty darn cool.

As were the views of the city and beaches. Javier noted several times how unique Rio is in its land diversity: ocean, moutains, city...all in one!

And stretched out below us, it was pretty gorgeous.

A bit red faced, but happy to have accomplished our hike!

After the quiet hike (we did not pass that many people) it was a surprise to fine the monument bussling with tourists.  It was difficult to grab a photo without including a mass of strangers in your photo!

The hike up was quite an experience, but with the sun setting, we decided to take the tram down off the mountain.  The setting sun made for some beautiful pictures on the way down.

Just gorgeous.

We rushed to the beach to try to catch some of the last bit of light that was hitting the sky.  Not a bad look for Copacabana Beach.

For out last evening, we decided to go out and enjoy some of the street parties that were so prevalent in the city for Carnival.  Food, drink, and music abound.

I think we were most struck by the dichotomy of the city: sandy beaches rushed upon towering mountains; sweltering cement streets next to luscious gardens; and gorgeous homes and apartments only a block away from favelas.  The people were happy and the food was delicious.  We would definitely recommend a visit to Rio if you are considering one (but again...maybe not during Carnival).  But Rio wasn't the end of our Rio adventure: next stop was Ilha Grande and our own island paradise.