It's been a while since we last blogged so thought we should let people know all's well here in Rio. While winter in Europe seems to be dragging on longer than usual this year, the weather here shows no sign of cooling as autumn approaches. Even when we have spectacular thunder-storms in the night, it's invariably back to 30+ degrees the next day. It may sound wonderful & we don't expect you to feel sorry for us but the heat can be very enervating, day after...

Two preliminary observations - over Carnaval anything goes and Brazilians certainly know how to party! Carnaval kicked off at 8am on friday 8th and it soon became apparent that this was the start of a 24/7 5 day knees-up. Revellers stay up all night and then the first blocos which start at 9am the next morning are well attended, often by the same people.... It's interesting how this year we feel more involved than we did for the first Carnaval holiday. We're far...

Kate's birthday weekend was very special this year. Usually it occurs in the depths of winter - last year's was spent filling in residency forms in a hotel - but this year we headed south to Rio Grande de Sul. We flew into Porto Alegre as Hugo arrived there by bus from Florianopolis. We struggled in the one way system to find the Dan Inn but when we did, found H already checked in. The hotel porter jumped in the car and took me around two blocks to find the hote...

Having cold showers in January is not what I expected to be doing in my 56th year! However, there is nothing better on a hot steamy night in Rio! We've had rain on and off since the family left after Xmas. Pity those many poor souls living in sub-standard housing. Heavy flooding has been a problem in some parts of Rio state but we haven't had that in our part of the city though there was a very large clap of thunder that woke us up in the middle of Friday nig...

How do we best start the Christmas blog when so many folk have sent such nice emails in response to our premptive strike? Perhaps a "thanks to you all" is appropriate and same to those whose cards arrived via Jess. We've had a great Christmas week with all three 'young' ones here - very strange as we are rarely all together for very long these days! Christmas began as always for us with the carol service from King's and the making (and eating!) of mince pies. ...