Last friday was a holiday -Independence day - so we'd booked ourselves a weekend away. Hugo had spotted the place in one of our travel guides while he was here so we have him to thank for what was a stunning weekend. It's an eco bird lodge between Teresopolis and Novo Friburgo about 2 hours from Rio, on a large estate belonging to a British Brazilian and his Argentinian wife. We travelled by coach and hadn't prebooked our tickets so queued with the world and his...

What do we do on weekends in Rio? Last one - August Bank Holiday in the UK, was rather quiet. On Saturday we went into Centro and the Banco de Brasil for the Anthony Gormley retrospective. Seeing his work here is like having an old friend turning up unannounced at the party - Angel of the North, Event Horizon, Hayward Gallery, Stavanger Beach - and now Rio. The appearance of building-top metal mannekins signalled we had come to the right place. The interior - ...

After our successful weekend in Salvador we had a good and bad start to the week in Rio. The 'luxury' airport bus back to Zona Sul had provided a classic example of Brazil's lack of organisational skills that we mentioned in our last blog. Chaos at the bus stop with people getting onto the bus with big suitcases and seating themselves at the back only to have to carry them to the front when they wanted to get off and negotiate not just the people standing in the ...

This blog will have two parts: Patrick's field trip to Bahia and our weekend in Salvador. This is quite appropriate as when you say "Bahia" the large state has two very different aspects: the vast interior plain is barren, barren and harsh - whereas Salvador is lively, colourful and a wonderful historical centre to visit. Patrick's field trip out to Morro de Chapeu to the Irece Basin - named after the town in its centre - provided a great opportunity to experien...

I thought this week's blog should have an Olympics photo - this is of Tom and Ruth's 3 girls, Lilian(16), Leah(15) & Molly(12). They live & go to school in Hackney, close to the Olympic site and are lucky enough to have been to several events. Lilian was chosen from her school to be a 'young ambassador' for the games (I think thats what it's called) and I'm sure all 3 girls will remember this summer for the rest of their lives. Having everything we get t...