Our days in Brazil are almost numbered - we booked a flight heading to Cartagena, Colombia this Saturday. We wish we could spend more time here but unfortunately this country is killing our budget. Brazil is not cheap! We've tried to balance being somewhat frugal with not wanting to miss out on cultural experiences like seeing the Christo statue over Rio (over US $50), or going to a soccer game at the famous Maracaña stadium (also $50) and getting to yell VAMO...

We have an exciting end to our homestay to report. After being left with a messy kitchen and no keys of our own, we decided to strike out for greener pastures on Monday. We'd had the song Copacabana in our heads since we got to Brazil so that's the first place we tried. The good news is we found a fantastic hostel with our own kitchen and super friendly front desk staff that speak English. The bad news is that our homestay was not especially supportive of our dec...