The bus to Rio left at 9pm (Eastern time) and I slept amazingly well, except for one time in the night when a rather nice looking military policeman boarded our bus and apparently spent a good few minutes trying to wake Alex up, who was then instructed to wake me up... again taking another few minutes. By the time we were awake the guy across the aisle was in hysterics, and amazingly everyone else in the bus seemed to be wide awake, chairs upright and lights on!

Whole day sitting on the bus and looking out the window. The highlight was passing through Sao Paulo, which is a huge metropolis of buildings and people picnic-ing on traffic islands. From there to Rio we were two of three people left on the bus and the journey seemed to go on forever. We got stuck in traffic entering the city and saw (I kid you not) at least 10 broken down vehicles on the way to the rodoviaria. The bus wa scheduled to arrive at 7pm, and at around 9:30 or so we finally got our first view of Christo Rendentor. We had arrived!

The rodoviaria is notoriously located in a seriously dodgy end of town, so we tried to look sharp and awake to get a taxi to Ipanema. Luckily our taxi driver was lovely, and we driver under Christo and along the inland lagoon behind Ipanema, finally arriving at a hostel. Because we had not had our rest day in Campo Grande as planned, we had had absolutely no opportunity to book a hostel. The first one we went to was fully booked and although she directed us to another hostel (which we couldn´t find), we then did what we really didn´t want to be doing late at night in Rio, we had to walk along the streets as complete targets with our backpacks on, trying to find somewhere with a space. Amazingly we were really lucky, and found a sweet hostel in a little mews that had 2 spare beds as a couple hadn´t turned up. After 32 hours travelling, this made us very happy!

Day 12 - this hostel is amazing. Free breakfast and a load of nice friendly travellers (something we were having a dearth of so far). Here we met Sam, an ex-squaddie from London who was quite a character, and still very drunk. Our favourite quote of his was when he was looking through his wad of Reals and said ´I keep thinking I´ve got loads of money but it´s all f***ing twos´! Unfortunately the hostel is booked up for the rest of our time in Rio, so we spent at least an hour picking the brains of Chris, the owner, and the rest of the morning was taken up with ´business´, like finding a new hostel (we got a cheaper one in the same mews but without the same loveliness as the first), getting money without being mugged (if you believe all you read), buying our onward bus tickets and also some cheap flat shoes to wear out tonight. With all the business finally done, it was time for the beach.

Ipanema beach is something of a spectacle. It was absolutely rammed with sunbathers in thongs / speedos, beach vendors, people playing the football equivalent of volleyball and surfers. I took my book but my afternoon was happily spent people watching. The only downside is that the waves were too big to swim, so a paddle would have to do.

Once the sun had gone behind the buildings (which was quite early at around 5pm), we went back to the hostel and did the best with what we had in terms of looking presentable to go out. Then caught a bus to Lapa and found a totally happening street full of open air bars and people everywhere. We had 2 x Brazilian dinners where one would have sufficed (or still been too much), a beer and our first caiprinha of the night (evidently not our last) and then made our way across Lapa to the Rio Scenarium, which is apparently the place to go on a Saturday. We got in the queue and then got asked for ID. s***. We had brought the absolute minimum out with us, but I don´t suppose they were too bothered as getting in was the easiest blag I´ve done in a long time. Inside was totally unexpected - light, with tables and chairs and antique decor much like a museum. There was also a stage with a samba band playing. A bit bemused we went and got a caiprinha from the smallest barman I´ve ever seen and tried to learn samba from the masters. At 3am the band finished, but don´t worry an even bigger band came on. We got back to our hostel around 6am, just as it was about to get light.

Day 13 - Morning was (of course) a write off as we slept until 1:30pm. We then went to the restaurant next door for a well-needed per-kilo buffet lunch. At 4pm we got picked up to go to a football match - a local derby between Botafogo and Vasco de Gama. On the shuttle bus we were reunited with Anna, the Irish girl who we met coming back from the Pantanal... she had flown to Rio - slacker! The game was at the Maracana stadium, which is where the World Cup and Olympics will be primarily held. It has just undergone rennovation, so we were lucky to see it. At the game we bought a beer (hair of the dog) and found that it was 0% alcohol. We hoped the placebo effect might work, but we couldn´t help thinking the beer tasted funny. The game was brilliant - incredibly skillful football, amazing atmosphere from the (very very very passionate crowd) and lots of goals. The final score was 2-3 to Botafogo, further solidifying their position at the top of the league.

Back at Ipanema we found a great local ´lanches´(snacks) place for a sandwich. Then back to bed!

Day 14 - 2nd semaniversary. We got up early today as we had lots of sights to see and only 2 days left to do it, starting with Christo. Unfortunately we were greeted by overcast weather so we needed to rethink and rearrange. Got a breakfast of toast, cheese and the most enormous piece of cake and arranged to go on a favela tour instead of any attractions that require views. The tour was really interesting and we walked 2km from top to bottom through the rabbit warren of streets. The favela is called Rocinha and is the biggest ´slum´ in South America, with I think around 69 thousand residents. The favelas have been pacified a lot in recent years, and we found it relatively friendly, although drug dealers still operate there a lot. I was quite surprised to see the level of infrastructure that the favela had - much more than some rural areas in Asia. While we were there it rained like hell and we returned to Ipanema totally drenched.

In the afternoon we caught the bus back to Lapa and had a picnic on the steps of the Cathedral, which is really modern and looks a bit like an Inca temple. Then spent the afternoon walking around the Centro area, looking at the baroque churches, plazas and office buildings. We also saw the Lapa steps, which are famous for a Chilean artist spending years decorating them with tiles from around the world. As hard as we tried we could not find one from Hereford. We also saw our first arrest - some topless man handcuffed and crouched in the corner up against a wall for everyone to crowd around. Then caught the metro to Copacabana, which was fun because I got through the ticket gates and Alex couldn´t, and as I was waiting for her to sort it out lots of other people also asked me how to do it. My transport skills must have been obvious. So we walked along Copacabana beach and watched a bit of football as it was getting dark. Back in Ipanema I devoured a load of chicken skewers (plus rice + beans + chips + manioc powder). I stayed up online for a bit and when I went to bed Alex was fast asleep in the only blanket the hostel could provide. I then spent the rest of the night freezing cold and at one point, even wrapped myself in my towel.

Day 15 - Up at 7am - absolutely knackered, but it´s ok because today the sun is shining! Christo is our first priority, so we hopped on a bus and found ourselves surrounded by other tourists, who seemed to me very aggressive. When we arrived at the cog rail station some of them actually ran to the ticket office. Forget different nationalities and cultures, the most annoying people in the world are other tourists. Obviously I enjoyed the cog railway a lot, and He was pretty amazing too. The views from the top were incredible.

We said bye to Him and got in a taxi to Santa Teresa, which is an old area of town on a hill overlooking Centro and Lapa. We had lunch in a restaurant called Miniero and this time ordered one dish between two. It was still too much. Walked it off around Santa Teresa and followed the Bondinho tracks down to Lapa. The bondinho was the tram, which the locals were obviously very proud of. It´s not in service at the moment, but I think some new company is looking to take it over.

Back in Lapa we got another taxi to the Sugar Loaf in Urca. We decided to walk up to the first station and on the way saw a couple of tiny monkeys! At the top we rewarded ourselves with a dolce do leite magnum and then got the cable car over to sugarloaf. The views were impressive, but as we were there we could see a weather front coming in... we were lucky to get there before it. As we headed back down we bumped in Irish Anna (again) and Koos, a dutch guy who was also at the football, and the favela tour! Unfortunately I don´t imagine the views were going to be as good for them as they were for us!

Caught the bus back to Ipanema, which was the longest and most round-about bus ride ever, confirming that we have, in fact, seen every area / street in Rio by the time we left. Walked along Ipanema beach a bit and then (rather shamefully) went to Starbucks and bought 2 cups of english breakfast tea! Our bus to Ouro Preto didn´t depart until 11:30pm, so we had a few hours to kill still. We went back to our first hostel (which felt like home and is currently in the lead in our accommodation ranking system), ate cheese and crisp sandwiches and hang out until it was time to leave.

The bus to Ouro Preto was less decadent than all others to date, and we both slept pretty badly.