Ok so a bit late in updating this but here goes! 2nd week in Rio was when we moved over to Copacobana staying in a huge hostel in a room of 24 people! As you can guess there was a serious lack of sleep. We hit the beach on out first which wasn´t as nice as impanema but still good. The first night we spent in the bar etting to know everyone that we would spend the next week with.

On the thursday our hostel took us on an all day boat party, all you can eat and drink! Food was terrible but we made the most of the free capirinhas which is Brazils national drink consisting of chucassar, sugar and lime - very strong! The boat stopped in the sea just of the shore and loads of people were jumping in, me and Sian braved the highest tier and jumped with the result of alot of sea water up the nose!! when we ghot back from the boat party it was still evenin so we headed to the bar where an Irish guy betted me 10 Reais I couldn´t eat my lasange in 8 minutes - I won!

On the Friday we headed to the markets of Uruguaiyana which along with clothes and craft stalls had an insane amount of carnial costumes and decorations. The heat was sweltering!! That night we headed back to Lapa with people from the hostel to party in the streets with the locals.

On the saturday after only about an hour in th sun I started to get this bizarre heat rash so i chilled indoors reading in the hammocks while thegirls sun worshipped! Saturday night was our night to shine and parade in the sambadrome in the most ridiculous of costumes.It wasn´t the main parade more like the opening ceromany! We had a samba lesson before had where the only engliah the teach knew was ´shake,shake´and ´very good. i got dragged to the front of the class - no idea if i was sambaring but i was moving my feet! Unfortunately there was a mix up with the outfits meaning sian couldnt parade - not such a bad thing when we learnt we had to take the metro dressed in our outfits - so embarrassing!! The actual parade felt like miles long as we danced down it for 1hr 30mins - so tiring but alot of fun.

The only problem was the costume irritated my heat rash sdo when the girls went out that night I stayed in! And good job I did because over night my hands,feet and face swelled up - not a pretty look. It meant I was out of action on sunday and missed one of the blocos where a road gets closed of and everyone celebrates in the street in the middle of the day! After sunday night I was still poorly so the girls took me to the doctors early monday morning. This was an amusing experience as he said I had had an allergic reaction and then a nurse stabbed somethin in my bum - no idea what it was but it worked!!

I was so happey to be feeling better because that night we were going to see the actual carnaval parade. The top 6 samba schools perform for 1hr 30mins each. It was AMAZING!! Exactly what I expect it to be. carnaval was made for us - so much glitter, colours and amazing floats and costumes. We watched 4 out of the 6 and there was so much energy from the performers. We didnt leave until 5am in the mornin.I would definately recommend everyone seeing it. Celebrations are atually 24/7!!

Have just been in sau paulo for a few days to catch up on sleep and prepare for Argentina - which we are now in!!!!! So exciting.