This morning I met my small amazon tour group of 5 for breakfast, and what a delicious buffet breakfast it was too!!! Soon this little group of 5 will no longer be..... as this afternoon our group of 5 will increase in numbers to 40. So we made the most of it whilst we could!!
We decided that as a group we would walk down to Leblon in search of a shopping centre and supermarket. We were all feeling a bit vulnerable after yesterday being left with no food. Essentially none of us had eaten after breakfast, the exception being the tiniest roll you almost needed a microscope to find. So we thought we all should at least have some small snack just in case, this would be our back up plan!!
I was waiting for the gang in the foyer, when all of a sudden I see a man wearing a Globus pin.... Here we go. This is either a very enthusiastic Globus tour group member..... or our tour director/dictator.
It was our tour director. I introduced myself to him, and he was like 'oh, thank goodness I met up with you before everyone else is here. Now Globus would like to sincerely apologise for having to change your pre-accommodation hotel in Manaus at such short notice and would therefore like to refund you the money for one of your optional tours that you paid for!' After I finished cleaning my ears out with my fingers, I happily accepted the money back. Shocked, but super stoked!!!
The gang arrived and also introduce themselves to Fernando our tour director. We chatted quickly about how much we loved the amazon and Marko our guide, and then we made tracks. We headed down the mountain, using a pathway that follows the shore line. The pathway at times was elevated boardwalks, other times suspension bridge. We stopped occasionally to take photos along the way, as the scenes were so stunning. Just looking at the shanty town behind the hotel, lodged high up on the mountain side, it is easy to tell that you are in a foreign country. Beaches we have in Australia, but shanty towns high up on hills, that we don't!! There is something gorgeous about the shanty towns though. Many would not agree, however I think that they are something to look at and appreciate.
We walked through town, looking for shopping centres and a supermarket. We walked for quite a while, not really finding much. So I asked someone in Spanish where to find a supermarket, and the lady happily pointed us in the right direction. Finally we found the supermarket and we bought the goods that we needed. The muesli bar however we picked up, we promptly put back down again when we realised that the $5 (US) wasn't for the entire box, rather just one.
Eventually we also found a shopping centre, casually picking up a new pair of thongs for Rob, who was about to have a blow out on his old pair!! We then decided to walk back to the hotel all the way along the beach. That will be a nice way to head back to the hotel. The sun was shining, the waves were crashing, and the views along the beach were just stunning. So we start walking along the boulevard, and by this stage the wind has really picked up. It was blowing our hair around, as if we were in an 80's film clip with the wind machines. The only difference being that the wind was also carrying with it half a beach worth of sand. Again Mother Nature was teaching us a damn fine lesson. That wind was whipping us, every-time it picked up and the sand lashed us, all I could do was yelp. I could not walk fast enough to get off that beach.
By the time we got back to the course way leading back up the hill I was completely covered in sand. Gees, I'm glad I washed my hair this morning!!
I got back to the hotel, and spent the next hour removing the sand that covered me from head to toe. I felt sorry for the lobby man, he was just sweeping up sand all day long!! He would just finish sweeping the lobby, only having to start again - very similar to the guys that paint the Sydney harbour bridge, once they finish painting it, it's time for them to start again.
At 2pm, it was show time. I was going to meet the other tour group members, all 40 of them. This is going to be very very interesting!!
We all gathered in the lobby.... I soon realised that I was going to be the youngest one by far!! Then out of the corner if my eye I see a guy... Probably a little bit younger than me. Brilliant I'm not the youngest.
We had a pretty boring briefing on what to do, what not to do,what to expect etc. The briefing was made that little bit better and easier by the fact that we were all served up a yummy welcome cocktail!! I think that was the point.... knock us all out with a strong, stiff alcoholic beverage, least amount of resistance that way!! After our briefing was done and dusted, some of us went and grabbed a coffee and waited for our afternoon tour in the lobby bar!!
At 4pm the entire group of 40 were herded onto our private coach. Now this was luxury!! Full leather seats, LED strip lighting, a microphone system that actually works!! We are travelling in style!! The buses name.... black bird. By the way I didn't name it.... it's a huge black coach... I think night rider would have been a lot closer to the truth!!
So we travel along the beach, Fernando was giving us a running commentary on the history of Brazil, the beaches, the music. He even started singing a song for us. I was just waiting for him to start hocking his CD.
We reach our destination. Sugarloaf mountain. The plan, catch 2 cable cars up to the top, which is essentially made up of 2 huge, huge rocks/mountains. The cable car took us to the first rock. It was amazing, the wind was gale force speeds, yet you hardly felt it in the cable car. The only time you did realise the wind was when the cable car was stationary. Just as you were about to step into the cable car, the wind would sometimes pick up and move the cable car slightly, widening the gap that you need to step over. It's a long way down if you miss the step as well!!
Here we are, perched high up above the city of Rio. We got the most astonishing views of Rio, it's beaches and it's port. You can't get a more beautiful view than this... or so I thought. We then caught the second cable car up to the second rock... Holy moly this was the most stunning thing I have ever seen!! The views spectacular!! We walked around the top of the rock, taking photos of the 360 degree views of Rio. By this stage the clouds had descended a little and the sun had started to set. This made the view even more spectacular. At times the bay looked eerie with its low cloud cover, and yet the twinkling of lights across the buildings in Rio looked like thousands of stars shining brightly!! Up on the hill tops were the fevolas, or shanty towns. Down along the beach hotel and apartment complexes hugged the coastline. We stayed up there for about an hour. Photo after photo we took!! The wind though made it quite cold. I was lucky, I had brought my jacket, however other tourists up there weren't so lucky. They must have been caught out, unfortunately spending a lot of time shivering their tooshes off!! The wait for the return cable car rides was quite long, and the cable cars didn't really connect at all. Kind of reminds me of metro, Melbourne's train system.
Eventually we did make it down to the bottom of the mountains, where we all jumped back on our coach and made our way to a restaurant, located on Copacabana beach.
We arrived back at the hotel, where I did my good deed for the day. I helped out a handful of tour group members get their Argentinian reciprocity fee paid and printed out. You can't enter Argentina without this piece of paper, and many people were told by their travel agents that they could just get it at the border - which was wrong. So I helped out a few of my colleagues. Getting them registered and paid wasn't so much of a problem, however when it came to printing the document do you think I could get the damn thing working.... No. Finally I asked the concierge to help. This guy was amazingly sweet. He realised that I was just helping everyone, so he took it upon himself to log everyone on and printout all of their documentation for them. He said to me that he would look after it and that I could retire for the night, if I was comfortable. I made sure everyone was ok if I headed off.... they were more than happy and just super stoked that someone took the time to help them out! Good deed for the day - check!!!