How surreal! This morning we visited Christ the Redeemer.
We were picked up from our hotel at 8am and made our way through some pretty heavy traffic in night rider. Our journey eventually stopped at the train station, where an electric train would ferry us up to one of the most famous statues in the world.
As we got off the bus, Fernando's parting words to us, thank goodness it's not raining. Now at work we have this thing, do not mention the quiet word, because as soon as you do all hell erupts and it ends up being really busy. Well, Fernando put the mozza on us.... as no sooner had the words left his mouth, did the rain start to lightly fall. I wasn't going to let the rain ruin my experience. I was here, and I was going to make the most of it.
We received our tickets from Fernando, and boarded the 2 carriage electric train. It was a short trip up the mountain, through beautiful green mountain sides. Occasionally we would come across a road coiling up the side of the mountain, or a house with large gates protecting it. We also occasionally stopped so that the train driver could get out and manually adjust the train tracks to ensure that we continued on our pathway up the mountain, rather than descend back down again.
We arrived at the station at the top of the mountain and amazingly the rain had stopped. We walked out and started to climb the stairs. You could take the elevator with 100 other people if you wanted, however we decided that the stairs would be completely fine for us. As we ascended the first flight of stairs we emerged from the shelter of the station, revealing the large landing and the most amazing view of Rio, and it's surrounding forest. What I failed to do was turn around.... Because as I did go to climb the next flight of stairs, I looked up and saw the back of Christ the Redeemer, towering metres above me. Wow it was so close, I just wasn't expecting it.
So I quickly climbed the remaining flights of stairs and headed around the corner to see the front of the statue. Oh yes, this was everything I thought it would be and more. We then became the pap, snapping photos left, right and centre. Me and along with a thousand other people. I'm glad we did get there early, as it wasn't too busy. But the longer we stayed there, the more trains arrived, bringing more and more people. We did manage to get some great photos, however space soon became hard, and getting a photo with just you and the statue became impossible. People were pushy and disrespectful of other peoples photos which was sad. But we got all the photos we wanted or could get, and it was soon time to depart. We caught the train back down the mountain side, and climbed back on to night rider again.
We continued on our down town tour, and visited a cathedral, which I wasn't quite expecting to be as modern and boxy as it was. Looking from the outside, I was very underwhelmed. It looked like a concrete jungle. We then made our way inside the cathedral.... and I was pleasantly surprised. The stain glass windows were amazing. There were 4 stain glass windows extending from floor to ceiling, surrounding the round structure, all coming together in a cross on the ceiling. It was gorgeous to have the light filter through these windows.
It was soon back on the bus, and we were taken to a jewellery manufacturer, who use the precious gems of Brazil. These included emeralds, aquamarine, topaz etc, all of which were mined in Brazil. It wasn't compulsory, however most of us were interested in just seeing the process of making the jewellery. We knew there would be a time when the hard sell would come, however we all know how to say no. So we start the tour, and it is a well oiled operation. Greeted, we then walked through a huge display room filled with the precious stones, in it's raw stage, and then after it has been cut and polished.
We then moved on to the manufacturing side of things, where we were issued headsets and listened to the audio guided tour on how the gems are processed, the jewellery designed, the setting of the gems into the jewellery to the final product. It soon began to feel like a trip to ikea. The only way out was to go through the entire store. We made it through the hard sell quite easily (without any purchases) and finally released from the business. They offered us a private car transfer back to the hotel, however we decided to walk and get some lunch.
We walked down to Ipanema beach and walked along the boulevard back towards the hotel. It was a lot more pleasant today, as the wind was absent as was the sand lashing. The beach was fairly empty today, I think mostly because the temperatures were in the low 20's, it was overcast and the waves were huge and absolutely pounding the beach. The only ones braving the surf today was the surfers.
We continued up the mountain towards the hotel, and couldn't believe how much traffic there was heading towards the hotel. Wow, it's early for peak hour. Half way up, we then realised that it was due to a broken down combie van. A police motor bike came flying up the hill, sirens on.... He then extended one of his legs and started to accelerate his motorbike pushing the van up the hill. He did get a little angry when he initially tried to start pushing. He was revving his bike, but the combie wasn't going anywhere. He then said something in Portuguese... Next thing the driver (who was on the phone) quickly reached down to release the hand brake... Yep that would help. So they slowly made their way up the hill, and then out of no where a whole heap of construction workers appeared to help out and they started to help push the van up the hill. Blockage cleared, the traffic began to flow again!!!
Back at the hotel, Michelle's laundromat re-opened for business today. Washing done, it was time to get ready for dinner.
With a slight delay of half an hour, due to our bus being stuck in traffic, we eventually made our way to dinner. Tonight we headed to a churrascaria restaurant for a meat fest. Now this is not a restaurant for vegetarians. The waiters walk around with hunks of cooked meat on skewers. If you decide that you would like some of that particular meat, they will gladly slice off some for you and place it on your plate. For the entire 1.5 hrs, the waiters continually walked around the entire time with so many different types of meat on offer. All the meat that I selected was cooked beautifully. Once we were gorged full on meat, we left the restaurant, and made a quick trip across town to head off to a samba show.
This show was amazing and stunning. The costumes were fantastic, the dancers gorgeous and it was just a really fun night out!! The show depicted the history of samba in Brazil, and ended with a taste of what carnival would be like. It actually makes me want to head to carnival in the future!!
With the show drawing to an end, so was the evening. It was time to sadly head back to the hotel in order to get some beauty sleep before tomorrow's escapades!!