Rio is fab. Okay, so some might say that we are slightly biased by it being the first step on our honeymoon. But the people are friendly, the landscape is striking and the beaches are lovely.

Granted, the weather is pretty rubbish so no beach lazing so far, but it's pretty smart to be walking along Ipanema and Copacabana beaches without a care. It's been white cloud overhead all the time we've been here which at least means no sunburn. It does also mean no hang-gliding (Mum, you'll be glad about that, I think) which was recommended (and wedding presented) by Jim & Jennie and Clare & Andy. We signed up for it and were due to go at 9am this morning but they called to say the weather was too dodgy - they tried again at 1pm but still not do-able.

So instead we tried to go up Christ the Redeemer but he was covered in cloud too so we went to the Botanics - brilliant. Really chilled out in the middle of the city, with amazing plants.

Of course, when we say ´rubbish weather´, it´s still 24-28 degrees.

Yesterday, we had a successful day - after out beach walk, we went up Sugar Loaf Mountain on a cable car and the views over the city were second-to-none. Looking across the whole city with Christ up on the hill in front of you, beaches to the left and a bay full of posh boats to the right is pretty smart indeed. Especially when you can laze on a lounger supping beer and caipirinhas, enjoying that view.

We then got the bus back to the hostel. Now. The buses. On most foreign trips, it is perfectly normal to be surprised by the way in which people drive. You know, it seems that cabbies in many parts of the world take the job in order to show off how fast they can drive whereas in the UK, they take the job because they really really want someone to talk at all day. That's fine, that we can deal with. But the BUS drivers here are something else. Seriously, they have no setting between 'emergency stop' and 'pedal to the metal'. They have excellent brakes and every surface is padded so that you stand some chance to remaining conscious when you are inevitably sent head-first through the bus while looking for a seat which, I suppose, at least shows joined-up thinking by the bus companies. It's not that the drivers are irrational - they're not, they just have a single-minded desire to move as FAST AS POSSIBLE. They even have a little man sitting behind the driver to take the fares so that the driver can concentrate on accelerating as soon as you have placed a foot on the bus with out being distracted with your money. Suzie sometimes comments that certain small dogs don't realise that they are small and therefore pick fights with massive hounds - these drivers seem to be unaware that they are not driving a rally car. Amazing. And strangly addictive - we've been on four now.

What else... the hostel is really nice (thanks Ricco for the reccommendation) with very helpful and friendly staff. Lots of recommendations of what to do, beer served in the evening, great Ipanema location.

Suzie has been ravaged by mosquito bites. And when Suzie gets bitten, she doesn't just get little red bumps like boring, normal people do. No, she gets MASSIVE WELTS. So far, she's clocked up one on her forehead, one on her left buttock, one on her knee and one on her left
ankle that is so swollen she now has a right ankle but a left cankle and veers to the left when walking, such is the extra weight of the fluid.

As you might have noticed, this blog is rather less a well-structured story and rather more a stream of consciousness. And so it is that we now mention that WE GOT UPGRADED ON THE FLIGHT! Amazing. Politely asked at check in, were told that she couldn't sort it but she'd makea note on the system and maybe we'd get bumped up. Got to the gate, smilingly told them that we'd been told at check in that because it's our honeymoon we might get upgraded... And they took our boarding passes and swapped them for ones twenty rows forward. Okay, so it wasn't the very poshest bit of the plane but it was 'world traveller plus', where a return to rio costs about the same as our round the world ticket and, more importantly, where you get massive seats, loads of legroom, more cabin crew, a section with 3 rows curtained off from
everyone else, posher pillows, big reclining seats with footrests and (the two most surprising bits) massive posh sound-excluding headphones and a complimentary pair of BA socks.

It's even the sort of cabin where the staff are nice to you if you spill a whole glass of red wine over your seat, inevitably staining it and stinking out the whole place.

Or *ahem* we imagine that might be the case. Oops.

Oh, and Angels & Demons is a really, really bad film. We weren't expecting greatness but really, it's a special kind of terrible.

Food news: day 1 in rio, we lunched at a loncheria where they have a buffet of a huge range of hot and cold meals. Perfectly normal until the bit just after you load your plate which involves putting it on scales and being priced per 100g. Perfectly logical, but there's something weird about handing over a plate of hot food for weigh-in. Other food news: the other brazillian form of loncheria is a bar with a glass counter filled with various forms of 'meat in pastry'. And you just stand there munching and browsing the pasty-style options. Amazing.

What else did we do in rio? Well, on the second afternoon it rained.Lots. So we had a nap. Rio is nice but (1) it rained and (2) we were jetlagged and tired post-wedding so maybe we should just go to arelaxing paradise island tomorrow. What's that? We're going to? Oh...