We had a good flight, I managed to sleep a few hours. Although Scott did not! We landed at 5.45am in Brazil!! Still can't believe we are here! How exciting!

We got off the plane, again dizzy and light headed. Not used to having this much oxygen running through our blood again!

We had to walk absolutely miles to security but went straight through fairly quickly, we were a late disappointed with the boring passport stamp, you would expect an animal or flower at least! Not just a boring box.

Our bags came out she's apart, there was a little heart palpitation waiting for my bag to come out, I must say! I deep down hate that part but never show it to Scott because he's a nervous wreck collecting bags aswell! Haha.

We got a few tips of Nikki and Jess from when they were here before the Peru trip, they said to not bother with the taxi stands in the airport and go for the yellow and blue stripe taxis outside because they were cheaper. I looked online before had aswell which said the same.

We jumped in a taxi, it was so quiet. There were very few travellers coming through which surprised me because I thought it would be a busy airport almost 247.

There was tonnes of traffic on the roads for 6.30am! Good really because we got to see the sights, our driver pointed at things and told us the name in Portuguese but we didn't always understand, we just nodded and smiled and acted as though we knew.

I'm going to struggle with Portuguese, I thought they spoke Spanish here! There's me saying 'Ola' and 'Gracias' and they're probably thinking what the hell is she on about!

We got to the hotel super early considering check in was at 3pm! We thought we would be able to just dump our bags and have a quick change of clothes to go out for the day but the man at reception helped us out a little and checked us in right away! How amazing!!

Scott couldn't wait to have a nap and I couldn't wait to have a hot shower! The bathroom even had a hairdryer - Lush!

We chilled in the room and freshened up until about 10am, the girls also gave us a tip about downloading the 'Uber' app. It's a cheaper way of getting a taxi I guess? They used it everywhere and recommended it.

So, we booked an Uber to the Sugar Loaf mountain, it arrived within 10 minutes and we car shared with a young woman that was also going to the Mountains.

Along the way we drove right the way across Copacabana beach, it was such a good looking beach! With the separate road for bicycles next to the road for cars. The sea was blue, there were loads of people playing volleyball and others setting out their drink stalls, paradise!

Although, we did see a little too much skin than we had hoped; And it also came from the wrong age group of people! Mainly retired, a few mid 50s who enjoy walking around in a thong bikini... or jogging in a thong bikini! Yup, it just gets better! They lunge whilst playing volleyball too! Oh it's all wrong, all entirely wrong... and it's way too early to be stomaching that stuff!

We arrived at he cable car ticket booth, there weren't many people about, I think we may have beaten the crowds. We went straight up in a huge 65 person cable car to the first mountain. The view was spectacular! We were seeing the landmarks, the landscape that makes Rio famous! It was awesome!


The views were awesome! We just sat there and enjoyed he view, we could see copacabana, the Christ redeemer, it was crazy! We were actually here! And s*** was it hot... like 35 degree with no clouds hot! In December.

We watched a few planes going into the small airport just down from the mountain, they come in at super sharp angles and for a few moments we were always thinking that they weren't going to make it onto the airport runway but into the big building next to it!

After the mountains we went over to Copacabana beach and had some lunch and a much deserved chilled beer each! We watched the word go by and enjoyed a game of 's***head' with the cards. It was nice to watch the world go by, even though a few wobbly backsides in high waisted thongs wobbled passed. It really was not great! All the best bums were covered up! Work that one out?

We walked the length of Copacabana, enjoyed some of the buskers playing salsa music along the way but we didn't show that much interest in case they chased us down the street for money.

Everyone kept going on about how Rio is so unsafe and that we wouldn't be able to walk down the street regardless of whether or not it was night or day. It's so crap! You feel safe, you don't get hassled as much as you do else where to buy fake goods or give begets money, they let you do your own thing which is nice. I'm not saying I wouldn't kept all my cameras out at once or leave anything hanging around. I'm always super careful with everything and keep my eye open for anything suspicious but I didn't feel I needed to.

We walked right the way across over to our hotel and enjoyed the views again. I don't find it fair that the retired here in Brazil or South America get Rio De Janeiro and it's lovely beaches to retire on and we have Benidorm and Magaluf to retire at. How unfair is that!!

We got back to the hotel for about 2pm and had another beer (Bohemia) we stayed by the pool for the rest of the day and fell in and out of sleep all
Afternoon. We have such a good view from the hotel aswell, we could see the Christ Redeemer!

After few deep sleep naps, hell of a lot of dipping in the pool and a lot of sun cream layered on we went down to the room at 6.30. Scott found the football match that was playing on ESPN channel and I pottered about and showered - as you do!

I did sit on the bed and oh my god was that a beautiful bed to lie on! Your head sinks into the pillows! I'm definitely going into a coma tonight when I sleep on that bed!! Plus another good thing - its king size so Scott's snoring will be further away from me! Bonus!

There are a few good restaurants on our street so we didn't go far, we went to a Mexican bar and had some grub, I had a shrimp Cesar salad in a tortilla which was yummy! Scott had a pasta dish with broccoli and sundries tomatoes in it, etc.

It is so much more expensive here than it is in Peru, wowza!



Hotel - Golden Tulip Ipanema Plaza