On 23rd September we were headed for the final destination of our travels - Rio de Janeiro! After our usual complex combination of various smelly buses and taxis from Puerto Iguazu, through Foz du Iguazu on the Brazilian border (where we suddenly were unable to communicate at all in the Portuguese language, whilst failing and probably offending in our attempt to continue using our Spanish), we arrived in Rio over 24 hours later after taking our very last bus journey thank god; we must have spent a month alone on various buses!! We checked in to 'Chez Michel', a guesthouse in a gated cobbled street just a few minutes walk from the renowned Copacabana beach. Slightly apprehensive having read mixed reviews on the rather full-on owner, 'Michel' himself, we arrived to a warm welcome from him, his first question being 'you do drink alcohol don't you...well you are English", and the promise of the Brazilian national cocktail "caipirinha" later. That afternoon we went for another Brazilian special; eat and pay by the kilo - a large varied buffet of meats and sides you pile on your plate, and then pay an amount based on the weight of your plate at the end...a dangerous concept for Trevor! After a quick look at the amazing panorama that was the Copacabana Beach stretching as far as the eye could see, we took our very last washing load into a laundrette with heavy hearts, and headed back to our hostel for caipirinhas with Michel. The caparinha is a cocktail made from 45% Cachaca alcohol, sugar, ice and lime juice (we're not sure you can call it a cocktail without a mixer can you?!) After a fair few of these intoxicating drinks, strange conversation with Michel about his travels and various women along the way, plus the company of Michel's extremely old and decrepit looking French poodle which seemed on the verge of imminent death, tired we stumbled up to our room, slightly inebriated with alcohol but counteracted by Michel's leftovers from dinner that he randomly offered us

Next morning we had somehow managed to get away with a clear head, and after cooking ourselves some fried eggs on toast headed out to the subway on a mission to tick our third and final Wonder of the World for this trip off our list; Christ the Redeemer. Having caught the subway to Largo do Machado Square in the city, we bought tickets which included a mini-van bus to take us up to the statue and bring us down, and also our entry to see the wonder. The mini-van wound its' way up to the top of Corcovado Mountain, around slightly hairy bends and drops on a long cobble-stoned road, until we reached the top where we strangely rode an actual lift and then an escalator(?!) up the very last ascent. On arrival at the statue, Sophie once again decided it didn't look as big as she thought it would; the statue alone isn't the grandest in the world and it's age isn't as great as other wonders, but we could both appreciate how iconic it has become, especially as seen from the city below and it's catholic population. We quickly got the stress of the obligatory photos in front of Christ the Redeemer out of the way, trying to avoid getting as many people as possible in the background, before we started to take in the enormity of the wonder, and the amazing views from this vantage point. We had impressive views over the city of Rio, the beautiful stretches of golden beach, the harbour and out to sugar-loaf mountain, all obscured with a slight haze of smog. After spending a while soaking up the cityscape below we made our way back down, pleased with how easy it had all been, with very little energy left for this kind of thing by now! After spending the day browsing the shops for some more gifts and souvenirs, we celebrated our 3 year anniversary that evening by typically going out for food, to 'Carretaos', an all you can eat churrascaria buffet. The churrascaria is famous in Brazil as a place where meat is cooked in 'churrasco' or bbq style. While we helped ourselves to an enormous varied salad and sides bar, waiters would then come round with various skewers of meat fresh off the bbq to slice a cut off at each table and we'd either accept or not (we always accepted)! We even had a little disc on our table which said 'more please' or 'I'm full' in Portuguese so the waiters would know whether to make the meat-laden visit to your table or not. The meat tasted delicious although not quite so refined as we'd had back in Argentina...however after some wine and pudding also, we were well and truly stuffed once again and rolled ourselves back to the hostel where we were caught by Michel and forced to have a few more drinks before bed...

Unfortunately we both woke up with stomach cramps the next morning which persisted through most of the day!! However, our spirits were enormously buoyed by the fact that we were off to stay at our luxury hotel - a treat we had booked whilst in Bolivia for our last few days of travelling. After packing all our belongings up in our hostel we caught a taxi to the 5 star Miramar Hotel, directly across from Copacabana Beach. On arrival we lugged our scruffy backpacks into the air-con reception, dressed in our equally scruffy clothes before we were met by bell boys who we reluctantly let help us. Upon arrival at the reception desk we received a glass of champagne before retrieving the key for our room. We took the lift up, feeling pretty out of place, leaving our luggage with the bell boy to bring up, and checked into the most spacious, clean room we'd seen in a year, with an enormous bed, a TV, an amazing bathroom and a sea view! The bell-boy soon arrived with our skanky bags and explained everything in the room, after which we spent the rest of the day relaxing on the bed watching Wales beat England in the rugby world cup much to Trevor's delight. Late afternoon we got a knock on the door from the housekeepers delivering what we would soon realise was a nightly box of 4 chocolates for us (amazing)!! and then another knock later on revealed a small bottle of champagne and chocolate truffles as a gift for our lie of being there at the end of our honeymoon - result! We had the most amazing sleep that night in a bed which felt like it was made of marshmallows it was so comfy; a far cry from some of the flea ridden pits we had been unfortunate enough to frequent over the last 12 months...and that was when we had a bed for the night!

Up at 7am the next morning our illness had seemed to disappear and we were downstairs ready to try the hotel breakfast, which had received hundreds of amazing reviews online and which we'd been looking forward to for months! It did not disappoint...after being shown to our table Sophie tucked into an enormous variety of cereal, juice, fresh fruit, cooked breakfast and cakes, while Trevor went repeatedly up for more bacon, eggs and sausages, avoiding most of the healthy options. The service was excellent, our table being freshly cleared and our cutlery replaced whilst we were at the buffet, in some kind of seamless display from the waiters! We spent most of the day at our rooftop infinity swimming pool with stunning views of Copacabana beach below, sunbathing and drinking cocktails, pretending to fit in with the other rich people, which was quite difficult with Trevor sporting faded and worn swimming shorts he'd bought back in India. The city itself exhibited parallels to Mumbai; there was a shocking mix of rich and poor visible in the area - looking forward were the 'rich and beautiful' on the beach, whilst looking back a couple of hundred metres were favelas scattered across the hillside - the poor of the city. On return to the room we discovered we were slightly on the pink side...success! Later that day we visited the bohemic 'Ferria Market' which was full of the usual tat, and then a small shop with handmade pottery (we do love a good pottery shop) made by ingidenous groups living in the Amazonas (the heartland of South America's mighty Amazon rainforest). Here we bought a gift and some souvenirs because we love to carry as much breakable stuff in our luggage as possible. That evening we had dinner in the posh hotel restaurant where we had steak and sea-bass. Although far from fussy by this point on our travels, Sophie discovered a long hair and tiny piece of plastic in her meal. After sending the dish back and getting a whole fresh one, the main was also taken off the main bill so we treated ourselves to dessert as well...and of course tucked into the free chocolates that had been popped on our pillows whilst we were out!

Next morning we were up early again to tuck into breakfast and then wandered down to the beach, but with it starting to rain we soon gave up watching the hawkers scampering around with all types of goods to sell people, along with the guys working out in their scarily tiny shorts, and retreated back to the hotel. That afternoon we went on a Havaiana flip flop hunt, which cost about a tenth of the price in Brazil than back home. Having had orders from home we ended up buying 8 pairs in total and were certainly going to have to leave some of our scrubby old clothes behind to fit everything in our backpacks! Next on our whirlwind tourist list of things to do was to try 'acai sorbet' - the super fruit becoming very popular around the world. It tasted extremely healthy i.e. plain and left our mouths a deep purple colour! That evening we wrapped our Arentinian wine bottles in all sorts of paper and clothing to try and get them home in one piece in our main luggage, and had dinner at the hotel once again feeling completely exhausted having stopped our usual rushing around for just a few days, and it all seeming to catch up on us.

29th September, and the very last day of our round the world travels! After stuffing ourselves on our amazing breakfast once more we packed our numerous over-filled bags as best as we could for the final time and wandered around the area whiling away the time until 6pm when we caught a taxi to the airport. Staying at the 5-star hotel had been an amazing treat after the far less luxurious accommodation we had spent most of our travels in, and had allowed us to have a few days of relaxation at the end of a manic year, before returning home. Sitting at the airport it still didn't feel real that we were about to fly home after a year away; it felt like travelling was ingrained in us and part of normal life. We were so excited to see our families, including a new addition, but it was all a rather surreal feeling that the day had finally arrived. It was exciting to be checking in at the British Airways desk for the flight to 'London' - a flight we'd seen at so many airports and sometimes wished we were getting on for a quick visit home, but inevitably were always boarding the tiniest tin can standing on the runway instead! In the departures lounge we got chatting to some very strange, obnoxious guy from England, now apparently leading a life of luxury in Brazil, who was telling us about "Downtown Dave", an alcoholic man he vaguely knew that he could see in the departure lounge. Sitting down on our gigantic plane, who should be sitting directly in front of us but Downtown Dave, drunk as a skunk! Shortly after takeoff, Dave became extremely loud and rowdy, being aggressive and verbally abusive to one of the air hostesses when she refused to serve him more alcohol. Instead his girlfriend ordered alcohol and he secretly drunk it (not so secretly as Sophie saw and dobbed him in). Finally he fell into a drunken stupor and we could actually enjoy the rest of our flight home, passing the hours watching various films, eating and drinking and catching naps here and there. We had taken off a little late as the captain was testing one of the engines (a horrifying statement for Sophie). After about 10 hours in the air we finally approached the southern coast of Britain, the most green landscape we had seen for a while, and had to circle Heathrow for another half an hour to wait for a landing space. We eventually landed and welcomed the familiarity of English soil, where it was particularly strange hearing English accented announcements over the tannoy, and expecting rain and gloom we were surprised to see the sun shining and it was actually quite warm! After going through passport control with no staff welcoming us back excitedly much to Trevor's disappointment, we collected our luggage which amazingly hadn't gone missing the whole time we were away, observed that there were no obvious liquids leaking out of them, declared our coffee and chocolate at customs which they weren't vaguely bothered about, and then excitedly made our way through to arrivals! As we emerged out through the doors into the arrivals lounge looking like hobos, we could immediately see Sophie's mum and dad waiting there for us, holding up a welcome home sign, and then all of a sudden Sophie's mum was under the barrier and running down the walkway towards us, with her Dad following in a more typically reserved British manner, to embrace us with some emotional hugs! Luckily Sophie's mum wasn't mistaken for a terrorist by airport security and it was nice to receive such a warm welcome home. After much commotion with the airport parking machines not working properly, we were soon driving back through the green Kent countryside and back at Sophie's dads' house where we had left all those months ago, welcomed home with banners outside, and a homemade cake from Sophie's mum. We quickly unpacked our bags with the main priority in mind - success, miraculously all our alcohol and gifts had survived the journey home and were in one piece!

It was strange to say the least to be back after all that time, having a slice of cake and a cup of tea, but we were truly exhausted and glad to be back to see everyone. The year away had been the most amazing trip and we'd stuck it out for the whole year, although at times when Sophie had been face planting jungle floors, or Trevor couldn't move more than 5 metres from a loo, or when we'd been sitting next to an Indian train toilet for 18 hours, we would loved to have gone back home for a while.!

It is difficult for us to end this blog, our story a piece we have worked so hard on for 12 months is over, but all good things must come to an end. We have created the most amazing memories together and been on the best adventure of our lives, we hiked up mountains, hacked our way through jungle, jumped out of planes, trekked through the desert, dived into the depths of the ocean, visited wonders of the world, explored the backstreets of ancient cities and soaked up a diverse range of cultures. We met some fantastic friends along the way, and took over 30,000 photos! We'd had our ups and our down's along the way but it was absolutely everything we had imagined, and at times so much more...we're just not sure we've fulfilled our travel bug just yet...