I woke up tired due to a very short and poor quality sleep. Our stay at this dive began with washing my face with a dirty towel last night. We checked in at 1am, our noisy neighbours, the fluctuation between hot and frigid air due to the a/c blowing directly on us half the night, and when it wasn’t blowing air it was making a hammering sound, the multi-panel blind system that was very ineffective, and climaxed with the second dirty towel after my shower this morning. So at this point in the day, I am pretty set on checking out ASAP.

We were up and out the door after breakfast at 9am with Monica and our driver Leonard. We arrived at the base of the Holy Redeemer and bought tickets for the 10am departure. The funicular took 20 min to get to the top of the 7,010 ft summit. I was surprised to find out that the statue was purchase from France and is a mosaic. The base is 8 m and the statue is 30 m in height with an arm span of over 20 m.

It was super crowded and the clouds impeded our southern view of the city, the area we are staying in and the ocean. We managed to get one or two good pics, peeked into the chapel and headed back down. We saw a couple of monkeys on the return trip, but did not get a good look.

Next stop was Maracana, the football stadium that also hosts major concerts and other events.

We toured the Metropolitan Cathedral which looks like a cooling tower from the outside. It opened in 1976and can hold 20,000 worshippers. Inside it is very bare, but has 4, 60m high stained glass windows, one in each direction that light up the otherwise dark interior. The cross above the alter was unique in that Mary and Joseph surround Jesus on the cross.

We were going in circles for a while. Anita is performing and they are shutting down all the streets to auto traffic. We saw the show of military force that we had heard about on BBC. The gangs are out of control and the senate has requested military assistance to get things under control.

We had lunch near our hotel at at Brazilian BBQ, Churrascari Palace. The salad spread was great and included sushi, sausages, lots of veggies, mushrooms, beans and real cheese - Parmesan, Brie and Blue. The meat was really good, the filet minion, lamb, and brisket were my favourites. We had a good bottle of wine that was very reasonably priced.

After lunch we had a heat and meat induced nap on the way to Sugar Loaf. It was the highlight of the city tour for me. We had great views, there was a nice breeze and even though it was busy, it was not super crowded. Selfie taking has risen to a whole new level here. We saw one woman take at least 50 photos of herself in a 10-15 min span. Also, bikinis are considered regular wardrobe items even while touring, so that has been interesting, but not as exciting as you would expect.

We concluded our day tour at 5pm and I had a much needed nap while a maintenance guy changed the direction of our A/C vents which made a huge difference. We also have new clean towels, so things are looking up.

We went to the rooftop for a couple of drinks and watched the concert at the end of the beach. We arrived during the end of party week after all.

As a great surprise given the late timing of us coming here, we were able to get 2 tickets to the finale of the Carnival parade. We were picked up 25 min late, at 8:40 pm. and then were stuck in traffic for the next 45 min. But, we arrived at Sambodromo on time to see the first parade. They were super cool and the crowds were up singing and dancing the whole time.

The sights and sounds were amazing. The amount of effort and dedication that each team puts into their floats and costumes is unbelievable. Everything was so beautiful and it was clear how much time and energy was put into the concept, the construction, and the costumes.

We were there for 5 hours and saw many schools do either performances with each parade lasting over an hour, then a wait between each for them to get set up. We were ready to stay for one more performance, but our guide texted us to let us know that our transfer was going to expire, so we headed back to the hotel.

We were going to have a nightcap, but the celebrations had ended in our area, so we just headed to bed.

Rio - Whirl Wind Tour