It is said that the sail into Rio was one of the best in the world, and I would have to agree. We were lucky to have a great clear day and very calm waters to enjoy the view of the coastline. The mountains were jagged and looked like they came straight out of the ocean. The iconic Sugarloaf mountain and Corcovado were hard to miss as we cruised into port. As soon as we docked I hopped on a tour bus and headed straight for Christ the Redeemer, one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. Pretty sure that was everyone else in the whole cities plan also…since it was ridiculously crowded at the top. As we summited to stairs we thought we would be getting skunked in seeing the statue since it is a gamble if the clouds were going to uncover the 30m tall statue. We got lucky that the wind picked up and the clouds blew out the reveal this massive statue on top of the mountain and everyone up top cheered with excitement and immediately started to take selfies. Not going to lie…. I did as well. The view from up there is really incredible. That night we got a group together to go grab some dinner with a friend that Lou had made back in California who is from Rio. It was in a cool little part of town where it seemed all the younger people went and hung out. Our cab ride home was interesting, since no one spoke any Portuguese, but somehow we got back to the ship with out to much hassle. Lou and I made plans to go meet up with Fernando the next day to go have a little beach day since we managed to get some free time. Our cab driver on the way to Fernando’s spoke a little Spanish/English and that was helpful to get us to our location and also confirm that we heard gun shots while passing a Favela. He laughed and pointed his finger in the air and made gun shot noises… Fernando took us a bit north to a less touristy beach much further past the Copacabana and Ipanema crowds. We got some time to body surf, drink some coconuts and just relax. I got some Matte tea from a man that walks around on the beach with two kegs, one sweetened and the other not. All of this was much needed to reset our minds. After some beach time we grabbed a traditional Brazilian lunch we headed back to our floating home to catch the sunset while sailing away. Rio was a very interesting place, it felt like we really just touched the surface of what fun could be had there.
