Parati Wednesday 16th
March
Bought
some postcards from the kiosk in the square for about 10 Reals then looked
round for breakfast. Not many options since most places were still closed at
9.00 am. One place in the main street close to where I am staying promotes its
"Acai" Looked it up on the web and found several articles about it
such as http://www.frombraziltoyou.org/acai-bowl-acai-na-tigela/
It
sounded good: “quick, energy-boosting, satiating, and very refreshing Açaí
Bowl… a typical Brazilian dish ….made from frozen açaí pulp that is blended and
sweetened with guaraná syrup until obtaining a smoothie-like consistency. Then,
it is topped with banana slices (and/or other fruits) and granola. It is often
consumed either at breakfast time”
The
pictures looked pretty so I ordered an acai and coffee, 26 Reals. What flavour
acai did I want? I hadn’t realised it came in different flavours but chocolate
sounded good so went for that. The coffee arrived in a couple of minutes and
was fine. The Acai took a long while to arrive and when it did it was
enormous. OK you should try everything
once. The Acai I got was incredibly sweet, with chocolate ice cream, loads of
fresh cream, chocolate flavoured "dust", multi-coloured "smarties"
and lots of sweet purple gooey stuff. I’m sure it provided enough calories for
the day but I couldn’t finish it. It didn’t bear any resemblance to the glowing
reports on the web. Headed back to Jo's,
picked up my stuff, checked out and off
to the bus station for the 1050 Costa Verde bus
which left at 1055.
The
bus is only half full but think it must pick up more people later because there
weren't many window seats available when I booked it. The coastline continues
to be spectacular. On one side sandy coves offshore islands and rocky
promontories where the mountains reach down to the sea, on the other side
thickly forested slopes reaching up into the clouds. And then rather incongruously
a Nuclear Power Plant (Central Nuclear Almirante Álvaro Alberto) which has a
dormitory town of Praia Brava close by
where we drive round but pick up no passengers.
Praia Brava is a bleak settlement of several hundred identical concrete
terraced houses but it does have a pretty beach.
At
a larger town, Angra Dos Reis, which seems to be Costa Verde’s base, we switch
to another, virtually identical, Mercedes bus at the Costa Verde garage, before
stopping to pick up people at the bus station.
Mercedes seem to have sewn up the Brazilian long distance bus market; every
one I have been on has been a Mercedes Marco Polo. Apparently it is a joint
venture between Mercedes-Benz and Brazilian coach builder Marcopolo. We continue
along the coast but the weather turns wet and the cloud comes down to cover all
but the bottom of the forest slopes; there is a reason it's called rain forest.
Stop at some services for 20 minutes.
Later
we enter the outskirts of Rio which look pretty grim, two and three story
residential buildings thrown up and crammed in as tight as possible, industrial
premises and overhead freeways. The image isn't helped by the heavy rain.
Reminds me a bit of Manila. When you see a Subway or McDonalds they stand out by looking
so much better than their surroundings. I was rather surprised to see ships on
our left shortly before we pulled into the bus station, since the coast has
been on our right for almost the whole journey but later when I look at the map
I can see that the bus station is on the north facing shore of Rio. At the bus
station there are four taxi counters but none of them wants to take me to
Copacabana. Each of them is pointing to what I think is one of the others.
There is an information desk where the guy recommends one particular taxi desk
but the guy there points me out the door. One helpful young woman shows me to
the taxi queue outside. I think Rio is like Singapore, taxis dissolve in the
rain. There is a long queue, luckily under cover, and few taxis. It's a long boring
wait for a taxi, over half an hour. Looking at the map on my phone I can see
there is a metro station about a km away and if it wasn't pouring with rain I'd
probably head for it. Strange that the Rio metro connects with neither the airport
nor the main bus station. Waiting in the taxi queue couldn’t help noticing
dozens of weird, almost sinister, birds with very angular wings soaring
overhead. Found out later that they are Frigate birds and an icon of Rio.
Eventually
I get to the front of the queue and into a taxi. Just as we leave the bus
station I can see about ten, brand new, black and white trams parked in two
rows but showing zero activity. Suspect the trams were delivered before the
lines were completed. According to the taxi driver, Google estimates the
journey will take 40 minutes. Traffic is crawling and however much the driver
curses other drivers, pedestrians and possibly God himself, however much he
weaves from one lane to another we don't make any faster progress. The journey
takes an hour but the last 20 minutes are enlivened by his watching a Barcelona
vs Arsenal football match on his other phone and he gives me a running
commentary; Arsenal lost. But finally we arrive, Google delivered, and the fare
comes to well under the 60 Reals I give him; He earned it. Check in at the
Ibis, get a map and remember to get my free beer this time. Find that
Churasscuria Palace, which gets a good review on Trip Advisor is just round the
corner so head there for dinner. The place is packed but the maître d' tells me
he should have a table soon, and after about ten minutes I'm in. It is obviously
very tourist oriented; all the waiters speak English and I can here American
voices from nearby tables. It's a fixed price with an excellent open buffet
but, following Trip Advisor's suggestion, I avoid over indulgence since the
real treat comes with the selections of meat served off long skewers by waiters
at the table. Various cuts of mostly beef and lamb, all tender, juicy and
delicious, a carnivore's delight. It's probably my most expensive dinner at 155
Reals including a beer and service but definitely memorable. Plus the restaurant
was founded in 1951, a vintage year; maybe I should have asked for a discount. The
restaurant is close to the Copacabana Palace Piano Bar which is recommended in www.theculturetrip.com The hotel looks
suitably sumptuous and the bar was elegant, refined and really rather boring; think
the pianist got bored too since he went for a rest after about ten minutes. Only
two other guys drinking there and discussing some sort of business in English. Went
for a walk along Copacabana promenade which is very pleasant, relaxed and cool
after the rain.
Thursday 17th
March
Breakfast
at the Ibis was pretty good value at 19 Reals and better than most. Walked down
to the beach which is long and wide, so although there are lots of people, it
doesn't look too crowded. All along the promenade are small beach cafes and
there are even subterranean changing rooms and toilets; all very civilised. On
the other side of the road are hotels including the Copacabana Palace which
looks to be the most prestigious. (US$500 a night according to Trip Advisor) Copacabana
is a different world from downtown Sao Paulo or probably Rio. Definitely a
place devoted to hedonism. Years ago I would probably have been very sniffy
about it but think I've become quite decadent in my old age. Only when I got
half way down the beach was I able to make out the distinctive shape of
Sugarloaf Mountain behind me. Rio has many of these dramatic outcrops; which I
found out are “granite domes” and I found a useful explanation of their
formation:
 |
| Copacabana Palace |
 |
| Copacabana Beach |
Near
the far end of the beach I found the camera repair place I had identified
through Google, hidden away upstairs above a clothes shop. The guy didn't speak
much English but we made ourselves understood and he agreed to examine it and
let me know at 4 pm this afternoon.
From
there I continued to Ipanema beach which is fairly similar to Copacabana, a long
wide beach of golden sand fronted by big hotels. Think both beaches became
world famous through the power of popular songs. From Ipanema I continued on to
Lebon, another upmarket area, which has a large shopping mall where I was
hoping to buy a pocket sized camera, hopeful that my Nikon can be repaired
eventually even if not here. Found the shopping mall but no shops selling
cameras apart from one strange shop which sold all sorts of oddities and which
had just two cameras for sale at much more than I wanted to pay. Searched the
mall from top to bottom; nothing, nada, zilch. Time for a cup of coffee and a
chocolate cookie. Walked up to another mall shown on the map, the Lagoon, at
the side of the lake behind Ipanema beach. But the Lagoon is mainly restaurants
not shops. Headed back towards the camera repair place by which time it was
raining quite heavily. I wasn’t too surprised when the guy told me it could
only be repaired by a Nikon authorised service centre and gave him the price of
a beer for his effort.
In
the evening I had a "media" Pizza Margherita at a little restaurant
close to the Ibis. The pizza came in only two sizes “media” and “grande”. It
was quite good but I could only manage3/4 of it. Thought I would have a glass
of wine for a change but the Sao Victoire red wine was disgusting. When I
visited the winery near Santiago I was thinking that now wine making is a
science rather than an art, downright bad wine is a thing of the past; I was
wrong. This stuff was BAD. Not like
any wine I have ever tasted before. Was it even wine, or grape juice mixed with
industrial alcohol? First time ever I have not been able to finish a glass. Later
Googled “bad wine” and found many articles describing the flavours exhibited by
wine that has spoilt in various ways but none of them matched this stuff.
Looking
at the bill I read that it was described as “suave” literally “smooth”.
Googling that brought me to an interesting article which explained everything,
in Portuguese but what’s Google for if not to translate?
Apparently
in Brazil you can describe just about anything as “wine”
Some
excerpts:
“The annoying is that most
of the time, when the label of Brazilian wine says "soft" in fact you
mean "sweet" with grape juice smell - there, my friend, is not wine”
...
“My father lives in Louveira
and repeatedly took me to visit "wineries" that produce wines that
most have in your mix alcohol and sugar.”
“Much of what is produced in
Brazil with the generic title of Mild Wine is only deception: wine is made from
grapes no grapes. His trademark is that unmistakable aroma of grape juice -
nothing farther of a wine,… “
Decided
to stick to beer, which was a good decision, since close to the Churasscuria
Palace was a bar “Mud Bug” celebrating St Patrick’s day. There was a lively
crowd in there and an energetic band.
Rio Friday
18th March
There
is a shopping mall near Botafogo metro station, which is only one stop, but there
is a granite dome in the way and I don't know if it is possible, or safe, to
walk through the road tunnel. The Metro works well with a flat fare of 3.70.
Almost immediately inside the mall there is a shop selling all manner of
things, various electronic items, toys and curiosities but they do have three
cameras, a DSLR and two compact cameras a Nikon and a Sony. Looked all around
the rest of the mall but couldn’t find anything else. But there was a great view from the top of the Mall. There are shops selling
home electronics, appliances, computers, home entertainment etc. but no cameras,
except for GoPros.
 |
| Not many shoping malls have a view like this |
According to the map there is a shopping mall called Rio
Plaza but it seems to have transformed itself into a home furnishings centre.
Further south I find Rio Sul but no cameras there either. Head back to Botafogo
and the first shop I saw. Sales guy doesn't speak English but I get to play
with both the Nikon and Sony. The Nikon is cheaper at about 550 Reals compared
with the Sony at 800 but the Sony has an 8x optical zoom compared with 5x on
the Nikon. Both have the same nominal 20 M pixel resolution. But the Sony seems
to have more flexibility, menu options very similar to my old one and feels
more solid and substantial. Confirm that it takes standard SD cards. The sales
guy's colleague joins us and confirms that very few shops in Rio sell cameras
these days, except for the Go Pro. If this is a worldwide trend I wonder how
long it will be before Nikon, Cannon Leica go the way of Kodak, at least as far
as their camera operations go. Yes, there are professionals and serious
amateurs but are there enough of them to sustain the business? I am sure there
must be serious photographic shops in Rio but I haven't seen them. Had a coffee and a cake at one of the cafes at the mall. Feeling quite tired by
now, I headed back to the metro spending another 25 Reals on a tee shirt. In
the evening had dinner and a drink at one of the beach side bars. The hamburger
was just OK but it was worth it to enjoy a drink on Copacabana beach. 40?
Saturday 19th
March
After
breakfast, down to the beach where I hired a chair and umbrella for 25 Reals.
The sea isn't quite as warm as SE Asia but once I’m in it feels comfortable. There
are big waves breaking on the beach which can easily knock you over so I didn't
go far out. Walking along the beach are vendors selling drinks, food,
sunglasses and, among other things, bikinis. One guy was carrying a big
umbrella shaped frame loaded with hundreds of them. OK the typical Brazilian
bikini can't weigh much but multiply by hundreds and I could see it was a heavy
load to carry. And do any women buy bikinis on the beach? Well one did. Not
surprisingly, she was already wearing one but then she started trying on ones
over her existing bikini. The vendor was very patient as she tried one after
another. I could imagine the conversation with her conservatively covered up
husband or boyfriend. "But you’ve got a bikini. Why do you want another one?
Yes that suits you. And the black one looks good too. So does the dark blue
one. Yes I'm sure it's a good price...”.Eventually, she did buy one much, I'm
sure, to the vendor's relief. I stayed on
the beach until about 11 when it was getting very hot and rather crowded. Back
to the hotel to shower and change and then got a taxi to the cable car station
to the top of Sugarloaf Mountain. There was a long queue to get tickets and realised
I could have got half price if I'd brought my passport along to prove I am over
60. I can see some people climbing up the shear granite cliff but think I'll
settle for the cable car. The first cable car takes you to the top of a smaller
granite dome from where there is a great view of the city. Before joining the
queue to buy the ticket, the top of Sugarloaf had been clear but now it was
covered in cloud and invisible, the cable car disappearing completely from view
as it ascended, so I was rather pessimistic about whether there would be
anything to see once I reached the top. But I needn't have worried; once at the
top there were amazing views through gaps in the clouds below, and the forest,
on the slope that isn't shear rock, reminded me of enchanted forests in fairy
tales. Not only is it green and luxuriant with brightly coloured, mostly red,
flowers but you can see wisps of cloud passing through it and condensing as
little droplets on the leaves. The views over the city, beaches, sea and islands
are constantly changing as fluffy white clouds form and change shape, moving
windows of visibility; one minute you can see Copacabana beach through a
window, next minute it is gone. From one viewpoint I can see lots of big black
birds wheeling around and occasionally one would land on a nearby branch. Found
out later that they are Black vultures Had a cup of coffee at a terrace where I
could watch the scenery and the people at leisure before going for another walk
along the forest paths. On the way down stopped off to visit a small exhibition
on the history of the cable car.
 |
| View from First Station on the Way Up Sugarloaf Mountain |
 |
| View over Copacabana Beach from the Top of Sugarloaf Mountain |
 |
| Another View from the Top of Sugarloaf Mountain |
 |
| Cable Car to the Top of Sugarloaf Mountain |
Walked
back to Copacabana trying to follow the "Walk Rio" signs. The cynic
in me can't help thinking that having dedicated pedestrian routes through the
city suggests that pedestrian were previously overlooked in designing the city
roads. The pedestrian route takes me through one of the shorter road tunnels
under a dome but there are plenty of people using the pathway and the tunnel
seems fairly well ventilated so I don't get poisoned by fumes.
In
the evening went out for dinner at La Fabrique, an ostensibly French restaurant,
that offered something other than pizza, sandwiches and burgers at reasonable
prices. I settled for a "traditional Brazilian" dish of steak, black
beans, rice, farofa and fries. Amazed at how many menu items here, and in other
places, contain both fries and rice. The plate came with three tenderloin
steaks, any one of which would be a good portion anywhere but South America.
Not the best steak I have had but not bad. Two “chopps” of Brahma beer to go
with it.
Sunday 20th March
Took taxi to the station for Corcovado. (28) Quite long queue for
tickets and they specify a timed train so mine was for 1040 which meant I had
over an hour to kill. Didn't want to buy anything in the tacky shops at the
station so walked 50m up the road to the Museum of Naive Art but found it
didn't open until 1000 which I can't help feeling is missing out on a lot of
people like me. So spent the time just wandering around, and watching a Palm
Sunday Procession, until about 1020 when I joined the queue to board. They
started boarding the little red rack and pinion train about 1030. It only has
two carriages so it didn’t take long to fill them up. Then we were off, faster
than I expected, up the steep and winding track through the forest with
occasional tantalising and fleeting views through the trees.
Once
at the top there were some more stairs to climb to get to the foot of the
statue. There isn't a lot of space on the terrace and it's very crowded with
people taking selfies and photos of each other, often with arms outstretched in
imitation of the statue. There is a small chapel inside the base of the statue
where some worshippers gathered, many with palms, but palms were massively
outnumbered by selfie sticks. As expected, there are fantastic views over the
city and surrounding mountains although it is a bit hazy. Sugarloaf mountain
looks quite diminutive from here. But the terrace is very crowded so it isn't a
pleasant place to hang around so after taking some photos along, with thousands
of others, I went down to a lower terrace for a Magnum and a beer. The Magnum
cost considerably more than the beer, 12
Reals compared with 7.7.
 |
| Corcovado Train |
 |
| The Photo Everyone Takes |
 |
| But some people go to more extreme lengths |
 |
| Even practicing ballet steps |
 |
| View from the Top |
It
was a fairly short wait for the train down the hill and then paid a visit to
the Museum of Naive Art which was 1/2 price with a train ticket, 6 instead of
12. Quite interesting; the collection was built up my one man Lucien
Finkelstein, although I wouldn't have made a special journey. One long mural tells the history of Brazil
and there is a section devoted to Rio.
 |
| Museum of Naive Art |
 |
| Naive Depiction of Corcovado |
Looking
at the map, I could see that the Santa Theresa tramway runs quite close by. Set
off towards it but although it may not be far horizontally, it's a steep climb
vertically through an affluent residential area, the winding steep streets
lined with mansions behind high walls. Up the hillside I can see less affluent residential areas. Eventually I found the tram lines but no
sign of a tram stop, or any trams. Then realised that while there was no sign
of any overhead power line. Could it be battery operated? Eventually asked the
only passer-by I saw who told me the tram was "nao mas". I later
learnt that this section of the tram routes had been discontinued after someone
stole the overhead cables.
 |
| Houses Clinging to the Hillside |
I was tempted to follow the tramlines back to the
city but they disappeared into a deserted forest so decided that might not be a
very good idea and I might find something more sinister than a teddy bear's party so I returned the way I
came, past the naive art museum and on to Largo do Marchado, a city square with
a Metro station and several weird looking trees with massive brown spherical
fruits or nuts that seem to grow straight out of the trunk. Found out that they
are "cannonball trees. Got the metro a few stops to Copacabana.
 |
| Cannonball Tree |
In
the evening I spent a lot of time trying to book a flight to Manaus. Amazed
that there is only one direct 4 hour flight a day that leaves at an ungodly
0714. Indirect flights take 6 hours or more and are also more expensive. The
flight is operated by TAM and I can get a price of about 500 Reals on their
website and everything goes fine until I try to enter the address for my credit
card when the website won't accept anywhere outside Brazil. If I click on “other
country” at the top of the page, the price increases by about 50%. Sky scanner
gives me a good price but takes me back to the TAM website. This time it's in
English which I think is a good start but it still can't accept a non-Brazilian
credit card address. Several other sites don't show the direct flight at all.
Eventually I manage to book it through the Brazilian Expedia site, all in
Portuguese, for about 650 Reals.
It’s
after 9pm by the time I'm done so decide to try Cervantes, one of
"Copacabana's best bars" that serves food only a few blocks away.
It's a very popular restaurant which suits me fine but not a "bar" by
any stretch of the imagination. It’s obviously popular with families. Due to a
miscommunication with the waiter I end up with two substantial steaks with
huge piles of vegetables. Not what I thought I'd ordered but I was hungry and
the waiters were very busy so decided to accept it. The steaks were good and
the vegetables, broccoli, carrots, artichoke peas and potato were OK even if
they weren't going to win any awards.
Then
looked into one of the suggested beach bars, Skol 360, nearby, but it, and all the others along the beach,
were fairly deserted.
Monday 21st March
Had
my standard Ibis breakfast, checked that the Santa Theresa tram is running today and got the Metro to
Cinelandia, close to the tram terminus. There is a typical city square, Praca Alagoas, with
several, very ornate 19th century buildings and I can see, and hear, some
walking tours starting in the square. I would be quite keen to join them but I
don't hear any in English.
 |
| Theatre in Praca Alagoas |
 |
| Old and new in Praca Alagoas |
 |
| Re-purposed Phone Kiosk in Praca Alagoas |
Found an amazing flight of steps decorated with
tiles from all over the world. Obviously every other tourist in Rio has found
them too, so they are quite crowded but they are very pretty. The downtown area
is very mixed with lots of modern high rises next to some beautiful, nicely
renovated 19th century buildings and across the street others that are dilapidated,
crumbling, covered in graffiti or all three. I found the famous Roman style viaduct, which
I learnt was built in the 18th century as an aqueduct and which now carries the Santa Theresa tram.
 |
| Pretty Tiled Steps in Rio |
 |
| Carioca Aque/Via duct |
And then
there's the cathedral, possibly the ugliest cathedral ever built. Maybe in the
architect’s sketches the concrete was white and shining but now it is dung
brown and glowering. In Liverpool the Catholic church built "Paddy's
Wigwam" which was conical so maybe conical was in vogue at the time. Seems strange since I always
associate cones and pyramids with pagan cultures, Egyptian, Mayan, Khmer and others. Apparently it was
inspired by Mayan architectural style of pyramids, which might make some sense
if the Mayans had ever been anywhere close to Rio. The cathedral looks very
much as I imagined the Tower of Babel to be, or at least how it would be if
it's builders had access to reinforced concrete. Not often I feel any empathy
with Charles Windsor but the word "carbuncle" does come to mind. Inside,
to be fair, is better since it is dark and dominated by four huge stained glass
windows running from top to almost bottom. And inside is one place in Rio where
the outside is completely invisible. I find it difficult to get inside the
minds of people who thought building such a massive, ugly, monstrous and almost certainly expensive structure was
a good idea in a city which has no shortage of large, extravagantly decorated
churches and no shortage of poor, homeless people sleeping on the streets. Inside and up close I can see the concrete is crumbling to reveal the reinforcement so have my doubts whether it will outlive the great Gothic cathedrals
 |
| Rio's Tower of Babel aka Cathedral |
 |
| Looks Better from Inside |
 |
| The nearby Petrobas Building is quite Elegant |
After
looking round a bit more of the area, I found the tram station and a queue of
people waiting for it. The tram is free and is supposed to run every 20
minutes. From what I have read the, city authorities invested in new tram cars,
replicas of the original ones, which were withdrawn and the service halted
after an accident causing several deaths. Having spent the money one might
think they would be keen to recoup some of it by charging for tickets and
running a service which met demand. As far as I can see they have four new
tramcars, sitting idle and according to Wikipedia
they spent over 100 million
Reals
(about £20 million) on upgrading the system and ordered 14 new trams. So
far only 1.7km has been reopened.
It
was nearly an hour before I finally got onto the tram since the first one to
arrive after 20 minutes filled up before I reached the front of the line. More
frustratingly after filling it with people it waited 15 minutes before leaving.
But when I did finally get on a tram it was quite fun rattling over the viaduct
and up the hilly winding cobbled streets. It stopped outside a conveniently
situated bar, which was sadly lacking in cold beer so I had to make do with a
Coke. I then had a wander round the area which has many “arty” shops and cosy
restaurants and bars. I started trying to walk back but the maze of winding
hilly streets, which double back on themselves had me walking round in circles.
I was just about to start walking back along the tramlines when the bright
yellow tram came rattling along and offered a lazier return option. Then found
the pleasant Campo de Santana park which is home to hundreds of agoutis, rabbit sized rodents, and feral
cats. Sadly it is also home to many vagrants. Quite close by is the railway
station which serves commuter lines and was getting busy when I looked around.
From there I got the metro back to Copacabana.
 |
| Santa Theresa Tram |
 |
| Agouti in the Park |
In
the evening went out to Pavao Azul, another of the ten best bars in Copacabana,
according to www.theculturetrip.com and which again is a restaurant rather than
a bar. It may well be wonderful but the tables were packed solid so no chance
of getting anything to eat. Next door was another very similar place, Bar Bunda
de Fora which obviously benefited from the overspill and where I had an
excellent dish of liver, onions, trice and chips accompanied by black beans
and a beer at a very reasonable price of under 30 Reals. Another evening walk along
the promenade.
Tuesday 22nd
March
My
last day in Rio so spent much of the morning enjoying the beach at Copacabana. After a shower took the metro to Carioca and walked the short distance down to
Praca XV which is dominated by the ornate Tiradentes Palace, apparently built in
1926 to be the home of the Brazilian Parliament and now the Legislative
Assembly of the Rio State. By comparison the Royal or Imperial Palace next to it is
quite austere and workaday. It is supposed to be a cultural centre but by the
time I got to explore it sometime after 4pm all the exhibitions were closed. In
the middle of the main courtyard is a weird concrete “sculpture” comprising three
massive solid “walls”. Despite Google I haven’t found out what they are
supposed to symbolise. But the cafe was open so enjoyed a coffee and brownie while contemplating the concrete.
 |
| Tiradentes Palace |
 |
| Statuary on Tiradentes Palace |
 |
| Concrete "Sculpture" in Royal Palace Courtyard |
Close
by are two ornate baroque churches the “old” cathedral which makes me wonder
why they wanted a new one and next door another church which, if I understand
correctly, was built because to be a second church for the Carmelite convent. It
has a quite theatrical look about it with curtained “boxes” for the nobility.
 |
| Old Cathedral against Modern Backdrop |
 |
| Baroque Interior of Old Cathedral |
 |
| Theatrical Style "Box" in the Church Next Door |
 |
| Quaint Old Letterbox to Post my Cards |
 |
| Narrow Street near Praca XV |
In
the evening went back to the Skol 360 bar, which was busier than most of the
other bars, for my last dinner on Copacabana beach but the expensive, 30 Real, cod
fish cakes proved to be mostly potato and a great anti-climax. Luckily the evening
cheered up when I found “Bottles Bar” tucked away down a side street where
there was a band and a great singer who I learnt was Daíra Saboia. https://www.facebook.com/DairaSaboiaOficial The
small bar was packed and the crowd clearly loved her, almost physically
preventing her from leaving the stage. The bar had a cover charge of 30 Reals,
which was far better value than the “cod” cakes!
 |
| Daíra Saboia at Bottles Bar |
Of
the South American cities, I have visited Rio stands out as by far my favourite
and the one where I feel I could happily spend another week.
