Day 1 - Rio

I arrived last night, after 26 hours in transit, and wound up on the same flights as about half the Aussie competitors for "Oi Rio Pro", the international surfing competition. It took me a while to work that one out, as if push came to shove I think I'd only recognise 2 current international surfers while not holding a surfboard for context, and Kelly Slater was not on the flight. It took all of them sitting together, and a touch of eavesdropping for me to sort out the disconnect in wardrobe of my fellow passengers, as it was less Kathmandu-autumn-catalog than I was expecting, and more sponsored-by-Billabong. 

The flight landed and I was on my way to Leblon, Nobby Beach to the more Surfers Paradise-like Copacabana, and the Burleigh Heads of Ipanema. The driving style of locals is quite like some of their European forebears, with safe braking distance an oxymoron, and occupying only one lane at a time being something my driver only did when there wasn't the slightest chance he could overtake someone. At one point I thought we were heading for a traffic jam, but it turned out half a dozen cars had pulled over on the bridge of an 8 lane highway for a spot of fishing. 

The tree-lined cobbled streets of Leblon have a vaguely Parisienne feel to them, helped in part by the seemingly excessive number of pharmacies, which always baffled me in Paris. After checking-in and showering I headed to a nearby pub called Jobi for some Pastels (local pub food - meat or cheese-filled fried pastries) and some local beer which they call Chopp. It was here I had my first, and likely not last, moment of regret for the next week about spending all my effort on Duolingo improving my Spanish, and none getting some basic Portuguese.

I woke at 4:30 this morning, my body resenting jumping 13 time zones, and I headed out just before sunrise for a long walk along the beach. To the right, the houses of the hillside suburb of Vidigal framed the peaks in Tijuca National Park, and making for the first of many postcard moments of my walk. Turning left, I headed towards Ipanema, alongside early morning joggers and the coconut delivery guy, who drops mounds of the fruit to each of the beachside bars each day. I rounded the corner from Ipanema to Copacabana as a light drizzle started, hiding the view of Sugarloaf mountain and its cable-car. By this point coffee was calling my name, though to my surprise, the beachfront bars, while serving beer and coke at 7am, weren't serving coffee. 20 more minutes of walking along the beachfront didn't change that, so I gave up on the idea of a beachfront breakfast and headed a couple of blocks back and found a great little bakery. By the time I'd polished off my second coffee and a pastry the drizzle had turned into rain, with my raincoat back in my room, I legged it back to the hotel, just in time for it to stop raining. So after a quick change of clothes, I headed to the Botanic Gardens. 

The gardens were gorgeous, walking there you see the rainforest stop where the housing starts, and wonder briefly how long it would take for  nature to reclaim the city if it was abandoned. The gardens contain a truly amazing collection, the water features are beautiful and I can picture mum coveting the contents of the orchid house. After that I sit on the beach and do some people watching and write this. The odd thing is that the people aren't playing beach volleyball as I know it, they're playing "footvolley", where your hand doesn't touch the ball in play. Serves are with the foot, and shoulders, knees, chests and heads seem to cover the rest of the shots. 

To add to the weirdness, I've just come home via a "legalise marijuana" protest and easily a third of the protestors have lit up  joints in front of what must be 100 police covering the protest.

I head to a little place by the hotel called Filet for dinner and order a steak with sides of black bean stew (feiojao), a jacket potato and a glass of red. Some manner of miscommunication with the potato, as I get a bowl of crisps, which sit at the edge of the table untouched. The other three items combine to make a delicious dinner and I figure I can cross Feiojada off my list now, having consumed the vegetarian version and avoiding the offal and other weird cuts that often go into this dish, apparently pig eats and trotters are not unheard of additions. I get another early night and wake as the girls in the room next door return from their night out around five, the noise they make in stumbling up a few of the steps further proof of a big night out.