Day 72 - Christo Redentor and Pão de Açúcar

Today is Sam's birthday, and after having sat up for most of the night drinking Caipirinias, she was rudely awoken at 10am and presented with breakfast and THE birthday, which I painstakenly handwrote last night from the 60-odd emails I had gathered from people who know her. She was touched - more so by the 100 quid she had been 'donated' by people she cares for. Guys, its my birthday on September 19th. Just thought I'd let you all know...


(see a close-up of the card here)

We spent the day yesterday swimming in the atlantic ocean, soaking up the sun on Copacabana beach, and generally accustomising ourselves to be at sea-level again (you'd be surprised what difference a few thousand meters makes). But today, the birthday girl wanted to do something special, so we booked ourselves on a trip up to see Jesus (you know I love him) and off to the Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf mountain).



The ride up to the big Jesus was amazing, through the largest urban forest in the world. Sam saw a massive cat the size of a dog (of course you did darling), whilst I spent the whole time being a totally knob in the back of the van trying to make peolpe laugh (unsuccessfully). But on arrival, I was pleasantly surprised at his size (he's big - maybe 4 or 5 stories high) and at how cool he looks. And the views from the top were pretty special. The Lying Planet (as we call it) said that from here, Rio is truely one of the most beautiful cities in the world. They're not so wrong this time.



    



Its stacked with tourists up there, and most of them are trying to take arty photos (its tough - he's huge), small or far away photos (its tough - he's huge and not very far away) or they just stand there with their hands out, imitating christ. Not something I would normally laugh at, but in this case, its was pretty amusing.



Sam and I gorged ourselves on a local delicacy of mashed chicken wrapped in mashed potato and deep fried, then we headed down the mountain to catch the sunset at the sugarloaf.





One cablecar later, not on the actual loaf, but next to it, we were running a bit late, so caught the sunset from there. I'm pretty impressed with my photography here guys, so feel free to email me and tell me how special these are. The city is WELL photogenic. And at this time of day, the place looks magical.







Another much scarier cable car ride up to the loaf, and a change of perspecitive on the city makes it look even sweeter. But by this time, it was getting down, so Sam and I headed down with our new Kiwi mates Justin and Chloe and headed out for an ALL YOU CAN EAT MEAT buffet.



This place is unreal. The buffet alone is AMAZING, for salads and sushi and general non-meat food. But then, every 2 minutes, some guy comes round with a massive skewer of meat, and fills your plate with EVERY type and style of meat possible.





Sick to the stomach by the end of it, we HAD to go out for Sam's birthday night, so the lot of us headed off to a proper brasilian locals Samba club (Democraticos) and, not being able to samba very well, at and drank beer until we needed to go to bed. Did Sam have a good time - yeah, I think so. A memorable birthday all the same.