Salvador, Brazil – December 23

giant street art

Weather…28 degrees, occasionally overcast then sunny bits,

more giant street art

some showers and then torrential ‘tropical rains’, quite sultry

Today was our first time on land in 2 days. As soon as we docked, we were greeted by a Brazilian band and a few huge pieces of street art – bom Dia!

This morning’s 4-hour city tour started at the 1698 Fortress of San Antonio and Salvador’s last working light house. Meandering through the city streets – music, street art, and the people on the streets make Salvador’s Afro-Brazilian heritage obvious. 

lighthouse

Salvador de Bahia (the city’s full name) was the first capital of Brazil, from 1549 to 1763. The first slave market in the New World was also here starting in 1558, with slaves being brought here to work on the sugar plantations. We stopped for a brief time in front of Salvador’s most infamous pillory (whipping post) Largo do Pelourinho where the slaves were punished – we probably would have heard a bit more about this if it weren’t pouring at the time.

bay view

The bulk of today’s tour was spent on foot in Salvador’s old city with a guide. Walking over cobble stones we visited 2 churches – a 17th-century Cathedral Basilica and the Church of São Francisco. These churches were over the top with gold decorations. There was so much gold it was hard to concentrate on what I was looking at, it was just gold, gold, and a whole lot more gold. BTW…masks are now required in Salvador’s (or maybe all of Brazil’s) churches.

gold church

church ornamentation

The most interesting thing about today’s tour was driving thought Salvador’s neighborhoods, just seeing people on the streets, peeking into their auto mechanic shops as we drove by and seeing the many bananas and coconuts for sale on streets corners.

As is typical of all tours we eventually found ourselves at a typical souvenir shop for a ‘comfort’ stop’. We didn’t buy anything but did notice quite a selection of culturally ‘inappropriate’ souvenirs.

and more...

Just as we were headed back to the bus it started to rain, not crazy rain, but enough that I was glad to have a hat with me. As we got back to the boat and wanted a pre-lunch ‘cool by the pool’ cocktail it

more gold church

became torrential! And just as quickly as the rain came it ended and the sun shone again. After lunch we found a sunny break to sit at the pool bar – we could actually see the wall of rain bearing down on us and 5 minutes later…torrential.

more street art

Sea day, Cruising the Coast of Brazil – December 22

breakfast at sea

Weather…25 degrees, sunny in the morning…good for pool time, showers in the PM…good for napping. 

No too much to report on today. Slept in, breakfast, pool time (reading, champagne), noon time “cool by the pool”, lunch, blogging, nap, 

“Cool by the pool” is when one the ship’s musical duo plays for an hour or so while we have a pre-lunch cocktail.

The evening consisted of the captain’s welcome party, music and a cocktail, dinner, show and post show music and drink.

One thing I’ve noticed and still find weird are Christmas decorations in the heat. It doesn’t seem quite right to hear Jingle Bells and see Christmas trees while I’m sitting at a pool. I’m hardly complaining, just still find it weird.

Sea Day…was supposed to be Cabo Frio, Brazil – December 21

pool beer

Weather…24, a few fluffy clouds, windy

We learned long ago not to expect things will go according to plan when travelling and especially when on a cruise. Last night at dinner, when we were able to set sail, we got the dreaded bing, bang, bong of the boat’s PA system. This is very unusual other than the captain’s noon time announcement and never brings good news. The captain reported that there was a foreign object tangled in one of the ship’s propellers. This is delaying our departure…could be 30 min, 45 min or until the next day if divers were needed because Rio doesn’t allow divers in the dark. As it turned out it was a quick fix, and we were only delayed by about an hour.

The captain went on to tell us to expect rough seas over night and we may be missing today’s port. Cabo Frio is a tender port – tendering in rough seas is pretty much a no-go, so we weren’t hopeful. When we woke up Cabo Frio turned into our first sea day. I wasn’t too broken up about it…what can you do about it anyway?? I’m always up for a sea day, especially when I didn’t have my heart set on what the plans were.

So…off to the gym, a quick breakfast, reading and a reading-induced chair nap…not a terrible

what we return to each evening

recovery! I’ll tell you what else I did that was actually, in fact TERRIBLE…I called the plumber. Why you may ask, did I call the plumber…well, let me tell you…the toilet SOUNDED like it was flushing, but in fact it WAS NOT flushing…grrrrrrr! Cruise ship toilets work on a vacuum system, you push a button, hear a woosh, and the ‘material’ is gone. Well…this morning there was plenty of woosh, but the ‘material’ remined! I called someone, they called someone, and the plumber came. As least Chris told me a plumber came…I figured it was more important that I go to the gym and let Chris deal with the plumber. For the rest of the day all worked…we experienced this twice on this same boat last time we were here, so I wasn’t surprised, but COME ON!!!!!

The rest of the day was less eventful…noon-time cool by the pool with the cocktail of the day, lunch, balcony time, nap, dinner, bed. 

One thing we did the ship’s ‘block party’. This is where at 6 PM everyone (who wants to) hangs out in the hall outside their rooms and meets their neighbors while staff pours wine and passes out snacks. We’ve done this plenty of times and it is charming…it’s nice to know who your neighbors are.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – December 20

unpacking

Weather…rain, rain, and more rain, 24 degrees

No alarms were needed as we had nothing to do other than breakfast until our 11:00 pick up. If we need to have any day of crappy weather, it should be the travel day. After a 20 min trip to the cruise ship terminal a 10 min check in procedure, we were sipping some bubbly.

It’s always nice to start a cruise with a champagne or 2 at the pool and despite the downpours that’s exactly what we did! The pool has plenty of overhang that usually provides coveted shade, but today served as a good rain barrier. As expected,

cloudy Jesus

the room wasn’t ready when we arrived, so I did
some laundry. We had 5 days of dirty clothes and although the ship will do our laundry, I figured it would be a good use of this waiting time and the machines would be free.

The rest of the afternoon was spent unpacking, checking in at our muster station – one positive of post-covid travel was no more in-person muster drills…all we have to do now is watch a video at home and then report to our particular station once on board…done!

The evening was dinner a few drinks, listening to music, and try to see the Jesus on the sail away. It was almost too cloudy to see the Jesus, but we did a bit.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – December 19

waterfall

rustic beauty

Weather…woke up to cloudy skys, prayed for it to stay that way…nope…rain, not actually that much really, but heavy in tiny bits, 24 degrees, still humid…may hair is ‘responding’

more Chris and Wilson

Chris and our guide Wilson

“Jungle Jeep Tour” is the title of today’s tour. I wasn’t sure if that meant riding a jeep through the jungle, to the jungle or what exactly. We were picked up in a jeep with a driver, a guide, 2 other
people and us…a perfect number. The open-top jeep was exactly that…a driver in front and the rest of us in 2 bench type seats in the back, we had lap seat belts, but I wasn’t so sure how we would have faired in a roll-over…thankfully, that wasn’t a concern today!

monument to the 6 who reforested

The Tijuca Rainforest (a UNESCO World Heritage site) is situated right in the heart of Rio and is the world’s largest urban forest – 40 square km. We passed a beautiful house that our guide told us Pelé lives. As soon as we started our ascent to the park we could feel the drop in temperature, a few days ago this would have been welcome, but today it is bit cool. The wind in the back of the open jeep is causing me a significant hair situation.

Lisa take the wheel

This park is apparently where in the 1700s the forest was clearcut to make space for coffee plantations and livestock. In 1861, reforestation of the area started. The replanting of the area was undertaken by 6 slaves over 26 years – this fact was repeatedly mentioned throughout today’s tour. It is pretty incredible…6 people, 26 years 40 square km!

Main attractions of the park are the Taunay Waterfalls. These falls are gorgeous, I could stand all day in the misty thunder of the crashing water. After the falls. we followed our guide through the thick, lush, never-ending green canopy of forest stopping every so often for an explanation then meeting the jeep again for a ride further along into the forest.

more beauty

Throughout the morning, we were sprinkled now and again with rain, but never enough to be wet…that is until we got in the jeep for our last stop. It was torrential! Still not cold, but wet. I was wearing a tank top on and the guide took pity on me and gave me a rain coat…I was thankful! We eventually pulled the top onto the jeep so that we were out of the direct pelting rain.

This visit to the forest was breath-taking. The only disappointment was seeing no animals…we were told to be on the look-out for monkeys, turtles, and birds, but they must have been taking shelter which I suppose is what we should have been doing.

one final lookout

One favela exists within this park with apparently 200 000 people living there.

Once back at the hotel, we decided a walk down the ocean followed by a beer or 2 at an ocean bar was in order. Today the waves were bigger than other days and a few people were trying to surf.

Ocean beers were followed by a bit of soccer gear shopping where Chris bought a shirt and a flask and then I visited nap town.

Copacabana beer

In the evening we found an Italian spot for dinner. We wanted a bottle of wine but have discovered that wine drinking isn’t at all the culture here. We saw

Copacabana beach

bottles on a shelf but had to ask for a list…the drink list never includes wine here…by the glass or bottle…basically by the bottle is the only way wine exists. Drinking involves cocktails or beer. After dinner we found our local for a couple of beers before calling it a night.

Globo!!

2 nights ago, we had late night beers at our local as we did tonight…that night the clientele was older, single people…tonight was families...odd difference. The thing that was the same was the DJ. Definitely a fun spot I’m glad we found early enough in our stay in Rio.

last beach moment

Tomorrow, we board the boat for the next 18 days! 

End note…we finally tried the ubiquitous Rio snack…Globo. These are a very light, airy crunchy snack that come in a savoury and sweet version – kinda like a cheezie minus the cheese.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – December 18

ready to set sail

Weather…woke up to RAIN, by the time we stepped outside it was only cloudy, a bit of mist later, 25 degrees

sailing

Thrilled was how we felt when we saw Luis waiting for us in the hotel lobby this morning! Luis was our guide from our visit to Christ the Redeemer, he was a great guy then and was our 'private' guide today. Today’s tour wasn’t meant to be private, but we were the only ones who booked…GREAT! We’re obviously happy to be with others, but when it’s just us there’s definitely a benefit to private.

Sugarloaf covered in clouds

Because there were only 3 of us, we took an Uber to the marina for our Guanabara Bay Cruise. We boarded a 2-level tourist ship for cruising with about 50 other people for a 2-hour cruise around Guanabara Bay – the world’s largest bay in terms of volume of water. Although we’ve been in Rio for a few days, this gives us a new perspective on the city.

We sailed past and heard commentary about many things including the Naval yard, the cruise ship terminal we’ll be visiting soon, and the 9-mile-long Rio-Niteroi bridge across the Guanabara Bay. One interesting thing about Rio is its domestic airport is located right next

airport on the bay

beautiful customs house

to the bay. This is the airport we arrived at and as we were landing it seemed as though we were going to land on the water.  

Guanabara Bay bridge

To our surprise when Luis picked us up we learned that lunch was part of today’s tour…nice! A Brazilian BBQ seems to be something not to be missed when in Rio. The restaurant was exactly the same as Brazilian places in Calgary…meat, meat and you guessed it more MEAT! We started with a salad bar that was a meal in itself, then came the main attraction…probably 10 kinds of meat options including chicken heart which I had to try!! Despite being glued to the game, waiters were eagerly waiting for us to flip our “please don’t bring me any more meat” sign, to “bring on the meat” as soon as we flipped to green they were on us! More skewers of meat than you ever thought possible, carved right onto your plate! My favourite may have been the beef filled with oozing blue cheese, oh and the tiny cheese filled garlic buns also skewered. Oh, and the skillet (not a skewer) of melted cheese just scooped right onto your plate!! To top this carnivorous feed-fest off was ice cream…not on a skewer. All of this was 

MEAT!!!

washed down with a caipirinha and ended with a shot of cachaça from the world's biggest booze bottle. None of this was heart healthy, but sure was stomach and palate pleasing! 

more MEAT!!!

We arrived at lunch just as the World Cup final was starting…perfect timing I guess. There were plenty of TVs in the restaurant for viewing…I’m not sure who was keener to watch…customers or staff. Our meal ended just as over time was starting, so Luis got us another Uber and we raced back to our hotel bar (saying 'tchau' to Luis along the way) to watch the rest. Although Brazil wasn’t in the final, there were plenty of

hello giant cachaça!!

people everywhere watching…TVs on the beach, TVs in bars spilling onto the road and TVs in hotel bars…definitely an atmosphere! We didn’t actually see the final goal until replays because the hotel TV feed froze (typical of TV here), when it came back Argentina was celebrating. We heard most Brazilians didn’t like Argentina and expected most to be cheering for France, but I’d say it was about 50/50.

Argentina wins!!!

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – December 17

Ipanema beach

Weather…cloudy, 26 degrees, muggy, humid, sticky, could have used more of what little breeze there was…I see that it is 26 degrees on the other side of zero at home…BRUTAL!

Well…another disappointing-ish day in the tour department. We were supposed to have another morning visiting some of Rio’s “traditional” neighborhoods. That was not to be. After another hotel breakfast where the fruit selection was a bit more interesting (the most enormous passion fruit I’ve ever seen) we headed to the lobby to meet our guide…an hour later and still no guide, we gave up and made our own tour. We were annoyed, but not completely disappointed. Not sure if we should blame this on covid’s lack of staff, or on a screw up, or on who-knows-what.

World Cup lunch

We used this opportunity to venture to Ipanema beach. Our hotel is located right
on Copacabana beach, a 4 km stretch along the Atlantic and where we’ve become familiar with. Ipanema is about 2.5km long and not so much connected  but adjacent to Copacabana. Rio’s geography is like no other city’s I’ve visited. It surrounds a giant bay and the Atlantic with mountains dotting its coast – Sugar Loaf Mountain is at the mouth of the bay, our hotel room faces Sugar Loaf, and the Atlantic. Plus, the vegetation all over the city is lush, lush, lush. So, although close to Copacabana, we have to walk through some neighborhoods to get to Ipanema because of a mountain – we probably could have walked along the beach, but we weren’t sure, so we stuck to what we knew. Half way to Ipanema we were getting a bit thirsty, so found a beach bar for 2 beers (2.50 CAN.)

beach bar

Ipanema is supposed to be less commercial, with less in-your-face hawkers, but we didn’t think so. There were just as many opportunities to relieve beach goers of their R$ (Brazilian Reals are about 4 to 1 Canadian dollar) as are on Copacabana. Ipanema beach was a bit shallower and maybe had a few less beach bars, but all in all very similar.

Once we felt we had sufficiently checked out Ipanema we headed back to home base. This morning seemed to have more beach activity on the go like groups of paddle boarders, swimmers, volleyball players etc. Maybe I just didn’t notice this yesterday, or maybe it’s because today is Saturday.

beer for 2

Lunch was at the hotel pool restaurant where we caught the second half of the
third place World Cup Match. We tried a couple of Brazilian snacks washed down with a bottle of wine.

The rest of the afternoon was spent napping and blogging. Around 8:30 we decided to go for a stroll. We wandered our hotel neighborhood, checked out a grocery store looking for Brazilian chips…nope…all they had were the usual suspects…sour cream and onion, pizza, BBQ, nothing blog-worthy. We ended up at a beach bar for a couple of beers – these 600mL bottles (15$R/4$CAN each) come in a foam cooler. We shared one and then another.. This place was pretty hopping with a DJ, a couple of big parties and a few dogs!

Not what we planned for the day, but a pretty good recovery. 

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – December 16

Christ the Redeemer

partly sunny and 29 degrees - enough to get some colour on our pale Canadian winter skin! rain in the evening

Rio is in the Brasilia Standard Time zone, 4 hours ahead of Calgary. Not as much of a time change as we typically contend with on vacation, but enough that I feel a bit out of sorts when I wake up at 6:30 (my body thinks it is 2:30.)

Breakfast is included with our hotel room, which is a standard international hotel breakfast…egg station, pastries, fruit, yogurt, cheese. We were hoping for a few more Brazilian options, we THOUGHT that will have to wait until lunch – a Brazilian BBQ...that was not to be. We had 4 days of tours organized for our time in Rio. While we were travelling to Rio, we received notice that the tours had been revised due to availability of guides. This was hardly a surprise, and we were perfectly OK with it. However…when the guide picked us up this morning his information was that lunch wasn’t included for us. So, at one point we were dropped off and the rest of the van of 14 headed off to lunch. We weren’t too broken up about this and figured there wasn’t much we could do about it.

Maracanã Stadium

A visit Rio’s Christ the Redeemer statue was still part of our itinerary. We saw it as we were landing yesterday, but today’s visit is up close and personal. A van picked us up from our hotel.

Christ the Redeemer was constructed between 1922 and 1931, is 30 metres high and the arms span about 28 metres. It is at the top of Corcovado mountain in Tijuca National Park overlooking the city. It is one of the New Seven Wonders of the World – this makes 6 of the 7 Wonders that we’ve seen.

After a 15 min tram ride up Corcovado Mountain, we have 230 more steps to

Cathedral stained glass windows

climb – there is an elevator, but we opt for the stairs. The tram takes us through the Tijuca Forest, which is apparently the largest urban forest in the whole world. I’d call it more of a jungle than a forest…it is thick, lush, and viny. We’re visiting the forest during one of our other tours.

The viewing platform at the base of the Jesus lets us see most of Rio. It’s crowded, but not overly so. There’s also a chapel at the base of the statue that we check out.

Next, we make a photo stop at the Maracanã Stadium where 2 of Rio’s soccer teams play. Apparently when this place was first built in 1950, it held 200 000

Cathedral exterior

spectators!! Now it holds about 80 000. This place was more interesting to hear about than actually see (we didn’t go in, just a photo stop in front)…it was a pretty much a concrete circle.

Our last stop was to the Metropolitan Cathedral of Saint Sebastian, better known as the Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro. This place is like no other church I’ve ever seen. It was apparently modeled after the Mayan pyramids, so once you are inside it’s like an alter “in-the-round”. There are 4 huge rectangle, stained glass windows on each side of the pyramid and it holds 20 000 people!

The afternoon was spent wandering Copacabana beach, having a few beers and lunch followed by a visit to nap-town. It was rainy in the evening, so we stayed in. Beers here don't seem too outrageously priced...a 400mL for 3 Canadian dollars and a burger for $6. The cocktail I had last night at the hotel bar was $10...also not bad for a hotel bar.

ready for a Copacabana beach beer!

BTW…after anticipating luggage woes, we had NONE!! We put an airtag into each of our bags, which was interesting to follow, but thankfully we didn’t need them.

ps...our hotel is the tallest building in the distance - the Copacabana Hilton, it's not fancy, but fine and the location can't be beat!

Calgary to Chicago to São Paulo to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil - December 14/15

clear skys, 27 degrees

7500 steps 6000 of which were made in the Sao Paulo airport!!!

March 19, 2020 – that is the date of my last blog entry I wrote – finally forced making it home outracing Covid. That was almost 3 years ago. Today is the first day of biggest vacation Chris and I have been on since Covid forced us home, March 2020.

a couple of champagne cocktails

This travel day was just as arduous! All told it took us about 24 hours to get to Rio! It was taking us 3 flights to get to our final destination of Rio de Janeiro – Calgary to Chicago to São Paulo to Rio. We had business class tickets so we’d be able to lie out for the 10.5 hour flight from Chicago to São Paulo. Fortunately, after a glass of champagne, dinner, another glass of wine and a bit of Tom Cruise I got a fair amount of sleep.

The flight leaving Calgary was 30 min late, but by the time we arrived in Chicago that didn’t matter because ultimately we left 3.5 hours late. This let us hang out (champagne and a shower!) in the United Airlines lounge in Chicago which was very lovely! As far as business lounges goes, this is at least a 9/10! We knew we would miss our connection to Sao

first sighting of the Jesus

Paulo but were assured United Airlines would take care of the rebooking.

Um…yeah, they did I guess, but kinda, sort of not. We learned upon arriving to São Paulo that we were rebooked on a flight 4 hours later. There are over 80 flights each day between São Paulo and Rio, but this was the soonest one with availability.

No problem, they gave us food vouchers and we planned to find a business lounge. HA!! All we did for the 4 hours from the time we arrived in São Paulo to the time we left was walk and line up, try to sort out our flight details, walk and line up some more.

Copacabana sunset and a caipirinha

In the end we ended up sprinting through the airport, Chris trying not to lose his pants. We bolted from security to the gate so fast there was no time for re-belting! WHEW!! We made it but it was tight, or so we thought. The plane didn’t actually take off for another 20 min waiting for more people.

Once in Rio, we checked into the hotel, unpacked, showered, hit the rooftop bar for our first caipirinha and then strolled Copacabana beach for a bit.

December 2022 – pre vacation

It is with more than a bit of trepidation that I said yes when Chris suggested this post-covid escape. While I have never been afraid of actually getting covid (not afraid, but certainly cautious), I’ve been more afraid of travelling under covid restrictions. The end of covid always seemed on the horizon until it wasn’t. Eventually, I figured if we don’t travel now…when? The timing of this trip seemed right.

A few days from now, I should be kissed by the Brazilian sun, relaxed by Brazilian Caipirinhas, and buoyed by the sounds of Samba.

A few days in Rio de Janeiro followed by a cruise to a few more Brazilian stops followed by hitting a few Caribbean islands.

Vancouver to CALGARY, ALBERTA, CANADA!!! – March 19

We made it! 48 hours later…and we’re home!


Now for a 48 hour long nap!