Day 249 - Redeemed

Rio De Janeiro - Ibis Hotel

Off to see the famous Christ the Redemeer statue this morning. It is massive, 30 meters high and can be seen from many parts of Rio looking down over the city. We started off with the metro, then a bus to get to the train that goes up the mountain to the statue. We arrived at the train at 9:30am to find a sign saying the next available train was 11.20 - you have to be joking! Standing around the entrance were taxi and mini van drivers hassling for your business so we took a mini bus to the next stop. From here we had to buy our tickets for the statue and get on another bus to go to the lifts and then finally take some escalators to the top. By now there were many tour groups and our early start had turned into quite a marathon of travel. The views from the top were extraordinary giving a really good idea of the layout of Rio with the bays, mountains and islands.

The statue is as amazing as you would expect, it must have been such a huge feat to have it built and erected all those years ago.

We then caught the train to Copacabana, we were feeling a little left out because almost everyone was dressed up in some way, so we each purchased a bright wig, which made us blend in with everyone else rather than than the opposite!

Copacabana was more of what we expected with beach side bars and restaurants on both sides of the road, so we walked along the promenade along with thousands of other people, and enjoyed an afternoon in the sun and dinner by the beach, before taking in the huge street party near our hotel, we later read in the news that 2.2 million people had attended the party that day, with only a handful of public urination arrests (but obviously not enough, because by the end of the day it was smelling pretty bad in some areas, and you had to be careful where you stepped!)