Andrew Patton - Trip to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Due to some unique circumstances, I discovered that I would be alone for Christmas in 2002. Rather than stay in cold Virginia, I decided that I wanted to travel to warmer location and chose to go to Brazil. Beyond being warmer, it would be my first visit to South America and to the southern hemisphere. After careful planning I decided that I would visit Rio de Janeiro and a jungle lodge in the Amazon. I choose to go through a travel agent, which I rarely use, who would make a custom tour for me. BROL provided me with what I wanted for a good price which included ground transfers to/from my hotels.

My vacation did not begin on the best footing. I was scheduled to fly from Washington (Dulles) to New York (JFK) and transfer to my flight to Rio, but my flight from Dulles was canceled due to a mechanical fault with the aircraft. The airline transferred me to the next available flight to New York - 2 hours later and to La Guardia rather than JFK (The airline promised a ground transfer to JFK). It seemed OK as I would still have about 3 hours to make my connection. I boarded the aircraft and we soon left the gate. Unfortunately I was soon informed that we were in a ground hold for 45 minutes. OK, now my connection time is down to about 2 hours but I still could make it. I flew to La Guardia and inquire about the ground transfer. Airline says there a 45 minutes wait for the transfer (Plus the transfer would take about 30 minutes). This would leave me with not enough time to make my connection. I decided that I would take a taxi to JFK an write the airline for a reimbursement. The taxi ride was a little stressful, but I made it to JFK with 1 hour to spare and found out that the Rio flight was delayed an hour so that I had more a safety cushion. The flight to Rio was thankfully uneventful.

I arrived in Rio early the next morning and after departing customs, quickly found my driver and started off to my hotel on the Copacabana Beach. I soon felt the warmth of a day in late December in Rio, the temperature was around 90 degrees. After arriving at my hotel, I looked over the room service menu to gauge prices, and was pleasantly surprised to see that everything was quite affordable (the exchange rate for the time I was in Brazil was around 3.50 BRL to 1 USD). After a quick break, I headed off to explore Rio.

I choose to first see the Christ the Redeemer statue on top of Corcovado. For this I took a radio taxi - which really became my private car as the driver waited for me and drove me back to the hotel for only 13 USD. The taxi drove me to the Corcovado train station where I took the small cog wheel train to the top of the mountain. The statue is nearly 100 feet tall and is quite amazing to see close up. Also from the base of the statue you can see all of Rio. After touring the statue, I wanted to go to the Museum of the Indian, but the taxi driver informed me that the museum was closed that day. So I returned to the hotel, and decided to explorer Copacabana.

Copacabana beach is a pleasant places with many terrace cafes. I choose one for dinner and had some grilled chicken breasts. The price for the meal with a soda was a total of 6 USD. Rio was definitely an affordable place for me. Before heading back to my hotel for the night, I walked through the commercial district of Copacabana and found a grocery store where I would buy drinks an snacks for the remainder of my trip. At no time did I feel unsafe in Copacabana, or any other part of Rio for that matter, despite the horror stories you hear about crime in Rio.

The next day I headed off to downtown Rio. My first stop was to ride the Bondinho, an old electric tram that traverses through the Santa Tereza section of Rio. This tram was quite old and the ride on it was quite exciting. Next to the tram station is the Rio's Metropolitan Cathedral which was designed by Oscar Niemeyer. It is an interesting building but does not really look like a church, rather it reminded me of a pyramid. I next walked over to the old Cathedral of Rio which was far more traditional.

I spent the afternoon exploring some of Rio's museums including the Paco Imperial and the National History Museum. It was interesting to see the history of Brazil as it is many ways similar to the US, both countries stared off as colonies of European Powers who exploited the resources of the New World, but different, the Brazilians had a monarchy for a century. The History Museum also had a good exhibits on how sugar and coffee are made (Two of Brazil's great exports)

On my third day in Rio, I took a Favela Tour. The favelas are the areas of Rio where the poor live. The rich live on the beaches and the poor have taken over government land on the mountainside. While the conditions of the favelas are not good, they are not ghettos either. I saw that the people who live in the favelas have pride of their homes and are trying to make it a better place for themselves and their children. In the afternoon, I took another radio taxi to Pao de Acucar, a mountain known in English as Sugarloaf. Most people probably know this location from the movie Moonraker where James Bond and Jaws fought. The views from Sugarloaf are great and it was a nice place to cool down as the temperature was some 5 degrees cooler than the beach.

I spent my last full day in Rio not doing much as it was Christmas Eve. It was a little hard to believe it was Christmas time as it was in the 90s. I had a enjoyable Christmas dinner of Brazilian Pork Chops and a few beers for 8 USD. Christmas like this is really difficult, but someone has to do it. :) The next morning, Christmas Day, my driver picked me up and drove me to the airport to fly to my next destination in Brazil, The Amazon (See Trip to The Amazon, Brazil).