Captain Fiendish & The Whirlwind Of Rio: The First 48
In my mind’s eye there is a British Airways employee, let’s call him Captain Fiendish, whose job it is to sneak behind a curtain just after all the passengers are settled in, and twist the AC control until it reaches the setting with an igloo logo as a temperature guide. As a result of his actions, the cabin quickly descends to unbelievably freezing and has every last passenger reaching for a combination of sweatshirt, hoodie and BA standard issue blanket, or, in some cases, all three. We understand the need for the comfort of AC but why oh why is it necessary to make it this bloody cold?
Captain Fiendish is on form from the off – and although we don’t know it yet, he is to have another trick up his dastardly sleeve later into the night. As the cold descends, screens flicker all around us and I settle into my world of music on the headphones. Diagonally to my right across the aisle, a ginger haired lad is playing Monopoly on his screen – as a non-player of games, I assume his opponent is the machine itself, but Michaela informs me that he may be playing against another passenger on the plane. I didn’t know such things were possible.
Food service is painfully slow. The veggies and the vegans get served early, of course they bloody do, but the rest of us – those of us vulgar enough to choose a chicken dinner – are still waiting after more than two hours of the flight as the crew slowly work their way down the rows. Predictably, she serves those immediately in front of us and immediately to our right, then disappears down the aisle, trolley and all, to goodness knows where. Ginge, eating left handed and playing Monopoly right handed, has probably passed “Go” and collected £200 three times, AND bought a hotel on Mayfair, before she eventually returns with our meal, full of apology but without explanation as to why we’re now eating dinner at not far off 2am.
Finally food is done and, as we settle down, Captain Fiendish plays his ace card and finds another setting on the AC, one with a permafrost logo. It’s ridiculously, unbelievably cold. Why do they do this??
Morning comes and we’re tempted to use the bread roll as a tool to knock the icicles off our noses. But we land ahead of schedule and, despite a gigantic queue for the airport exit which snakes all the way back to the baggage hall, we’re at our hotel shortly after 8.30am. For a fee (of course) they grant us early check in, very welcome, and throw in breakfast for good measure, equally welcome.
Sometimes the feeling of being in a magical city hits you in that very first moment, on the taxi ride in from the airport – and so it is with Rio de Janeiro as evocative names decorate traffic signs and towering mountains look past high rise buildings and out across the sparkling sea. Sugarloaf Mountain points its perfect morro rock shape skywards and rush hour traffic wrestles its way towards the hubs. Everything simultaneously glints in bright sun and drips in humidity, even at this hour.
Ten days in one place is a long stay for us: ten days in a hotel is even more unusual, but with the carnival season to add to Rio’s many other attractions, it’s not going to be difficult to fill our time. Our balcony looks across the strip out on to the golden sands of Copacabana beach which stretches a huge distance in each direction, multiple volleyball courts and football pitches along its course. Taking our first stroll along the strip is a major pinch-yourself moment, just soaking it in and thinking exactly where in the world we are: Copacabana Beach, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. A true travel dream becoming reality as we walk.
Bronzed bodies either laze in the sun or energetically occupy the volleyball courts, huge numbers of beach vendors hawk their wares, selling anything from caipirinha to espetinhos, bikinis to sunglasses, calling out their sales pitch in rhythmic chants. An occasional ghetto blaster throbs a beat across the sand; gentler acoustic music drifts over from the beach bars at roadside. There’s no way you can describe Copacabana as restful, this place is simply ALIVE. And it’s fabulous – and everything about it is just as we imagined it to be before we set foot on its powdery sand.
Tiny daytime food stalls form a long trailing mobile kitchen along the beach, each one then dismantled and moved to street side as darkness falls and the foot traffic migrates from sand to sidewalk. At the same time, the permanent beachside bars, each and every one of them the epitome of the perfect beach bar, fill with drinkers and diners, twinkling lights draw in customers and the sound of acoustic guitars and soulful singers fills the air. Caipirinha is everywhere, including in Michaela’s glass, while I imbibe my first tastes of Brahma beer. And boy that caipirinha packs a punch. These cocktails are not for learner drinkers.
Copacabana beach curves 2.5 miles around the seafront, a wide roadway providing space between the high rises and the sand; Atlantic rollers crash over the steep sandy shelf as the occasional giant container ship emerges from behind the headland and sets off towards unknown destinations. As we reach the “Morro Leme” end of the beach, we turn to soak up the stirring view of Copacabana’s sweeping bay and glinting buildings – and at that moment we catch our first glimpse of Christ The Redeemer, first peering through mountaintop clouds and then standing in true majesty against the clear sky beyond.
Such an iconic, mesmerising panorama: this sweeping seafront with its seemingly endless sands, its hundreds of beach bars, its gleaming high rise buildings, all watched over by the morro rocks and mountains, crowned ultimately by Cristo Redentor, Christ The Redeemer. If you’re not energised by this amazing view, then your batteries are well and truly dead.
From the moment you take to its manically busy streets, you cannot miss the fact that Rio is a city of verve and vitality, of life and action, a city of extremes. Music, chatter, vibrant colours, traffic jams, football, volleyball, coconuts and cocktails. Beneath it all the boom and swish of the Atlantic provides bass line and percussion. The dawning of carnival season is inescapably evident too: “it’s carnival time” says the guy on the bus, “time to drink and sleep, and if you can’t sleep, then you must drink some more”.
We are hugely, hugely indebted to Gilda at Traveller Interrupted for her faultless guidance on how to get the best from the coming weekend. On her advice, we have long since booked our seats in the Sambadrome for Sunday, joining one of the competing samba schools, Camarote Mar, for the celebration. Collecting our wristbands, goodie bag and team T-shirts goes like clockwork, following precisely the detail which Gilda had kindly and accurately provided; and, if the level of glitz at Camarote Mar HQ is anything to go by, Sunday is going to be seriously special.
And then there’s football. Of course, everybody knows that Brazil’s overriding passion is football (soccer), a passion which I, as you probably know, share wholeheartedly, and so I arrived in Rio really hoping for an opportunity to at least take a tour of that iconic mecca of world stadia, the Estadio Maracana. It’s with unbridled delight then that, shortly after arriving here, I spot a poster telling me that on just our second night here, two of Rio’s biggest clubs – Flamengo and Botafogo – are locking horns in that very stadium. Within minutes I’ve snared a couple of tickets and carry a smile almost as wide as the beach.
In our first 48 hours here, we have already been captivated by the verve of Copacabana; already been rapt by the pulsating heartbeat of the vibrant city of Rio de Janeiro, even before we really do justice to any of its major sites. And now, on top of all that, we’re off to see a football match in one of the absolute homes of world soccer. Maracana here we come. The Maracana. Just say it out loud and the skin tingles.
Now, if only I could get that damned Barry Manilow song out of my head….
30 Comments
Helen Devries
I’m not a beach person…but you could convert me in a trice with that post! And the chance to see a football match there…what an experience!
Toonsarah
What a wonderful start to your trip! You’re going to love the Maracana 😀 I still remember our taxi ride from the airport, talking football with our driver. when he heard how keen we were he said he could get us tickets for that evening’s match, and take us there and back, for a very reasonable cost. One of the best impromptu travelling decisions we’ve made! Despite the jet lag we loved the atmosphere there. We saw Botafogo play Vasco – we were cheering for the latter on the basis that they play in black and white stripes and when they threw away a 1-0 half-time lead it felt just like watching Newcastle!
I envy you the carnival experience – can’t wait to hear all about it!
Phil & Michaela
Maracana will be in next post, but wow Rio is definitely a whirlwind, especially just now!
Monkey's Tale
Oh I wish I were back there right now! Glad you’re loving it as much as we did, and hopefully your weather is better for your trip up to the Redeemer. Have some Pao de Queijo for me! Maggie
Phil & Michaela
Ha, will do. Redeemer visit was lucky weather wise, so good time for us and the other 90 million people who visited on the same day!
Monkey's Tale
I forgot to say, if you thought the plane was bad wait until you get on a bus! Bring warm clothes😊
Phil & Michaela
😂
leightontravels
Glad to hear you got there safe and sound and that you wasted absolutely no time in getting to grips with Copacabana. What a balcony view! And what a contrast, it strikes me, to our own view overlooking the mountains here in Tbilisi. Football and carnival… you guys are going to have an epic weekend by the sounds of things.
Phil & Michaela
Not a bad start, I have to say!
Suzanne@PictureRetirement
I think Rio has to be one of the sexiest cities in the world – along with Miami, of course. Ten days, wow. Pace yourselves guys, we aren’t in our twenties anymore…
Phil & Michaela
Very true! It’s a dirty job but someone’s gotta do it 😂😂
Heyjude
No wonder people get ill after flying! It’s a wonder you both don’t have pneumonia. What’s the weather like there? Hot? Humid? I have never been tempted by Rio. I just don’t enjoy crowds and beaches with skyscrapers, but you do make it look almost attractive especially with the swirly Portuguese paving. And I’d be quite happy to sit at one of those beach bars with a Caipirinha. Enjoy your football, and I will look forward to the carnival.
Phil & Michaela
Very, very sultry. I’m the opposite, I’ve dreamed of coming here for a long, long time. And so far we’re definitely not disappointed!
Lynette d'Arty-Cross
I’m a pilot and can explain about the cold cabin on long-haul flights. Actually, the temperature stays at a consistent 21C (outside, the temperature is about -60C). The reason you feel cold is because of a mild form of hypoxia at the high altitudes flown on those long flights (the higher altitudes help with efficient fuel consumption). So, it’s not any colder at 9pm than it is at midnight, but by then your body has been exposed to three hours of lower oxygen levels and that makes you cold. On my trans-Atlantic flights I always wore heavy socks (and usually a fleece, too) since my feet invariably got ice-cold.
Interesting opening post. Looking forward to reading about your further adventures. Cheers.
Phil & Michaela
That’s interesting all round, thank you for taking time to do that, much appreciated. I’d say a couple of things though…one, I hope you understood that the paragraphs about the flight were tongue-in-cheek and intended to be amusing…ironic humour is a very British thing and doesn’t always cross cultures well. In other words, we saw the funny side despite our moans and groans! The other thing is, we’ve done plenty of long hauls and night flights before, and no plane has ever been as cold as that, it was significantly different from normal. I’d even say there is no way that it was anywhere near 21C…houses heated to 21 don’t feel like that did 😂😂
grandmisadventures
Oh this post gives me all the feels from when I visited Rio. We stayed in a hotel right on the beach of Copacabana and I loved walking from one end of the beach to the other enjoying the beach scene and the black and white swirls of the sidewalk. 🙂
Phil & Michaela
It’s just soooo lively. It is, as we said, a whirlwind here!
Alison
Those freezing cold flights are a nightmare, must have been wonderful to feel the warmth on your bodies when you got out of the airport. Views from your balcony look amazing. Hope you’ve packed your dancing shoes, looking forward to seeing a video of some hip swivelling 💃🕺🏻
Phil & Michaela
Not to mention my little pink tutu…..😮
Gilda Baxter
Bem vindos a Cidade Maravilhosa!! I love this post, I can see you got what Rio is all about from day one. This post is almost poetry, you describe your experience in a way that it takes me back there.
Thank you so much for the mention, I hope you have a fantastic time at the Sambadrome and Camarote Mar. How amazing that you have already enjoyed a football game at Maracanã. Have a wonderful time, I am looking forward to following along.
WanderingCanadians
Ah yes, that’s one of the benefits of being vegetarian is that I often get my meal before everyone else on the plane. Despite the flight, it sounds like it was worth it to get to Rio and the Copacabana beach.
Phil & Michaela
I may have to convert if they keep me waiting that long again 😂. But wow what a city!
Lookoom
I’m delighted to read that your debut in Rio is going well. Your descriptions of Copacabana bring back so many happy memories. I think that the possibilities in Rio are so vast that everyone has a different, but always memorable, experience.
Phil & Michaela
And it goes on, as you will see from our next post!
Travels Through My Lens
Now that Barry Manilow song 🎶is stuck in my head as well. Looks absolutely fabulous. Enjoy every minute!
Phil & Michaela
I can only apologise for that!
wetanddustyroads
I think Captain Fiendish just wanted to make sure you guys would appreciate the hot weather in Rio after your ice cold flight! Oh my, I love Copacabana beach – what a stunning beach. Enjoy the views, soccer/football, the carnival, the drinks … what an amazing experience!
Phil & Michaela
This city is unique, Corna….especially at carnival time…..!
Andrew Petcher
Well worth the flight problems eventually.
Phil & Michaela
Oh yes!