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Time To Go
When the plane touches down in São Paulo on Friday morning it will be precisely four weeks since we made our way to Rio airport for our hastily organised and unexpected journey home, and frankly there hasn’t been much to shout about in those four weeks. Unless you are given to shouting about rain. One of the anticipated joys back when we were first planning long term travel was to escape the English winter. That word – winter – conveys, in many parts of the world, images of pristine white snow, frozen lakes and icicles hung from the eaves of roofs. It’s not like that in England, oh no. Winter…
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Returning To Brazil
It’s been a strange start to 2024. We can’t quite recall now why we decided to delay the start of our travels until February and give ourselves the whole of dull January at home in England. Had we had an inkling of what February would bring, we may have made different plans – but of course an event such as a family bereavement is not a predictable one. Our long journey through Brazil and into the USA was meant to last from the first week of February till the last week of May, but of course was cut short by the unfortunate news and we headed back home on Day…
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February 29th: Remember The Last One?
A post this morning by Lynette at In the net! was our prompt for these thoughts today… Where were you last time we had a 29th day of February? Cast your mind back. The news channels were by now full of stories emanating from a city called Wuhan, which most of us had never heard of before, about a killer virus, with all sorts of side issues including city lockdowns and the consumption of live bats, to name just two. Yet really, even then, on “Leap Year Day” 2020, we had no idea of how radically the world’s entire landscape was to change in the next three weeks. On this…
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Concluding Rio: Sugarloaf, Rocinha And Tijuca
Sugarloaf Mountain is, like Copacabana, Ipanema and Christ The Redeemer, an icon of this famous city. Reached by cable car from the neighbourhood of Urca, the double summit of Morro de Urca and then Sugarloaf itself provide yet more fabulous, panoramic views of the city, viewed from the opposite perspective to that of Corcovado. Thankfully a bit less crowded than the platform at Christ’s feet was, the peaks here also feature a number of paved trails through the surrounding hillside forest where vultures circle overhead, birds squawk in the trees and patterned lizards dart away from human footfall. Just like up at The Redeemer, it’s a joy to simply linger…
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24-Hour Party People: Up All Night In Rio
We are now just about to commence the long trip home after the news of Michaela’s father’s death. The following post was due to be next up before we received that news. There is one more Rio post to come after we arrive home….. Well, we’ve done it. We weren’t sure how we would react to partying all night, but we arrive back at the hotel while breakfast is being served and dive straight into the caffeine rush of Brazilian coffee, grab a couple of hours’ kip and then force ourselves to wake before lunchtime to start the day and avoid any jet-lag style slump. By the middle of the…
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Rio Carnival: Pageants, Parties….And Pickpockets
I am so angry with myself for letting it happen. We came to Rio knowing everything about its high rate of petty crime, knowing it’s a centre of the theft universe, came here knowing we had to take extra precautions, be doubly careful, and yet we only reach Day 4 and it’s happened to us. As you will see. But first, the Maracana….. There’s still around 90 minutes till kick-off as we enter the stadium, plenty of time to watch both sets of supporters fill their respective ends and make a start on creating an electric atmosphere. They do just that, and they do it in style – the whole…
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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…
- Brazil, Central America, Europe, Greece, Independent travel, North America, Photography, South America, Thailand, Travel Blog, USA, Wildlife
Countdown To Rio
It’s that time again. Never mind counting the days, we’re just arriving at the stage where we’ll be counting the hours until we lock the doors behind us and head to Heathrow to start our next great adventure. The exotic, vibrant city of Rio de Janeiro awaits, one of the world’s greatest carnivals about to begin, romantic sounding locations like Copacabana, Ipanema and Corcovado soon to be on our doorstep. It’s a little over a week until the journey begins. After waking up on New Year’s Day many thousands of miles from home in each of the last two years, this feels like a late start for us and the…
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264 And Counting
Being just a little bit addicted to making lists, we have kept a note of every city, town and village outside of Great Britain where we have stayed since we started travelling together in 2011. Not a list of everywhere we’ve visited, that would be too long a list, but a list of every place where we have stayed overnight for at least one night. One night, though, is enough to qualify. The number currently stands at 264 at the end of the year, so we’ll be hoping to push it beyond 300 during 2024. Putting the 264 into alphabetical order, the list runs from Acton (California) to Zermatt, in…
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Concluding Cape Verde
We’re so pleased that we’ve taken the option to walk to the taxi rank rather than arrange a pick up. Carrying our backpacks makes it obvious we’re leaving town, and as we make our way down Avenida Pescadora the walk becomes a succession of farewells which almost makes us feel like we’re leaving behind a lifetime’s friendships. “I take this”, says one of the crew who is always pushing out or hauling in the fishing boats, as he takes the garbage bag off our hands and carries it to the street bin. Next there’s the guy at the craft shop on the corner, then Mustafa the artist, and the girl…
