Rio and beaches

Rio de Janeiro is the coolest city in South America. I am sure it is, even if I haven't seen most of South American cities. It just must be! Our sightseeings started from Rio's botanic garden. When Bruno with Katia made this suggestion I thought that it wasn't such a good idea as I imagined it as boring as other botanic gardens I have seen before. But this one actually turned out to be very good. There were huge size palms planted along alleys which looked really impressive. They also were very old, planted more than a hundred years ago. Besides there were many other plants and trees, orchids orangery, and lots of monkeys. Our big group immediately took out cameras and everyone tried to do as many pictures as possible. Monkeys also were interested in our cameras. One of them tried to steal a camera from Olga, luckily she spotted monkey's intentions on time.



There are fantastic beaches and locals go there very often be it swimming, walking or just enjoying or hanging around on the beach. The most famous beach of Rio is Copacabana beach. It's very long and very clean with very soft and pleasant sand. I loved the lifestyle of local people. Even in the early morning at 5-6 a.m. you could find many joggers in Copacabana beach pedestrian road. I was really surprised by how Brazilians take care of their physical appearance, seeing man and women exercising in the streets which was actually very inspiring. I am not a big fan of sports, but when I was in Rio I went for jogging couple of times. I woke up early and followed the pedestrian way along the seaside until the end of Copacabana beach and then all the way back. Katia and Bruno who also went jogging suggested to take a different path and jog along the beach on sand. I took their advice and ran on the sand bare feet which was more challenging as sand was very soft and when waves would approach me I would have to run quicker to avoid them. Sometimes I couldn't, so my shorts were all wet.

People in Brazil wear Havaianas, which I think deserve to be mentioned. Those shoes are the most popular shoes in Brazil, everyone wears them, reach and poor, tall and small, children and adults... Basically they are never out of fashion. And they are very addictive too. Once I bought my first pair I started to think about the second. Then I bought the second, I started to think about the third. And I was about to buy the third pair when I pictured in my head London's weather and realised that Brazil is probably going to be the last place to wear them, so I stopped right on time.


Copacabana beach pictures
Copacabana pavement mosaic. Symbolizing coffee and milk
















One day we went to see Ipanema beach. Another famous (2-ond famous) beach of Rio, probably best knows for the song called (Girl from Ipanema), which is known by every Brazilian and was a huge hit in the mid-1960s wordwide. I personally have never heard that song before, but had a chance to familirise myself with it. Katia can even sing it in Portugese, which she did together with Bruno. And some pictures of Ipanema beach.