We took a night bus from Sao Paulo and after 6 hours sleep we‘ve reached Rio de Janeiro. The bus was „leito“ type meaning that it‘s possible to adjust the seat and make it almost like a bed. It was really comfortable and smooth ride. Another good thing is that when taking the bus you can go from one central station to another without going to airports which can be far away from the cities.
Rio de Janeiro welcomed us with sunny morning and the next thing to do was to find a city bus going to Recreio dos Bandeirantes where our Couchsurfing host Jacob lives. The bus station is nice and new itself, but the neighborhood didn‘t look that well. Anyway, after wandering around a bit we have found a bus stop and after 15min the bus (No. 315) finally came. The bus had to take ~3 hours, however it took only 1,5 hour as bus drivers drive like they are racing in F1. Recreio is a nice district, right on the beach which is also a great surfing spot. Jacob who is originally Norwegian lives there with his two Brazilian sons and seems really enjoys it there.
The same day we went to see Tijuca park up the mountain to check some fabulous viewing spots. You can see the whole Rio and also a Jesus statue. There are many amazing trails, so it‘s possible to spend days if not weeks exploring this park. One of the most famous viewing spots is Vista Chinese which is named so, because Chinese immigrants have been growing tea in this area for a while.
After coming back from the park we still had a couple of hours to enjoy the beach and quite warm (~21 C) water (Brazilians said it’s cold). Anyway Donatas wasn’t very lucky and got his foot finger cut with something sharp in the sand, probably glass. It was bleeding pretty badly, so we went to lifeguards who helped to stop the bleeding, but didn’t have any disinfection liquid, anyway Ieva managed to get some from one of the local bars. Flash forward, wound healed in ~1 week with no complications. It’s only a bit pity that Donatas couldn’t surf in really nice surfing spot there.
The next day it was Mother‘s day in Brazil which is really important and big day in Brazil. We have walked across the beach for a half of the day, stopping a few times to have a cold beer which is kind of Sunday tradition in Brazil. After that we went to a local park where we saw some crocodiles living in sewage (!) next to it. We‘ve also managed to see some smaller ones living in the park, also turtles and capybaras. What‘s interesting is that crocodiles don‘t seem to be aggressive, living in the same pond with turtles, so not that picture we imagined. The same day we also had to go inside local favela, but as it was Mother‘s day it was a bit unsafe as everybody was getting drunk there, so we left this for one of the next days. We‘ve also tried locally caught fried shrimps which were perfect and, of course, a capirinha to finish the day. After getting back home we spent the whole evening playing PlayStation with Jacob‘s sons.
On Monday we left Jacob‘s home and went to Rio center where we stayed with Katia (through Airbnb). She lives in a nice and safe neighborhood (Gloria) next to downtown. She is a retired psychologist living in really nice and big apartment with a great view from it. And the elevator goes straight to her apartment(!). After we got settled we went to see the center part of the city: interesting and modern Cathedral, Aqueduct, lots of churches, Theater building, National Monument etc. Unfortunately tram to Santa Terese hill is still not working after being closed in 2011 after a deadly incident when 5 people died. Guys working there said that it should open in a month or two which could be a lot in Brazilian standards.
On Tuesday it was another beautiful sunny day, so we have decided to visit both Sugarloaf mountain and Jesus statue. We tried to go there in the beginning, but unfortunately after last night storm the train going up was closed, so we had to turn around and go to Sugarloaf instead. Views are amazing from both Sugarloaf and Urca rock which is a bit below it, definitely worth a visit if you‘re in Rio. We also saw some nice little monkeys waiting for tourists to give them something to eat. After Sugarloaf mountain we went to try again the Corcovado mountain with Jesus Christ statue. The train was already working and we climbed up. Both the statue and views from top are amazing and as we came later in the day, we also had a chance to see Rio lights from above as it was getting dark already.
The next morning we went to Ipanema and Copacabana beaches. Both are nice, but we liked Ipanema much more, it‘s cleaner and not so crowded as Copacabana. Because of the storm waves in the ocean were huge, so there were lots of surfers trying to catch them. It was really great to see how they catch and rides those big waves (probably ~3-4 meters).
After lunch we finally went to see a favela. We have visited Rocinha which is the biggest in Rio and hosts ~200000 people, however the exact number is unknown. The favela itself is very different – from the parts that look the same as normal city to really bad ones with lots of small chaotic buildings and narrow streets between them. Some of them probably never sees sunlight. People living in favela get some most important things for free like water, electricity, school etc. Looks like people don‘t want to pay for anything and want that government would give them everything for free like build new houses as one of previous presidents did. Our guide told that it‘s actually pretty safe in favela as people hate robbers there, however for example it‘s possible to get in the middle of police and drug dealers clash which would be really dangerous. We saw some heavy armed police officers, so it seems the „cleaning“ of favelas is not over yet. In general, it was really interesting to see favela from inside and find out that people live there is not that bad, most of them have even the satellite TV.
Rio left us better impression compared to Sao Paulo, however probably because there is much more to see in Rio and naturally it‘s just nicer to live in a city which has perfect weather, nice beaches and friendly people. Ieva thinks that she would probably like to live in Rio, however Donatas still prefers California as there is a bit more order there. Also we would need to learn Portuguese..
Local highlights:
- Thin line between „safe“ and „unsafe“ in the city. We didn‘t have any incidents, so in our opinion if not doing stupid things like going to favela to buy drugs, it‘s a really safe city.
- Prices can be really different for locals and tourists, however most of the places have the same prices for everyone as there is actually such law.
- Local transport. The bus drivers go really fast, however we didn‘t see any accidents, so it‘s safe (probably). It‘s possible to anywhere in the city by taking the bus and in most cases it will be really fast. Metro is also nice and comfortable, for example, it‘s a great connection between city center and beaches. Also there are separate train cars for women which Donatas learned the „hard“ way.
The most interesting places:
- Sugarloaf mountain
- Christ statue and train going up to it
- Favela
- Crocodiles’ park
- Vista Chinese viewing point
- Bars on the beach serving great Capirinhas
- Ipanema surfing spot
- Local cafe next to Katia home with great food and friendly locals