Day 20: Rio - Santa Teresa and Cristo Redentor

Today...we take our chances with Rio's transportation system, in all of its various forms.

First, a metro bus to the subway and then, the famous Santa Teresa bondinho. Santa Teresa is a lot like San Francisco, in my opinion. It's very young, artsy, and set on very steep hills. The bonde (trolley cars) used to run all over Rio, but now the only one still functioning is in Santa Teresa.



The kids would hang off the sides (free ride if you don't require a seat) and the monkeys would watch from above.



Ian again got a lizard shot, since this was his third country, he was getting pretty good at the lizard shot by now.


Santa Teresa is one of the more shady parts of Rio, as it is surrounded by 7 of the poorest favelas in Brazil.

The houses often line their outer courtyards with broken glass on the top to keep out robbers.

One Australian tourist on our bondinho actually had his wallet stolen -- complete with 600 dollars inside. Yikes.

We got off and took a small walk around, catching some hearty feijoada, a traditional Brazilian bean and meat stew.


We caught the bonde back downhill (no seats left, so local hanging for us this time!)

We passed some interesting architecture -- a local boy told us the cone-shaped building was a large church.
We transfered by taxi to the Cosme Velho station to take the tram up to Cristo Redentor. The train ride us took us straight through the jungle.

To...Christ the Redeemer. (sadly, under renovation currently)


Still, you can tell why it was named one of the new 7 wonders of the world.

The views of Rio from above were also quite nice -- here's Ipanema, Leblon, and the lake that we biked around to get to the gardens yesterday.


Here's Sugar Loaf mountain in the distance.

And, of course, the classic spread-eagle tourist shot:

Ian reluctantly allowed me to drag him into doing it with me:

So ends another day...hang gliding tomorrow!

Day 19: Brazil - More Rio...

We woke up to yet another day of blue skies and sunshine. Perfect weather for a bike ride around the city and a visit to the botanical gardens.

Rio de Janeiro actually has some really nice bike paths, and they have a pretty lake in the middle of the city with very well-kept bike and jogging paths all the way around. You can even see the famous Christ the Redeemer statute in the far distance across the lake.



Check out the helicopter circling the statute.



After a pretty tiring uphill end to the ride, we finally get to the botanical gardens. The entryway actually reminded me a lot of Palm Drive at Stanford.



There was even a Claw-like fountain at the end of the path.



Ian made the most of this exercise in macro-photography.



Ian figured we'd leave it to Jim and Ann to provide the genus, species, and accompanying reference information.

I, of course, had my umbrella with me at all times China-style.

After another bike ride back to the hostel, we were royally famished. Perfect, because today was the day we would try out the authentic Brazilian barbeque experience. So much meat!

(although, to be fair, I'd like to draw your attention to the huge plate of salad I'd gotten to balance out the meal)

After lunch, the clouds started moving in, so we decided to leave Sugar Loaf mountain for another day.
Instead, it was time for a drink at the rooftop bar of the Hotel Othon. We passed some elaborate sand sculptures along the way.

The view from the Othon bar was worth the walk over there.


Especially after the sun went down.

Day 18: Brazil - Rio!

We got up later than usual after a lovely night's sleep, which, I forgot to mention, was prefaced by another bottle of complimentary honeymoon champagne, chocolate, and strawberries. (we clearly need to go on honeymoons more often).

Today was a day of relaxation to the max. Nothing but beaches for us. And we certainly picked a good day for the beach -- there were blue skies and clear waters galore.

It happened to be Brazil's independence day as well -- so there were random military helicopters and battleships cruising along the waves along with the swimmers:

There was even a submarine out for a spin.

There were also random street parades and random Stanford band run-esque street dance parties.

For lunch, we continued the spirit of relaxation and opted for the classic Brazilian fare of...


Pizza Hut. Ian was extremely happy with the pizza. The Brazilians add this cream cheese like stuff to the toppings which made it extra...heavy and horrible for your , or creamy and delicious -- depending on your point of view.

After lunch, more beach, closing out the evening with one of the best sunsets of the trip thus far. And even after the sun goes down, the beach party continues, with the Rio coastline making the best of backdrops (you can see the lights of Ipanema starting to light up along the shore).

Day 17: Travel Day -- Capetown to Jo'burg to Sao Paulo to Rio de Janeiro

This was our longest day to date. We got up at 3:00AM in order to drive to the airport, return the rental car, and check in for our 5:45 flight to Jo'burg. After a 2-hour flight, we then had to catch yet another flight, this time to Sao Paulo. Sidenote, we've discovered that we have a distinct knack for almost missing our flights due to bookstores. The first time it happened, we almost missed our flight to Hoedspruit because I was engrossed in "Confessions of a Shopaholic." The second time, we almost missed the Cape Town flight because I had to finish reading Shopaholic. This time, we again almost missed our flight because I picked up a South African version of "Sex and the City" -- clearly, chick lit is very mesmerizing.

The 10-hour flight to Sao Paulo was pretty grueling, but luckily, South African Air offered a great selection of free wine onboard all flights, so there was some comfort to be taken.


Once we arrived in Sao Paulo, we quickly made a bee-line for the ticket counter to see if there were any empty seats on the earlier flight to Rio. Luckily, there was! And thus we were saved from a 7-hour layover and another 1AM arrival in a strange city. Instead, we arrived in Rio around 7:30PM, got picked up by the courteous and capable Junio, who drove us straight to Inia's guesthouse in the Arpoador neighborhood of Rio. Even though it was only 9 o'clock or so Rio-time, we were completely beat (it was nearly midnight in South Africa time!). Direct to shower and bed (or, for Ian, a mumbled something about showering in the morning, and direct to bed).

Day 16 - South Africa - Cape of Good Hope & Robben Island

Attempt #2 at reaching the Cape of Good Hope. This time we cannot fail, since we woke up early in the morning.

The trick this time will be getting back to the Waterfront in time to catch the 1:00 ferry over to Robben Island. A few baboons tried to get in our way. One was guarding the entrance:

But we made it to the cape with plenty of time to check out the scenery via the funicular (yeah, yeah, I know you can hike it.)


First stop, the lighthouse.


The weather was nice, so the views from atop the hill were awesome. We ran into a Chinese tour group, and they helped us take this shot. Now that I think about it, we've encountered a Chinese tour group in every country of this trip. I guess that China's upper-middle is really growing!

Lots of people say that this is where you see the Atlantic ocean meet the Indian ocean (or at least where the two currents meet).

We weren't sure we could make that out, but the views of the Cape of Good Hope were enough to merit some pictures.


We headed down the hill again to check out the Cape of Good Hope in closer detail.


Of course, the requisite shot with the sign.
Still trying to figure out what it means to be "most South-Western." I guess if you drew a diagonal line between latitude and longitude and drug it across the Atlantic, the Cape of Good Hope would be the first point that it hits? I wonder what Africa's south-south-western-most point is.

We hiked around on the rocks for 15 minutes or so. Tried out some of the camera's timed-shot capabilities.

Before racing back to the Robben Island launch point. We were pretty rushed for time, so we grabbed a bite to eat from the local hotdog vendor. This one wins for worst-meal-of-the-trip. We ordered the double-dog with barbeque Chili. We had to throw away half of a "dog"... it was that bad.

The Robben Island ferry took about 20 minutes to arrive -- (by the way, many thanks to Chuck and Erin for making Robben Island possible -- really loving all the honeyfund items!) -- and we were immediately presented with stark photos of the history of the island as a prison for South Africa's political prisoners.

This, for example, is the limestone quarry where Nelson Mandela spent nearly 13 years working before he was freed and then voted President of the country. The little cave in the back was their toilet -- everyone had to share a single bucket on the ground.


This is his prison cell, pretty sparse.

Here is the prison's daily menu -- as you can see, even in prison, there was apartheid being practiced, with Asian and coloured prisoners getting more food than the black prisoners.


The island is clearly no longer a prison today, and with the wildflowers and wildlife and ocean views, seems almost a pleasant place to be.


I even snapped a picture of Big Bird from the bus:


The ferry trip back also provided some nice views of Cape Town, including the rare clear views of Table Mountain:


As this was our last night in Cape Town, we decided we had to get at least one meal of African game. Here's Ian's plate of ostrich, springbok, and kudu. Looks just like beef, eh?
The place we went, Marco's African Cafe, specializes in game meats -- and we lucked out by choosing to visit on a Jazz night -- so we rounded out our Cape Town week with some "jazz", African style.