At the Copa...Copacabannnnaaa...

Yup, we are in Rio de Janeiro, the plastic surgery capital of the world! (a plastic surgeon told me this info..:) Uh, I meacaine of the largest cities in Brazil....and I am staring out our hotel window at the broad expanse of the ocean and Copacabana Beach. We are on the 18th floor of the Porto Bay Hotel or as we lovingly refer it to it as "the Penthouse"..:) We arrived yesterday quite early since our flight was changed to O'Dark thirty. A 2 hour plane ride from Salvador and we were here. Our Rio guide was there promptly to pick us up and take us to our hotel. Both H and I were pretty out of it but soon we woke up after being taken to our new digs. They let us check in early, thank goodness. Arriving in our room, we immediately walked onto our little terrace and WOW! It was a WOW moment! Much more beautiful than I ever imagined for sure.

Views from our room

 

The guide told us on our 45 min. ride to the hotel that Rio has gotten a bad rap as far as safety goes. Just be smart, do not carry lots of cash, jewelry, etc. I was so relieved to hear this. 

The minute we set foot on the beach, I felt perfectly safe. As safe as any big city anyways. After a snack in the room, we went for a run on the beach. There is a bike/run path along the beach for miles, onto Ipanema Beach and beyond. We ran about 10 min. when H felt a terrible pull in this bad calf. The old injury reared it's ugly head and we had to walk back. Damn! We are hoping that it is temporary and that we can give a run/walk shot at it today.

Heading to the beach in front of us, we picked up beach chairs and towels from the hotel assistant. I even brought my IPad. Soon after sitting a few minutes I laid down, rested my head on it and promptly feel asleep! The IPad pillow was perfect! We hung out for a bit there, then up on the rooftop pool above us at our hotel. The views of the city and beaches from up there are outstanding! A bit of cloud cover, it never got really hot at all. The summer breeze coming off the ocean makes it perfect weather wise so far. 

About a half block away, we found dinner at an Arabian/Brazilian restaurant. We ate a totally vegetarian dinner and on the way saw "Fox Sports" setup near the beach-looked like Beach Volleyball Tournament was going to be played there? All of Brazil is abuzz with the fact that the World Cup Soccer Tournament will be played in several Brazilian cities in 2014. Then, the summer Olympics will be here in 2016. Our guide told us this is one reason why Rio is safer than before. The policia are apparently trying to take over the "favelas", which are parts of the city where Drug Lords have ruled in the past. The new effort is for these slums to be safer and more friendly when many Nations come to compete for these sporting events. 

Today, we enjoyed a delicious buffet breakfast with everything you can imagine for breakfast-there was even little hot dogs...gosh I am not one for beans and hotdogs for breakfast but I am sure some are! 

Our guide "Paulo" picked us up at 8:30 to make our way to the tram which goes up to the "Christ the Redeemer" statue. Paulo is a vast improvement from the last guide.This statue is probably the most familiar things folks think of when they think of Brazil. It is one of the 7 wonders of the world. I feel very blessed we got to see 2 of the 7 while we were in S.A. (Iguazu Falls plus this). The tram was a pretty steep 15 minute ride to the top. The air was a mass of fog on the ocean when we woke up today. It really looked like it might lift as the sun was trying to peek out. But we were not so lucky this time. The clouds socked in the famous statue most of our visit there. We could not see any of the city view we were suppose to see-guess I will have to rely on the picture of the picture! The sun did come out a very few moments so I got the Christ statue with blue sky in the background on a couple photos. On the way back, we got entertained by some musicians on the tram..

What we were "suppose to see" 

Christ the Redeemer 

Beautiful little chapel room below the statue. Very peaceful And serene

Trying to wait it out for the sun to come out..

 

The sun came out for one brief shining moment.

 

We got back to the hotel around noon. Then, it happened...It finally happened..it rained all afternoon today! Oh well it had to happen sometime! Good thing we had not gone out to the beach to run yet today. H's leg is better, not perfect yet. So we settled for a run on the treadmill while watching the rain fall around us in the picture window of the ocean on the 20th floor. Not a bad alternative! :)

We enjoyed the rest of the day just hanging out..not a bad way to spend a Tuesday in Rio!

One of the "favelas" 

 Rain/fog on the beach

During our morning tour

The end of a yet another beautiful day..

  

 

Day in the jungle, fishing, swimming and canoeing

I know my blog posts are out of order. It was virtually impossible to post pics in the jungle. Bear with me..I should get straightened out soon! :)

 Today was another beautiful Amazonia jungle day!! After breakfast, Hartley went fishing...yes fishing...for piranhas, on a boat with one of the guides and other guests. Apparently, he had fun! And has the pictures to prove it! 

 

Fishing pirañas for sport..I don't really get it!

I, on the other hand, stayed behind to pay our monthly bills. Usually this is not an issue, even from afar but since the Internet here is quite sketchy (in the Amazon?? Really??I know, what should I expect, huh?). After all this place is so wonderful, I assumed it would be one step above camping in the jungle, should have been pleased even if it just had running water! So after struggling with this for a couple of hours, I gave up..

 H and I went for another swim in the Amazon River, which should scare us right? The staff assured us there were no creatures..I am trying to figure out, if this is the same jungle that we saw S.A's deadliest snake in yesterday, then how is there nothing bad in the river? Again,the water was amazingly warm. We swam a bit further today, maybe 350 yards or so. The person who got out of the river before us said she had seen a pink dolphin out there. I would have loved to see him too but alas, no dolphins wanted to brush me with good luck today..

After the refreshing swim and lunch, I settled in our room to read a book. I have read 3 books so far, I am on my 4th. Since I only read while I travel, I have alot of literature to catch up on! Especially when there is no TV, as here. Then I started to drift off and the air conditioning stopped, just like that...I could not get it to turn on. We told the staff, they sent a guy, who came back after it quit 3 times in a row. Oh well, so much for my jungle nap! The result was we moved into the other half of the cottage we are in. I would have loved to be upgraded to the "Royal Suite" or whatever they call the rooms that are $250 more a night but it is not available! The good news is we got a bunch of stuff packed, and since we are hiking all day tomorrow in the jungle and leaving early Thursday AM, it ended up being OK..

Next we went off to do a  canoe ride inside the jungle tributaries

 

 

 

 

We worked hard canoeing trying to avoid all the brush in the stream..Fun, fun, fun! And so amazingly beautiful and calming..

Day 5

 After breakfast this morning, we boarded a boat along with a family with 3 kids and we were off for an all day hike in the forrest. I was committed to put my patient pants on today. They were really well behaved kids, which helped! We drove by small boat about 50k upstream on the river. It was a relaxing smooth ride all the way. 

Even though I have slept like a baby since we got to the jungle, for some reason, last night I could not fall asleep. We are in a new room because the A.C. broke in the room next door. I don't know if this was weird for me or what. At any rate I was really tired all day. We arrived at the place where the hike began, many miles from anywhere, even any villages. We had 2 guides, one who has been with us most of the time, "Robbie". Even though he stopped to show us giant spiders and bats along the way, I still rather like the guy! He totally traumatized the little girl with us as he showed us how you can take a bunch of ants, crumble them up in your hand and use it as insect repellent. The little girl hated the ants and it took her mom several minutes to calm her hysterical daughter. Robbie skipped the ants after that!

We hiked about an hour and a half. It was pretty challenging as the mud and hills made it pretty slippery at times. We saw some very cool caves. I continued to get bit by mosquitos, which has been the case much of our time here, even lathered up with probably the most toxic DEET we had. H did not get bit hardly at all. I am very glad I finally found a way to stomach the anti-milaria pills! The guide had frightened me into making that work.. After a brief stop, we started back. The little kids were as strong if not stronger on the trails as we made our way to the boat. Another short ride and were at the "watchtower" to have lunch. We hiked up to the tower after lunch and enjoyed the view over the tops of the forrest canopy. 

The Resident jungle keeper's "house"

We saw bats, spiders and ants that freaked the poor kid out that was with us..

Next we hit a "beach" on the river where we were suppose to swim but a squall was brewing above us and even the little ones did not stay in long. H swimmer a bit to wash off the bug juice. We headed back to the Lodge in the rain, I was glad they had taken the "covered boat". I was very happy and relieved to get back, my heart just was not into jungle hiking I guess. The electricity went off throughout the lodge for a bit, this has happened everyday almost usually during cloud cover. Such is life int he jungle-still beats camping any day!

We are scheduled to leave the Amazon tomorrow and head back to Manaus, where we will take another tour there then start the plane odyssey once more. This time we are coming armed with printed sheets regarding the whole luggage issue. We hope it is enough! By tomorrow night, we should be tucked away in a nice hotel in Salvador, Brazil..

 

Day 3 in the jungle

 I am sleeping better here in the jungle better than ever. The beds or pillows are not so comfortable but the sounds of the frogs, the fresh jungle air-whatever..it is wonderful!

In the morning we went to the closest village by boat. It has 16,000 people, which surprised me. Before we ventured into the village we were taken to a dock where they feed pink dolphins. They are not held captive, they just come in from the river for "feeding time" twice a day. They were so cute but something about them not really being in their own habitat made it not as enjoyable as I thought it would be-think Disneyland.. However, I did get to pet one of the 16 dolphins at the feed. I still love dolphins-pink, grey, river, ocean-it is all good!

 

In the Village

Chilling' on the Amazon..

A place in the  town we stopped in..

 

Afternoon, we went hiking in the jungled for about 3 hours. Our guide Robbie was wonderful! He pointed out probably 20 plants/herbs that could be used for medicinal and practical uses. A huge medicine chest all over the Amazon jungle! "Injuns", the term for the indigenous people can easily live off the land..also teak and many types of wood can be used for furniture. Leaves are stripped and weaved into baskets, etc..Robbie made me a crown of woven leaves..I was queen of the jungle?

 

Hartley being Tarzan

All of a sudden, the guide was in front of me and stopped short and caught his breath..his eyes opened wide as he stepped back towards us. Slowly, he pointed to the ground just beside the trail. A snake! he said. Ok, I have seen snakes before. However-he told us quietly that this one was a deadly snake- "Fer De Lance", one of the most poisonous in the jungle..that was enough for me to step as far as I could away without getting off the trail. I never saw it with my eyes, it blended so well into the brush. The guide however, took my camera and took a great close-up shot of the little guy..holy smokes! H saw it, I never got close enough. The guide had warned us at the start of the hike that there were several deadly snakes in this jungle. The Boa constrictor is interestingly not one of them..that surprised me. Robbie said since it is "dry" right now, the snakes are more prevalent. Yikes!! I guess so! 

Fer De Lance snake. One of the most poisonous snakes in the world!

After that I stayed right behind Robbie. I stepped exactly where he stepped, walked exactly his pace. I did not want to accidentally run into any more new Amazonian reptile friends! We hiked until the turn around. The wind started to blow and we heard loud thunder. Again Robbie looked concerned and said We better get back quickly. The dead branches could fall on us from the wind.." OK, another adventure at hand. We quickly walked back to the boat as it started drizzling a bit. The wind howled. Once in the boat we saw the river and it was amazingly choppy for a usually calm, still river. Short ride back to the pier and we were safely home..

After lunch, the storm had passed. We went for a swim in the river..I was nervous because when H was swimming, I saw his limbs had an orange tint under water. This, as explained to me by Robbie, is the acidic nature of the river water..it is "tannin"(sp.?). It is good for your skin, hair, detox. I jumped in and the water was so warm and lovely. I swam about 200 yards and I was pooped..it seems my new sport archery, has made my arms weary! I found myself thinking if this was close by in ABQ, I would be swimming in it everyday..home seems VERY far away these days..

          The dock where we swim

I felt so refreshed after the swim.,I miss not being able to go for a run, but you would not catch me dead (or not dead) running in the jungle by myself after the snake incident! Well unless I was running from a snake! I am making this my "rest week". The food is good and I am trying to stock my body up with vege and fruits to make up for all the meat and potatoes I gorged on in Argentina! The desserts are just OK, so cutting down on that too is not a problem right now.

At night, H went "night spotting" again, they had one extra spot in the boat:

A "tiny" Boa Constrictor

Little frogy

Random River pics

H admiring a jungle tree

The lodge has some interesting and annoying features. The Anavilhanas Lodge charges for any drinks, including water. They leave a liter bottle in your room for "free" per day, then charge you for any water consumed beyond that. For such a nice, otherwise first class Jungle Lodge it just seems weird! I would much rather pay up front for all the extras then not have to worry-like a cruise! :)

The dining room

 

 

 

 

Not a big deal in the scheme of life in the jungle. We are having such amazing experiences that we will probably never see again-I can't complain too much!! Dozed off to dream of spiders and snakes..

 

 

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