Arrived here about 10 last night. What an awesome sight cruising into this bay with our first sight of the Sugar Loaf mountain and the statue of Christ the Redeemer on the twice as high Corcovado mountain. We were really sorry and quite emotional to leave our lovely ship and friends. We now have a fantastic view of Copacabana beach from our 25th floor sea view room. A bit scarey out on the balcony. This afternoon we've toured the city, seen Ipanema Beach, the fantastic modern cathedral which seats 4000 and been up Sugar Loaf in the cable car! Ipanema means dangerous water in the local Indian language and you can see why! The waves are absolutely mountainous and crash onto the beach like thunder sending plumes of spume up as high as a building. What a contrast from the gentleness of "The Girl From Ipanema"! On the top of the granite Sugar Loaf we saw marmoset monkeys and the fantastic view of the bay. The frigate birds wheeling around give the place a sort of primeval feel because they look like pterodactyls!
20% of the 8 milion RDJ inhabitants live in the favelas which climb up the mountains all around. They're all illegal and have only steps up the steep mountainsides to them but I guess they have the best views from their shacks they could have in all the world. Tomorrow it's Christ the Redeemer and the long journey home.
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ReplyDeleteHi Val and Bill,
ReplyDeleteWhat a fantastic holiday you have had!!
In a way I am sorry that it has come to an end, we have really enjoyed sharing your adventures and seeing the photos on the blog.
Looking forward to seeing you both again - we have missed you!
Will you be back in time for Arty Farty Val? - bit low on numbers, and I have booked you in for Aqua on Saturday although you must be superfit after all that swimming on board!
So..........It's back to sunny Baildon
See you soon
Love Jean and Ron xxx
p.s. I made a right mess of my first blog so I took it off and re-did it - thats why there are 2 from me!
Enjoy your last day in Rio and have a safe journey home. Back to reality for you two.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the wonderful trip that you took all of us on.... loved keeping up with your travels and adventures and seeing your photos.
Love,
Jim and Pat
What a great holiday. Enjoy the last day, and have a safe journey home. Looking forward to seing you both again.
ReplyDeleteLove, Malcolm & Wendy
Man! Can you keep this thing going? It's been entertaining.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you can start keeping a regular Baildon blog - afterall, it's a pretty unique perspective on life...
Call me to let us know you got back ok.
Love,
Dncn
Thanks to you all for your wonderful comments. It gave us a real thrill to know you were following us. It is a great way of sharing - and we'll keep the blog going because - we couldn't get onto the internet as much as we'd have liked so, last thing at night, Val and I both wrote our own diaries of each day. Val's is beautifully illustrated with her artwork, relevant postcards, mementos etc. Mine is on the backs of credit card receipts etc. - so must be recorded before they go through the washing machine. (No - I never remember to empty my pockets before I finally decide to consign a pair of trousers to the wash basket. Well - as an excellent comedian said on one of the cruise shows - as a man, I don't actually put anything in the wash basket. Ladies: if you want a man to do that, you must leave the lid off so he can use it for basketball practice!)
ReplyDeleteWith all the activities, I don't think we got to sleep before 1am each night and we had to be up again for the start of each days programme at 7. So now we need a holiday to get over our holiday!