After James
being with me for the past 10 days it was time for him to slip back into
reality and head on back to England. His
flight wasn't until quite late at night, so we decided to make it a slightly
productive day. After getting up
reasonably early, packing up and checking out, we left the bags in reception
and headed to a small region just past Copacabana and Botafogo called Urca
which houses 'Pão de Açúcar' (Sugar Loaf Mountain).
To get to the top of Sugar Loaf there are two cable cars which hang precariously over the dense Rainforest part of Urca. The first car travels to a small peak with great views over the North and East of Rio and it looks directly over the Domestic airport where planes were continuously taking off and landing.
The second cable car journey is a lot longer and a lot steeper to get the main peak of Sugar Loaf; however definitely worth it as the views from the top were amazing and in a way slightly better than those at Cristo Redentor as the peak is not as high; therefore there is less of a haze across the city from the sun. From the peak of Sugar Load there are great photo opportunities across the Copacabana with Cristo setting the back drop high above.
Culture out of the way, it was time to get a bit more sun just in case it begun to fade; so we headed to the pool to chill out and for Kate and I to plan the movement for the next few days.
Gun and games out of the way, it was now time to hit the reality of traveling by checking into the first hostel of the tour...
'El Misti House' was located on one of Copacabana's side streets fairly close to the hotel; so we were pretty clued up on the area. The room wasn't the worst that I've seen: 6 bed dorm; however for the first two nights there was nobody else in there so managed to et a few decent hours of sleep.
Facilities were basic and one of the staff ran a pretty tight ship; scrutinising everyone and not allowing use of the kitchen during parts of the day. Other than that, can't complain. The main reception guy - Freddie - was cool and gave us some good tips on where to go and what to do. When asking do you where "Casa da chasca" is, he just laughed and said 'of course!! I live off of the stuff'.
Before piling James into a taxi the three of us took a last walk along the Copa at Sunset and then found a small bar on the front for a few Caiparinhas.
x
To get to the top of Sugar Loaf there are two cable cars which hang precariously over the dense Rainforest part of Urca. The first car travels to a small peak with great views over the North and East of Rio and it looks directly over the Domestic airport where planes were continuously taking off and landing.
The second cable car journey is a lot longer and a lot steeper to get the main peak of Sugar Loaf; however definitely worth it as the views from the top were amazing and in a way slightly better than those at Cristo Redentor as the peak is not as high; therefore there is less of a haze across the city from the sun. From the peak of Sugar Load there are great photo opportunities across the Copacabana with Cristo setting the back drop high above.
Culture out of the way, it was time to get a bit more sun just in case it begun to fade; so we headed to the pool to chill out and for Kate and I to plan the movement for the next few days.
Gun and games out of the way, it was now time to hit the reality of traveling by checking into the first hostel of the tour...
'El Misti House' was located on one of Copacabana's side streets fairly close to the hotel; so we were pretty clued up on the area. The room wasn't the worst that I've seen: 6 bed dorm; however for the first two nights there was nobody else in there so managed to et a few decent hours of sleep.
Facilities were basic and one of the staff ran a pretty tight ship; scrutinising everyone and not allowing use of the kitchen during parts of the day. Other than that, can't complain. The main reception guy - Freddie - was cool and gave us some good tips on where to go and what to do. When asking do you where "Casa da chasca" is, he just laughed and said 'of course!! I live off of the stuff'.
Before piling James into a taxi the three of us took a last walk along the Copa at Sunset and then found a small bar on the front for a few Caiparinhas.
x
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