We are now in Rio de Janeiro.

We started the day with a nice breakfast in the hotel and then returned to our room to finish packing. We left the hotel at about 9:00am and headed for the Foz do Iguaçu airport. Getting through the airport was a bit chaotic and it was a relief to finally get on the plane. The two-hour flight was pleasant enough and the time seemed to pass quite quickly. On arrival we were picked up by our driver for the trip to the hotel. The trip should have taken about 45 minutes but construction in one of the tunnels on the way meant that we sat in the traffic for about an hour and a quarter. We were very relieved to get to our hotel, the beautiful Copacabana Palace, right on Copacabana Beach. We have a magnificent suite, with a balcony that looks over the hotel’s pool and out over Copacabana Beach.

The Copacabana Palace.
The Copacabana Palace.

Once we had checked in our plan was to have a bite to eat and relax in the hotel. However, after checking the weather forecast, we decided that today could be our best day of weather so we decided to head to Corcovado (which means “hunchback” in Portuguese), a 710 metre granite peak in the city, to see the Cristo Redentor (Christ the Redeemer) statue. We hired a driver to act as our tour guide and we set off from the hotel with him at about 4:30pm. We managed to get to Corcovado just in time to catch the last tram of the day to the peak. We were very lucky to be able to get straight on the tram and head up. Our guide (Evandro) told us that he had taken some visitors earlier in the week to see the statue and the wait time to get on the tram was four and a half hours! We got to the top in time to see a beautiful sunset over the city. The statue is 30 metres tall and sits on a base of 8 metres in height. It is made of reinforced concrete and weighs 635 tons. It is a very impressive sight.

The Cristo Redentor statue.
The Cristo Redentor statue.

We stayed at the top of Corcovado until the sun had set, to watch the city of Rio de Janeiro light up. The panoramic views of the city at night from the top of the mountain are magnificent.

The view of Rio de Janeiro at night from the top of Corcovado.
The view of Rio de Janeiro at night from the top of Corcovado.

After about two hours on the mountain, we hopped back in the car and had a nice relaxing drive back to the hotel.

We are opting for a light dinner tonight in our room and will probably have a fairly early night. We are not sure what we are doing tomorrow so we’ll probably just see what the day brings. We have a few things we want to do but we’ll check out the weather to see what makes the best sense. It was lovely and warm today (about 30C) but the forecast for the next couple of days suggests that there could be a little rain on the way and that it may be a little cooler.