I arrived in Rio feeling better but not recovered from my bout with Dengue. My expectations for carnival were based on what I know about Mardi Gras. Although the reason for the celebration is the same, the execution seemed very different. Possibly due to the size of the city but in Rio everything seemed more scheduled and less impromptu than I expect at Mardis Gras.
After spending my first Carnival morning at a Blaco (block party and street parade to it) with a Taiwaneses guy from my hostel, I met up with Dick and Shannon, a couple friends from Colorado that got to Rio a couple days before me. It was great seeing some friendly faces from home and the goodie bag of resupply items I requested.
We spent the first day walking the streets of Botafogo, the neighborhood where one of the day”s blacos was taking place and where their hotel and my hostel were located. Later we hung out at a couple bars. Pretty much everyone in Rio was dressed for Carnival in festive outfits, costumes were common but wearing much of anything was not.
The next morning we walked to the Pao de Acucar (Sugarloaf Mountain) and rode the cable car up to the top. During our walk back another carnival street parade (a bunch of people drinking with music playing, blocks long, packed tightly together and appearing to walk aimlessly down the street, but most likely marching towards a destination which is another blaco) appeared on the streets that were filled with traffic just a short while before, so we bought some beers from one of the many vendors marching along, and marched for a bit. After, we headed to another nearby neighborhood for another blaco and listened to the neighborhood band and drummers play.
That night we went to the Sambradome which is where the official Carnival parades take place. The Sambradome is something similar to a drag strip, it is one long straight road, in Rio possibly a mile long (every city seemed to have one on a smaller scale). On each side the length of the road are stands for spectators, and approx 4 nights a year a massive parade takes place. On our night, the 3rd of 4 competition nights, 5 “schools” paraded. Each one individually for just over an hour. Each had approx 4,000 participants including dancers, drum corps and bands, and massive floats. The downside is each school parades the whole time to their own, unique song, just one. So you hear the same song, over, and over, and over, and over for the whole hour plus. Our first school’s song was painful but the ones after were better. Also, the first school does not start until 10pm which means the Sambradome festivities don’t end until about 5am.
We stuck it out until after 2am watching the first 3 schools which seemed to be the consensus plan for most spectators. These parades are where mine and I assume most people’s visions of Carnival come from. The participants wear colorful outfits and dance, spin, and drum their way down the route like you see in pictures and video. Interspersed amongst the participants are massive and complex floats. Each school easily spends millions of dollars each year participating.
Our last day in Rio we visited and had drinks (kai-pee-rihn-ya) at a few beaches including Impenema and Copacabana where we met up for a short while with my friend Albane and her friends. That night I said good bye to Dick and Shannon as they were flying home the next day and I was busing it to Arraial de Cabo.
Arraial de Cabo is a beach town a couple hours north of Rio. It was a perfect spot to escape carnival and relax on the beach. However, since I arrived on what we would call Fat Tuesday, my break from Carnival had to wait another day as just blocks from my hostel, along the beachfront, the whole town and the many Brazilian tourists still had one more day in them. Me and a couple guys from the hostel decided it would be rude if we didn’t participate so we made our way down to the beach for one last night of festivities.
The next day we spent at the beach and the following day I went scuba diving. My first dive of the two was a milestone as it marked my 50th dive. Unfortunately these were my coldest dives ever as the currents in that region come from Antarctica not the Caribbean (this tidbit was not in the brochures).
The following day I headed to Buzios, another beach town an hour further north, for a few more beach days. Buzios is a more typical tourist beach town with shops, hotels, bars and restaurants lining the beach. Rumor has it Bridgette Bardot visited the beaches here in the 1960s and overnight the area became a tourist attraction. There’s still a boardwalk named after her. Although touristy, it was definitely the most relaxing place I visited in Brazil and enjoyed my final Brazilian beach time. While in Buzios I met Jorge an Argentinian guy from Buenos Aires and we spent several hours speaking, me butchering Spanish and him improving his English.
Eventually I bused back to Rio so I could catch my flight the following morning to Buenos Aires. In my hostel watching their game was the Rio chapter of the Palmeiras soccer team fan club. After joining to watch the game and being given cake at half-time, I was adapted into the chapter (no official ceremony was held so I may not actually be an official member-also I don’t have a jersey). The opposition scored in stoppage time to tie the game which was a shame because I was looking forward to the victory celebration.
The next day, I flew to Argentina on a 777 and randomly got assigned a seat next to one of Albane’s friends that we met on the beach. Leaving Brazil was bittersweet as it meant giving up my acai addiction. Throughout the country they sell a frozen sorbet made with the fruit and you can add in all sorts of mixings (mine were granola and peanuts). When I get home I will certainly be trying to find or make this.
Fins Up!!