brazil day 8

woke up at 8am today. weather forecast was for sun during the day and rain in the afternoon so we wanted to get a jump start on the christo. left the house by 9am. walked to the bus station to catch the 497 to the statue just as rachel had researched as she was waiting for me to wake up. but, come to find out the 497 we hopped on did not go through the town we needed. so we arrived back to the bus station and had to hop a different 497 and continue our loop. an hour and a half later we got off at th site for the christo. sweet, only slightly car sick. go up to buy our tickets up the tram to find out the non-refundable tickets we purchased were for the 7pm tram. 7 hours away. walking up takes 3 hours and costs 47R. so we decided to hop a bus towards copacabana get off by botafogo and hike up sugar loaf. we got to sugar loaf no problem. it is so much easier and nicer to walk when its not raining here. got to the parking lot of the tram up sugarloaf.... and the line was about 1.5 miles long. good thing we are rough and tough and planned to climb to the first peak.

started out on the nice paved path then got to a trailha—we are thinking it means trailhead in porteguese. indeed we found some people traveling down. they said it takes about an hour so we decided to do it. it was only 1pm. started the muddy, slippery hike up in our flip flops we just purchased. it was an up trail so andrea enjoyed it. rachel did a good job of keeping up as well. sure enough about a half hour later, we reached the top, complete with magnificent views of the city of rio. we walked around up top for about 20 minutes before seeing the line to go to the taller mountain—which you can only get to on gondola.... we passed on that and started our trek down the mountain. switchbacks and mud filled holes were what encompassed most of the way down. we got to the T and saw about 6 tiny monkeys super close to use. then without falling got to the bottom.

we needed to let felicio know that we plan to go up to christo at 7pm so he and ana are not waiting for us. we took the metro to central and walked to felicios. then we changed into our swimsuits and found out a cab from flamengo to the christo would be 10R so we decided to do that. walked back to central and exited at lga de machado to walk to flamengo beach—just to lay in the sun with a coconut. check and check. we laid in the un and drank out of a coconut. 3R. about 6pm we walked to the main road and grabbed a 12R cab to the christo. found a shot glass for DJ. i swear it was the only one we saw!! you owe me big deej. then i chnged out of my swimsuit and we stood in line for the 7pm tram. we enteed the tram an sat on the right side—per a trip advisor suggestion for a better view of rio. yup1 was quite the sights. then we got to the top just s the sun was about to set over the mountains in the distance. absolutely gorgeous, we then climbed up the 200 steps t0 thechristo and got our pic taken before heading back down. we watched the sunset in the distance it was qute gorgeous. then we climbed back down, and waited in line for the next ttram. as we were waiting we heard american english behind us. the older couple was from iowa and he was a molecular cell bioloby professor at the university of iowa going on six month sebaticle to australia. we talked with the couple the entire time waiting in line and the ride down. then we parted ways when we got to the bottom and hopped a bus labeled centralsince we knewhow tto get home from there eventhough felicio said it was bad at night we didnt want to get lost. after a long detour we got off at central and swiftly hiked back to our place. not too many sketchy people. then we dropped our stuff off and i needed to eat. all i had eaten was 2 luna bars, a coconut water and a sandwich with cheese. starvng. we attempted to contact felicio but he did not answer. just as we were about to head towards lapa out hopped felicio and ana from the elevator with motorcycle helmets in hand. hence why he did not respond. we went outt to a nearby restaurant. rachel had a caipasaki and i had a soda pop. we then ordered a large meat tray complete with fish, chicken, pork, calebrasa, and beef. then quickly before the waitor brought the check rachel and i split the tab as a way to say thankyou. being exhausted from the sunlight we bypassed the samba, packed our bags and passed out.

tomorrow we head back via bus to sao paulo, but first breakfast with felicio and ana. rest of the trip: bus to sao paulo bus to airport, fly out to atlanta tomorrow night then into msp thursday at 9am.