Thursday, 22nd January, Rio de Janeiro, 22 degrees and fresh!

We had been invited, by the Captain’s message last night, to watch our entry into Rio harbour which was estimated to take place at 5.30. As we were both wide awake we decided to do it, so there we were on the promenade deck watching Rio come into view! Slightly cloudy, but definitely there, the iconic sugar loaf mountain and the famous statue of Christ the Redeemer …

As we moved closer it became clearer, but some times with swirling clouds around it and as we got even nearer other interesting sights came into view

On the other side of the ship, the sun was rising over a rather rusting workhorse of a ship…….

It was a pretty busy area

There was an island in the bay with a big banner saying Welcome to Brazil. Behind that was an extremely long bridge that seemed to cross the whole bay.

We were obviously near the airport as suddenly an aircraft took off and passed very close overhead.

Flocks of birds circled above us. They are called Magnificent Frigate Birds, scavengers apparently that eat anything and are not averse to stealing from other birds. Nasty! (It’s just nature. Red in tooth and claw. For the record we also saw lots of Brown Boobies and crowds of NeoTropic Cormorants , smaller and cuter than their European cousins. Ed)

Some background information about the city. Rio has the largest natural harbour in the world. It was founded by the Portuguese as a a landing point on their new route to get spices. As the actual spices come from India it seems to me that going via Brazil was something of a dog-leg. Nevertheless, it appears that it formed part of a route that took spices to Europe and slaves to Brazil. First came the need for sugar, then they found gold, then diamonds…… Rio replaced Salvador as the capital of Brazil, a position it held from 1763 until 1960 when Brasilia took over. Rio is still the cultural capital.

As we came close to the dock we saw an amazing modern building which apparently houses the Museum of the Future. It was an incredible piece of architecture.

The population of Rio is over 6 million. Rio is known for its favelas, the informal settlements that have grown up on the many hillsides of the City. They were started by soldiers returning from war with no place to live in the 1800’s. Since then their numbers have been swelled by former slaves, rural migrants and early settlers who could not afford to live in the city proper. The favelas often have no formal access to electricity or piped water (although it is often informally connected). The housing is mainly self built out of whatever materials are available. It is thought that 25% of the population of Rio de Janeiro lives in a favela

Back to our day! Given that we docked at about 6.30, we had an early breakfast, shower, change of clothes and we were ready to set off for THE big adventure. My birthday present. The flight over Rio in a helicopter. It was quite a long walk along the quay to the terminal building, so I was glad we had set out early. The now anticipated band were playing – this time in a military uniform of sorts …

There was the usual chaos in the terminal building with people offering tours, selling clothes and the usual crowds using the wifi. The mayhem was duplicated by the fact that there was another ship in port where people were not only doing tours, but embarking and disembarking as well!

We eventually found a P and O chap who directed us to another large ‘hangar’ like building where the P and O bus tours were departing from. We soon found our tour and after a bit of a wait for the final passenger on our bus, we set off. There were meant to be two groups of seven, but in the event, there were only 6 on our bus. Well I say we set off – we moved a few feet forward and were then caught up in the morning rush hour – Rio style. Progress was slow, but we had to get to the airport to pick up our helicopter which was on the other side of town, I think we both became aware that the weather outside was worsening. First the rain came and then the hills beyond the city became less and less visible. I don’t think either of us were terribly surprised therefore when, after about 3/4 of an hour of driving the call came through that the flight had been cancelled. We then had to make the decision to have our money reimbursed and return to the ship or be taken to the train station to take the train up to the Christ the Redeemer Statue. All of those in the bus had to decide on the same thing. We did, We turned back to the ship. It really seemed pointless to go up to the top when it was covered in cloud and you would see nothing. So we turned back the way we had come and set out on the lengthy journey back from whence we started. The Aurora had the feel of the Marie Celeste, there were very few people on board. The trip booking desk was also empty when we went to see if we could find something else to do.

I have to say we felt pretty deflated, so we decided to retrench by going for lunch on board ship and then thinking again this afternoon….

In the end we did very little. We went and had a coffee in the Raffles bar in the hope that we could replicate the carajillo of yesterday as I felt we deserved it. In the end I had a salted caramel frappe which came close but no alcohol and Keith had an enormous latte. He was writing background notes for his novel, having a great time discussing details with Ro his nickname for his AI bot (Ro Bot geddit? Ed) and I was reading, but in the end I abandoned him and the ship to go and look for a t-shirt in the port terminal. Having not found one I returned to the cabin.

By this time we had heard that Sian and Gareth’s trip was not going to be back until after supper and we knew that Penny and Michael were going to an evening outing if she was well enough, so we thought we would treat ourselves to the steaks available in a restaurant called The Glass House. So off we toddle to book ourselves a table. To find no-one there. Thwarted again. Keith decided to return to the cabin and I thought I would take a turn around the promenade deck as it had stopped raining. No such luck – the deck was closed for maintenance. Thwarted again!

Back to my diary. Even though we didn’t get to see the statue close to, I had made a note of a number of facts about it, so I will share them with you whether you want them or not …

The statue was commissioned to be built by the Catholic Church in the art deco style in 1932. It is 30 meters high and was made by a sculptor called Paul Landowski in France. It was made in blocks and these were shipped over to Brazil where it was put together. When constructed it was the largest statue of Jesus in the world and it is now considered one of the seven new wonders of the world. It has a a chapel in the pedestal on which it stands. It is a hollow structure but has holes that allow people to work on it for repairs. It frequently gets struck by lightening so has lightening rods to prevent it being damaged, An amazing piece of sculpture. I think one of my best views of it is this one….. before it become totally shrouded in cloud.

Given the day we had, we decided we deserved a special meal. So we visited the Glass House and had a splendid ‘surf and turf’ supper with an English glass of fizz to start and a very splendid Georgian red to follow, The wine went perfectly with our steak and the English cheeses to follow.

Just as we felt the tide had turned and we had put the day with its unfortunate occurrences behind us, we decided to go to the Curzon theatre for an evening of Carnival style entertainment by a Brazilian Group. All was looking set fair for a good evening until the singer joined in.

Disaster! He was so discordant it was almost painful. Perhaps it is the Brazilian style to sing off key but to me it was really grim. We left as volunteers from the audience were invited on stage. Just a step too far……

And so our not so successful day has ended. We are in Rio again tomorrow but we have booked to do a cooking course so we are unlikely to see the main sights of Rio that we had hoped to see, We are unlikely to pass this way again, but the view of the Sugarloaf Mountain and the Christ the Redeemer statue as we came into the bay is a memory that will never fade. Another special moment for that young girl from Northfleet and the lad from Carcroft, a pit village near Doncaster.

Let us see what tomorrow brings…