The Marvellous City

The lush foliage, and towering trees along the mountains soften the concrete barriers and asphalt roads of this city. Beautiful trees, wrapped in vines, with bromeliads and Christmas Cacti growing in the higher branches can be found in many neighbourhoods and really add to its' charm. One of my sister-in-law's first requests when she arrived was to see greenery and so we went to Rio's Botanical Garden. I love going to gardens, which cannot be said about Ramanan but since we had guests, he didn't protest. The towering palms at the entrance of the garden beckon you to enter and explore. The gardens, founded in 1808 covers an area of 54 hectares, and is part of a 140 hectare park at the base of Corcovado Mountain. After about an hour's walk, we munched on some delicious sandwiches at the garden's restaurant, then continued to explore. It's really a beautiful place, one you can spend a relaxing and peaceful afternoon in and come back to see more of another day.

Winter in Rio can mean torrential rain. So far this winter, we've had a few sunny days followed by three or four cloudy, rainy days. The week began with sunshine- the days we spent at the Botanical Garden, Ipanema, the historic district and Sao Bento Monastery. When it finally came time to head to Christo and Sugar Loaf, Mother Nature wasn't on our side. But when you're only here for a week, you have to make the most of it, so logically we went to Sugar Loaf Mountain on the rainiest day of the week.

It was a cloudy day when we arrived at the entrance of the train station that takes you up Corcovado Mountain, in Tijuca Forest to the Christo Redentor statue. The girl at the ticket booth was very honest with us when she told us what we would see on a day such as this one. I had to clarify, and ask what she meant by nothing. She replied, “Nothing, not the statue, not the city, nothing. Do you still want to pay?”.  At least they were honest. We decided to risk it and go up anyway. It being cloudy actually made for an interesting experience at the Christo statue. Compared to the first time we were there four years ago, there was about one sixth the crowd. Usually, it is near impossible to take a photo by yourself at the platform of the statue, as there are a million people around you, arms outstretched, beaming with a smile below the Christ. But this day, it was relatively quiet and the small crowd was eagerly waiting, anticipating the few seconds when the clouds would drift away and you could actually glimpse the statue above you before it completely disappeared again. The anticipation, the shouts of “Vai, vai, vai”, and the continuous snapping of photos that followed it made it feel just a little more special, when you did see this spectacular Art Deco statue of Christ appear from behind the clouds. Our patience paid off and the clouds cleared to show the views of the entire city before us. By this time though, we were all getting tired of being cold (the peak of Corcovado is 700m above sea level) and after a few minutes of admiring the view, we happily left it for some warmth.

The mountain resembled a cone-shaped mound of sugar to the Portuguese and thus the name Pao de Acucar. You have to take two cable cars to get to the summit of Sugar Loaf Mountain, the first to Urca Mountain at 220m, and from there the second cable car to Sugar Loaf Mountain at about 400m. On a sunny day, the views of the harbour and watching sunset from Sugar Loaf are spectacular, as our hope was on this day. Unfortunately for us, it began to rain when we arrived at the base of the mountain and it got so dark and dreary that we decided to stop at the patio on Urca Mountain, that provided much need shelter from the rain and had a fancy coffee shop with sweet and tasty treats! After warming up with some chocolaty goodness and realizing that the rain wasn't going to stop, we took the next cable car up to take a quick glance at the non-existant view before escaping into the gift shop. The only positive to going anywhere on a cloudy, rainy day is not having to wait in line for hours. This day from start to finish felt like VIP treatment!