Nicole, who lives at the CR house,
highly recommended checking out Parque Lage, a mansion with grounds
that are part of Tijuca National Forest and is very close to Rio's
Botanical Garden. We decided to head there on Sunday morning for a
late breakfast and to celebrate my birthday. We ended up leaving the
house later than I expected because the internet was actually
working, which is always a pleasant surprise, and arrived at Parque
Lage just before the restaurant closed in preparation for lunch.
The park is green, lush and quite a
beautiful place. The grounds include a mansion which is now the home
of the Visual Arts School, was built by Henrique Lage for his wife,
and is at the base of Corcovado Mountain, with trails from the park
leading to the top. Once you enter to see the marble flooring, the
view of the mountain and Christo above you and in the reflection of
the pool, you can't help feeling like you have been transported back
in time to the Roaring 20's. The glamour of the estate is undeniable,
and I can just imagine the Gatsbyish parties that they might have had
there!
We arrived about ten minutes before the
restaurant stopped serving breakfast. A classy place such as this
needs to serve a serious breakfast! We had a variety of warm, crusty
breads, dill cream cheese spread, papaya jam, fresh fruit of
watermelon and papaya, a delicious medley that tasted a little like
payasam, coffee and orange juice. The combination of bread with dill
cream cheese and jam was really good and I quite enjoyed the meal but
I think for Ramanan it was missing some meat! Bread with butter and
jam and coffee is the most typical South American breakfast we've
been served at hostels and restaurants this past year. If you want
eggs or something more filling and heavy, you have to generally order
a side or specifically the Americano breakfast. I really like the
bread, butter and jam combo, especially with tea but the down side is
that it doesn't fill you up for very long or isn't particularly
nutritious.
The greenery of Parque Lage is similar
to the botanical gardens but not as landscaped, includes a small
aquarium, duck pond, and various structures perfect for photography,
or an afternoon family picnic. It's been a while since we've taken
photos with our camera. With World Cup here, we usually travel light
with only the cell phone, so it was nice to spend a leisurely
afternoon celebrating my 35th, and taking my favourite
kind of photos, ones with nature as the subject.
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