CAR-NI-VAL !!!

Rio’s main carnival celebrations are spread over two days, usually 6 samba schools performing each night. On the first night, the Sunday, four of our friends were actually dancing for the Beija Flor school, so we all gathered to preview their beautiful costumes:

The next night, Monday, we all went over to the Sambadrome to watch from the stands. Despite hearing all about it from Mick 6 years ago, and seeing it on TV the night before, nothing had quite prepared me for the spectacular display, the size of the floats, the huge numbers of dancers – 2-3,000 in each school, and the  simply fantabulous costumes!

There were floats:

We loved this British float – the street-sweeper with the Queen is a genuine cleaner who was clearing up behind one of the schools a few years ago, and broke into a great samba as he swept – he became a crowd favourite and now appears every year!  On the right are Freddie and Amy (with wings) with Elton below.

There were dancing troupes:

Alice in Wonderland

                                         

And there were lots of fabulous feathers:

It was a fantastic night that I will never forget – a splendiferous ending to an amazing 5 weeks in South America. Now to start planning the northern sector – Chile up to Peru and Bolivia, then up to Cuba.

 

Watch this space…..

Rio de Janeiro!

Thursday February 16th - Thursday February 23rd 2012

So we finally got to Rio…..

We did the tourist bit:

We  did the beach bit – IPANEMA!

The old girl on Ipanema goes walking…..

We did sunsets:

We did a few beers and caipirinhas:

We ate – a lot!!

We did several “blocos” – wild street samba parties with hundreds and thousands of people, most in fancy dress or at very least a brightly coloured samba hat, having a great time, drinking lots of beer, caipirinhas and Smirnoff Ice – and gallons of water too – but we didn’t see any aggro at all:

And we did the Gay Ball – 6 years Mick enjoyed this event almost as much as the carnival, but this year was in a new downmarket venue – a hot, overcrowded, stuffy basement with different small areas and no real dance floor and an terrible band with a trumpeter who nearly did for my ear-drums. But the costumes were great, the trannies were a good laugh and we did enjoy it – as long as we kept going up to the street for a breath of air! We were finally driven out for good at 3am by the state of the loos, though there was an entertainment value in my “Ladies” as the trannies in the queue discussed their various corrective surgeries in high-pitched Portugesa girlie squeals and lots of hand gestures!!

And of course we did the CAR-NI-VAL! But that’s another posting…….