The road along the coast does not follow the beach but ismore inland. You are driving up and down through the coastal forest. There arenot as many resorts along the way between the road and the beach so there are not as many speed bumps to slow you down. We made good progress and were at Paraty at lunchtime. Although it was only some 255 km further to Rio we decided to stopover at this historical beach town. We parked the camper near the beach next to 2 other overlanders. They are both young Argentineans couples on a tour through Brazil. The town is on the tourist trail. A bus group wandered the cobbled streets. It used to be the port through which the gold from the hinterland was exported. This was one of the easier places to cross the coastal mountains. As a result of these riches there are several old churches and paved streets. After inspecting the town, we settled down for a huge fish lunch at a restaurant on the beach. It is more common here to have a big lunch and a snack in the evening. That is also why not many restaurants are open along the road in the evening. The lunch was so filling that we just laid back and relax on the chairs on the beach and enjoyed the view.

The remaining drive to Rio went without problems. We did get stopped, for the first time in this trip, on a military checkpoint complete with tank and guns. Not sure what they are looking for but they asked to look into our box at the back of the camper. They were polite. We noticed that they stopped only vans. Driving in the city was fine. The streets are busy but if you follow the Gps guide you arrive safely at your destination. Johnny and Aly de Leeuw Brandenburg live just off the Ipanema beach in a penthouse. You can see the beach from their balcony. Aly works for shell and they are now posted in Rio. We knew them from our time in Oman. Johnny had arranged to park ourcamper safely at a friend’s place who lives in a secure gated community. Their garage is too low for our camper. Street parking
so close to one of the most famous beaches is unsafe and also forbiddenso .

On Wednesday the skies were clear, so we made a trip to the famous Christo Redentor statue on top of one of the many mountains surrounding the city. We first walked along the Ipanema and Copacabana beaches. There were quite a few people on the beach despite that it was a normal working day. The beach in an integrate part of the life of the people living in Rio. Early morning (6:00) you already see the runners, walkers and cyclists on the beach. Later around 8:00 the first  beach chairs and umbrellas are set up and the sun worshippers arrive. In some places the beach sand is cooled down with a water spray so you can reach your deckchair without burning your feet.

The walk to the minibus taking us up the mountain was a bit further than expected, so it was a great relief that the bus was not full and the air-con was working. It was a hot day. The drive to the mountain is very steep in places. At a flat section there is a shop and bus exchange point where you go in another bus for the last stretch. They make sure these busses are full in order to minimise traffic on the narrow winding road. We were lucky that it was not too crowded at the top. There was ample space and time to admire the 38 m high open arm statue and the views of the city below. We were very lucky to be able to see Christ clearly (without the fog). As was not the case of the two following days. He was totally hidden in the clouds.

The following day was activity day. Johnny first went withJamaliah for a 7 km walk around a nearby inland lake and in the afternoon Rudy and Johnny went for a bicycle ride along the beaches and also around the lake.For the rest it was relaxing in the beautiful penthouse. On Friday we took the metro to the centre of the old town. Jamaliah held on to Rudy and made sure no pickpocket was around in the packed subway. Our experience from Santiago was still fresh in her mind. At the Carioca metro station we joined the free city walking tour. Although the centre is full of high-rise buildings there are still some small streets in-between lined with 19th century houses. At plaza 15 November we entered the Paco Imperial where the royal family temporarily lived when they fled Portugal from Napoleon in 1803. They enjoyed the climate in Brazil so much that they decided to stay and took on the title of emperor. One of the later rulers even proclaimed the independence of Brazil from Portugal. The arrival of the royals and the growing income from the coffee and sugar trade enabled the city rulers to tear down the houses of the poor and build large impressive buildings. Some of them we visited along the walking route. We also took a tour inside the overdone Opera house (Teatro Municipal). The inside is covered with various colours of marble. The foyer is decorated with motives from the old Persian empire. Now we have seen all three of the Opera houses (Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo and Rio). It started to rain and temperature dropped. To round off the day we had diner in Grotta Ipanima. It is a typical local restaurant annex bar. Here the famous song about a girl van Ipanima was written. She passed daily by on her way to the beach and made the heads turn.

Saturday evening Aly had organised a potluck dinner for her birthday. We stayed on and Jamaliah contributed a dish as well. It was good to meet the expat crowd. We saw familiar faces and met people who knew people we also know i.e. we felt that we were back in expat life.

After a slow start of the day we picked up the camper onSunday and followed Johnny on his motorbike out of town and up the mountain(823 m) to Petropolis. Here, the emperor had built his summer palace. Wemistook the large Casino for the palace which resulted that we were actuallytoo late to enter the palace proper. We walked around it and through the treefilled garden and visited the carriage house and the village church. During theevening the town was getting more busy instead of less. Maybe people were comingto see the Christmas decorations in the street. We were planning to stay overnighton the street around the cathedral but that was not possible. So we drove a bitfurther and parked at a hotel spot we read about in iOverlander. Unfortunatelywe were not allowed to stay in the camper and since our Portuguese is nonexistentand the receptionist doesn’t speak English or Spanish we couldn’t convinced himto let us sleep in it. It was too late to drive on to find another camping spot,so we decided to spend the night in the hotel.