South America

I have just had the most amazing week of my life! Rio carnival is madness!

I arrived in Rio on Friday afternoon after 25hours on the bus from Iguazu Falls. There is one massive bus station in Rio and I have to tell you that I have never felt more vulnerable as I did there. It was 1 pm by the time I got off the bus and the station was absolutely heaving with people. I had absolutely no idea how to get to the joining hotel of the Dragoman carnival tour that I was joining, and the tourist information desk had a sign up that read ´back in 10 mins´ with a queue about 10 people deep. The friends that I had made on the bus had disapeared and I was starting to dispare when I bumped into a british guy that had also been on the bus. He turned out to be my saviour as he was staying in the same area as me and spoke considerably better spanish, so we negotiated a rate with the taxi company (as instructed my his friend who told him that this would ensure that we wouldn´t get robbed by the taxi driver!) and off we went. I am telling you all this because I want to give you an idea of the first impressions that I had of Rio as I really don´t think that they were that far wrong.

But I did make it to the hotel in one piece, checked in and wallowed in the luxury of staying in a proper hotel! The afternoon consisted of meeting a few of the 90 people on the carnival tour, checking out the local beach and being overwhelmed the the humid heat of Rio.

Carnival wasn´t officially until Tuesday, but there were many types of parties (official and unofficial) to join over the weekend leading up to this as carnival has become a week long party that shuts down the centre of the city for 4 days. That Friday I went into the city to check out all the preparations and soak up the atmosphere