Today´s been our first day proper in Rio, after all we did last night was go for a meal at ´La Garota de Ipanema´ - which means ´The Girl from Ipenema´. It is, unsurprisingly, the bar in which said ditty was composed, and we enjoyed a good couple of hours eating, drinking, and people watching. I tried a caprihinha (spelling?) which was so sour it made my cheeks do that involuntary thing they do when you suck on the juice of about 20 limes. It is their national drink and consists of more sugar than at your average Tate and Lyle factory, more lime juice than in a Mexican restaurant, and some alcohol so potent I coughed for a few seconds after my first slurp.

Today has been a great day, for starters the hotel cable TV showed the rugby, and although I thought England were awful (and Wales particularly good) it was good to watch a whole game in the comfort of...bed...I do think we´ll get a spanking by the French though.

We headed out at about 10.30 towards Corcovado, which is most famous for what sits atop. The landmark statue of Jesus, some 70m tall, sits resplendent on the 710m peak, it´s arms outstreched, seemingly watching over the cariocas and their city. It was meant to be finished in 1921, but took a further ten years, and many handouts from various companies/churches around the world but is as impressive (if not more so) in the flesh as in countless TV programs/movies. We went up via the train, through some pretty grotty areas, and spent over 2 hours at the summit, just wandering and taking photos, soaking in the views and having a really rather good hot dog. When we left we bumped into Collette and Neil (Irish couple from the bus), who had been given som ebum info about a bus to take and had thus gone via Beiruit by the sound of theings. We agreed to meet up tonight. We also told them the Irish score and they didn´t seem too surprised by the mauling at the hands of the French, they´ll have to drown their sorrows now I guess...

After Corcovado, and with the cloud starting to come in we decided to leave our trip to Sugar Loaf mountain until another day. We headed back to the hotel for a brief siesta and then went for a wander along the Ipanema beachfront. We managed to find Jen a cheap sarong to replace the one from Thailand that got ripped, and sat and watched the world go by for a good couple of hours. On the beach there were some fascinating vignettes - sellers plying their trade, volleyball matches with seemingly loads at stake given the passion with which they were conducted, an American Football practice match, and many many more things to watch, all in the shadow of sugar loaf, the clouds having parted for the day.

On the way to the internet cafe we stumbled upon a group of musicians playing the famous samba beat, with a group of about 6 dancers, well, erm, dancing. It was like a kind of really good quality busking, with dance moves, and we watched for 20 minutes before wandering off. It´s been a great day, and although you never feel 100% safe here (mainly because of the reputation??) we´re really enjoying it. Tomorrow we´re doing the central walking tour, and the day after is spare, we´re hoping to catch at least one sunset from Sugarloaf/Corcovado, although the weather forecast is pretty poor for the next 3 days (scattered cloud and 30 degrees, ,not sure how we´ll cope?!!!)