Weather Check

We woke up and outside it was overcast, much more so than the day before, in fact it felt like it would rain. We walked to the beach to see if we could see the Christ Redeemer as an indication as to whether or not we should go up Corcavado mountain to see it. Nope, not a chance. But Sugar Loaf lookout was visible so we decided to go there and see if the weather would improve. We took the subway there when it started raining. Bummers, it didn´t seem like a good idea to spend the time and money to do it today either. Ah well. So we went to the infamous Ipanema neighborhood to wander and have lunch. We had lunch at a buffet place and wandered the neighborhood which reminded us of Waikiki. After lunch we stepped out onto Ipanema beach between lifeguard posts 9 and 10, where supposedly all the beautiful people go to sun tan, but of course no one was there since it was raining. Still the (natural) view was beautiful. On our way back to our hostel, we found a band playing bossa nova on the street so we listened for awhile before continuing on. At dinner time, we weren´t so hungry so we ended up only have dessert. Also, we were craving ice cream. We found a cafe and Jon had a chocolate milkshake and Ching Jen had a waffle with vanilla ice cream. It totally hit the spot.

The next day it was overcast, but the clouds were high and it seemed like it would stay that way all day. Optimistically, we set out to Corcavado mountain and waited for the train up to the Christ Redeemer. It is amazing that you really can see the Redeemer from every part of the city. The Christ Redeemer stands 13-stories high and he´s huge and awesome to look at. Many tourists were taking the classic photo where they stand with their arms outstretched like Christ, however, the photographer often had to lie on the ground in order to fit the Christ Redeemer in the picture. The views of the city were great too, you couldn´t see far into the horizon because of the clouds, but you could see the entire city and that was the important part. We took loads of photos in every direction before heading back down. We had a picnic near the water facing Sugar Loaf (Jon had a giant avocado while Ching Jen had a sandwich) before making our way to Sugar Loaf. Sugar Loaf lookout is made up of two small mountains, one smaller than the other, and there is an option of hiking up the smaller one. We opted to do this since it wasn´t too hard, just a nature trail and it made the views much more rewarding. From there, we took the cable car up to the larger mountain. Again, it had amazing views, this time with a view of the Christ Redeemer, even though he was tiny tiny. We planned the timing perfectly, the sun was just setting so we got a drink and sat and watched it go down. We waiting for the street lights to come on so that we could take more photos before finally heading back down via cable cars. It felt great that we were able to see both on our last day, the waiting was worth it.