The Portuguese that discovered this area presumed that Guanabara Bay was a mouth of a river when they arrived on January 1, 1502. Thus the name, Rio (river) de Janeiro (January). Rio is one of the famous sail-ins along with places like Sydney and Hong Kong. As usual, my expert booking agent ensured our cabin was on the correct side of the ship for the best view. The two key features illuminated in the early morning light where the statue of Christ the Redeemer and Sugar Loaf Mountain both of which over look the city.
Sugar Loaf is named because it looks like the shapes sugar used to be packed in for shipment from the port. You cane see the observation building and the cables off to the left for the cable cars that take you there.
Here is what it looks like in panorama.
Sailing in past a fort built during WW I
Extension of the fort into the bay. Only accessible by boat.
Fishing boat heading out for a day of work.
Traveling around the Bay.
City panorama as we sail in. In the center are the Copacabana and Ipanema beaches.
Downtown with a palace building extending into the bay.
We sailed in past half the Brazil navy or so it seemed.
The day was just starting and the crews were raising the Brazilian flag on the war ships.
At last we are docked started out. Of course our first stop was to visit old friends. Rio is the international headquarters for H. Stern. We had a very nice tour of the mining and making of jewelry. On the way out we had to pass through a series of gift shops (they learn from Disney). Noreen left a few of our Brazilian real (pronounced re-al) there.
Some street scenes from around Rio.
We missed Carnival by a day!!! The signs were still up.
Heading for Ipanema & Copacabana beaches. I always thought the Copacabana came from Havana. But the original is here.
Ipanema beach. Looking for the girl from Ipanema.
Copacabana Beach as we drove by. On the other side of the road is the Copacabana Club.
They still have a lot of pay phones around.
I think the local Information Office had the wrong idea of our passenger profile.
This is getting a little long so we’ll do the night and day two in the next blog entry.
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