Rio de Janeiro

24 hours on a bus from Foz do Iguaçu to Rio de Janeiro. Yet another long journey with absolutely nothing to do, and for the first time with no one to talk to. Back in Argentina when I travelled on my oen, I could at least try to talk to people next to me in Spanish, but now in Brazil, it is a whole new language.

The bus was also not quite as nice as the ones in Argentina. Sure, there was air conditioning (thank god), and the seat leaned back pretty far - making it easier to get some sleep - but the service was not as good. For one, there is no food served on buses in Brazil despite how much more they charge for the tickets, so how ever much you spend on your ticket, you also need to factor in the price of food. Secondly, when they show a movie, the show it dubbed in Portuguese (fair enough, I am in Brazil), but they also add Portuguese subtitles. Even when I asked for at least subtitles to be changed to a language I can understand, they did nothing to help me out. It is quite strange that this happens because all the Brazilians I have met so far are very friendly.

The one thing that did impress me about the bus service was the punctuality. I was told the ride would last 24 hours and it really did; 24 hours and zero minutes.

Stepping off the bus and into the oven that is Rio de Janeiro, I picked up my bag and asked where the tourist information des was. After asking several different people and being sent to all corners of the massive bus station, someone finally showed me where it was.

The guy behind the desk could speak English - one step up from alot of South American countries - but this was the only good thing the tourist information of Rio de Janeiro could offer me. I had made reservations at a hostel in Copacobana, but made the silly mistake of not writing down the address. Seeing as it is an HI histel (a big worldwide chain of hostels) I did not think it would be a problem. Apparently, I was wrong. The tourist information only knew of one hostel in the whole city - which they tried desperately to get me to go to - and had no idea of where my hostel was.He told me about where he thought it might be and how to get there, and since he was sending me to Copacobana, I thought I would at least take the bus he was telling me to get, and maybe ask someone once I got there.

As soon as I got off the bus, someone asked me if I was looking for the Che Lagarto hostel (which I was), so that was rather good luck.

Arriving in the morning gave me plenty of time to go up and see the Statue of Christ and go across town to the sugar loaf mountain in time to witness the sunset behind the city of Rio. Both were absolutely fantastic, and I was lucky enough to go see them on a day that was not too cloudy which I am told does not happen often at this time of year.

Having seen everything I wanted to see in Rio de Janeiro, I bought myself a bus ticket to Salvador leaving the next day at 4pm. I was told it would be 26 hours, and following my good experience on the last bus ride regarding Brazilians´accuracy for estimating bus times, I beleived him...