Spending the afternoon packing and getting things organised, our French dorm-mate Fred saw all my stuff (I thought I’d packed relatively light), pulls out a small little backpack and tells me he’s travelling for 6 months or so! We caught up with Teresa again for a few beers, another exception food binge at Frontera,  and some last nightcaps at Rex’s with Mick.

In a favela of 200 000 people, for everyone to know our guide and great him with a smile, showed that it was a very specific route the groups always went through. However, my cynicism with tour companies aside, it was an interesting experience and our guide was very informative about the drug trade in the favelas, the battles that occur with police, and how the majority of the residents have regular jobs in the wealthier areas of the city, but live in the favelas as there are no taxes, electricity is stolen from the grid, and rent is cheap (roughly 100 up to 500 reals a month). Though I didn’t experience the kind of extreme destitution or poverty that you see in some third world countries in Africa, (you could hear tv’s and radios blaring from houses, satellite dishes on roofs, clean though simple houses with funiture, couches, bathrooms etc) there was no doubt that these people had things rough in life and it really reinforced the notion to always be thankful for what you have.

Getting back to Ipanema around lunchtime I was introduced to Yogoberry…epic. The afternoon we all caught up at the beach again for some pounding shories and a game of beach volleyball with some random locals, before Dan and I headed off for a Football match. The game was a semi-final between Flamengo and Botafogo at Maracanã stadium, the largest in South America and once capable of holding 200, 000 people (in the 1950 World Cup final, attendance was apparently 199, 854)

The atmosphere was there from the beginning with drums and horns blaring, and people singing along at the top of their voices. The crowd was predominatly behind Flamengo, as were we, but Botafogo also had a strong section of supporters in full voice and flags waving. As the game was about to begin the flares came out all around the stadium and the noise from the supporters was nearly deafening at times. It was an exciting game to watch at the start with the momentum shifting back and forth, and the crowd absolutely erupted when Flamengo scored the first goal. Botafogo replied and the tempo simmered down a little with long stoppages for ‘injured players’. Although obviously very skillful players, they had a tendency to hit the ground and stay down far too easily. A swede next to us likened them to Italian players, take from that what you will…

Unfortunately for us and the majority of the stadium, Botafogo took the lead, and the game ended 2-1. It would have been nice to see the celebrations had Flamengo won, but three goals in a game was all the entertainment we needed. By this stage the week was catching up to us fast, so we were in no mood to party on anyway. It was great to see the passion and excitement that fans bring to a football game in South America, and we couldn’t help but feel a little dissapointed about the comparative lack of enthusiasm you generally see at Australian sporting events.

After the excitement of the last few days, we took the day very easy (and avoided our room), calling into Mick and Kelly’s around lunch to find everyone still asleep. A message had also come through that our Inca Trail trek in March had been cancelled, so we spent the day completely rearranging our travel plans, scrambling to get in touch with airlines, my Uncle Peter in Bogota, hostels and to rebook our Inca trail trek. So instead of the original plan to fly to La Paz, we were now off to Columbia and working our way from there for the trek in early April.

After catching up with the others for some beach time in the late afternoon, we somehow managed to crack a beer or two, which rapidly escalated when Claudia and Dane’s Portuguese friend Teresa arrived from Argentina and promptly bought a few cases of beer. We all worked our way through the pain barrier and ended up drinking beers down at the beach till around 1am.

Claudia got the first call up and headed up to Pedra Bonita for the launch. The winds had changed a little and the landing platform in front of us was no longer as safe, with most pilots opting instead to land further up the beach. So although we spent the next hour filming every hang glider in case it was Claudia, we only spotted her as she emerged from the car with dvd in hand and a grin from ear to ear. Dan and Dane headed up next and it wasn’t until around four-thirty that my opportunity arose.

The drive up the mountain was typical chaos, with cars travelling both directions along a winding single lane road and our driver raising the heart rate by overtaking around blind corners. This was in no way assisted by an assortment of cars parked awkwardly along the road at random intervals. Reaching the top, there was a bit of a queue for takeoff, so I watched a few launches and then was run through the motions with the pilot (or supreme aircraft commander as stated in the brochure). When our turn to launch came, I thought I’d be nervous but instead was pretty calm. We took off without a hitch and suddenly found ourselves soaring over Rio with just incredible views of the city, beaches and forests. The conditions were great and we circled around near the launch platform in an updraft for quite some time. It wasn’t really an adrenalin rush but still an unbelievable experience to get those views of Rio. There were a few shaky moments when the pilot really had to wrestle with the bar and at one point went into frantic mode when another glider came to close, yelling and gesticulating at the other guy to pull his head in. The harness wasn’t the most comfortable and I found myself awkwardly dangling my arms with nowhere to put them, but these were minor inconveniences in an otherwise superb flight. The landing was also amazing, swooping in over the beachgoers at Praia São Conrado and landing perfectly. It was the longest run of the four due to great conditions and was certainly an unforgettable experience.

It was getting late by this stage and Dane and Claudia had already rushed off to get ready for the parade that evening. Mick was also parading, but a little more casual in his timeframe to get ready. This changed though by the time we got back and everyone was still sitting about having drinks and some dinner. Mick tried his best to get people moving but was swimming against the current for a while. Mick, Kelly, Dane, Claudia and some guys from the apartment above were all parading for Mocidade Independente de Padre Miguel, in the Grupo Especial  (the best samba schools in Rio) at the Sambodromo that night. Dan and I coincidentally had tickets to the parade that night as well and were enlisted as official photographers in the hope we could spot them out of the thousands in their school.

Catching the metro to the Sambodromo was a mission to get everyone on board with all their costumes, but somehow they managed, and the Mocidade song was sung ad finitum during the train ride. Dan and I got off a stop after everyone and made our way through some dodgy backstreets to our sector (Sector 4). Cue sketchiness 3 of 3 for our time during Rio. It was an awesome atmosphere in the stands though and people began filing in thick and fast. Mocidade were the first school to parade that night and the crowd really got into it, particularly since they had one of the more catchy songs. Our section, opposite the judging boxes, was obscured from looking up to the starting area, so we had to wait for the school to virtually in front of us. Time was easily passed with a few beers though, and about half an hour after starting, the samba school began parading past us. By this stage the stands were pretty much at capacity and everyone was singing and carrying on. Every year each school writes a song, develops a theme and then creates the floats and costumes to tell the story. As we sang along to Mocidade parading past in a riot of colour, it was just incredible the amount of effort that must go into preparing each year, particularly as there are thousands in the school, split into many different groups all with distinctly different costumes. Bizarrely enough we were able to spot Kelly and Claudia and Dane out of the throng as their group danced past, and we frantically tried to get some good footage to show them later. Some of the floats were also spectacular, with massive animatronic tigers and rats to name a few.

The only drawback to the night was that there was at least an hours wait between seeing each school, which became rather tedious on the ass-numbing concrete seats. So after watching four out of the seven schools parading that night, we decided to head off as it was already approaching four am. The die hards: Dane; Mick and Claudia, who managed to get tickets after they’d paraded, stayed till the end and stumbled in around seven thirty or so.