Parque Lage, Sugarloaf Mountain and Buzios!

Morning of day 6 in Rio and we have been keeping pretty busy! On Sunday we went to the botanical gardens and walked around for about a hour. We even saw some little monkeys in the trees!

Then we walked over to Parque Lage which was really beautiful. It used to be someone's mansion but is now a public park, cafe and art school.

For dinner, we took a taxi down to Impanema, a beach neighborhood, and found a tapas place that was pretty good. Then we walked around and found a street market and went to a cafe for dessert and coffee. One thing that I've really been enjoying is how good desserts are here! Mom, yesterday I had a peanut butter flavored popsicle that had peanut butter in the middle!

Monday we took the tram up to the top of Sugarloaf Mountain. The views were incredible. We had a snack at the cafe at the top and sat up there for awhile.

We came back to our hotel and had dinner at a yummy Italian place nearby. One thing we are still getting used to is the style of service at restaurants--it's either very formal with waiters in bow ties who spoon the food on to your plate or very casual where it's hard to get anyone's attention. We've also learned that you have to flag them down to get your check. This has made for some long dinners!

On the way home from dinner, it was pouring rain. There seems to be a big thunderstorm every night around 7. But the drainage system is not the best so the streets get flooded very quickly, and it causes the sewer water to come up into the street with it. We had quite the adventure walking the two blocks back to our hotel. We saw other people that came prepared with plastic bags over their feet, so Berto jumped and ran through the streets to get me some bags to wear. What a guy!

 Yesterday we took a day trip to Buzios, a town about 3 hours from Rio. We went out on a boat that made a few stops where we could jump off the boat and swim. It was really fun and we were wishing we could stay there for a few days!

Today we plan to explore downtown Rio!