Ipanema

"Tall and tan and young and lovely, The girl from Ipanema goes walking, And when she passes, each one she passes goes - ah....."

The beautiful beach that inspired this bossa nova classic (Garota de Ipanema in Portuguese) is where Mads and I spend most of our days. At the forefront of the beach culture, many surfers and sun worshippers socialize daily along this pristine shoreline. Every Sunday, the roadway closest to the beach is closed to motor vehicles and local residents and tourists ride bikes, roller skate, skateboard, and walk along the ocean. There are always circles of people playing football (soccer), volleyball, and footvolley (a combination sport of volleyball and football originated in Brazil).

The beach is divided into segments by marks known as "postos" (lifeguard towers). Beer is sold everywhere on the beach at the barracas (tents). Mads was verry dissapointed to discover that since her last visit in January, the selling of Água de coco was outlawed at the barracas due to the weight of the coconuts for the trash collectors. Now you have to walk all the way up to the boardwalk to buy from the kiosks. Not too far of a walk, but definitely annoying!

We can normally be found just to the right of Posto 8 in front of Barraca da Tania. Not only is

this a beautiful and less crowded location, but it is also perfectly located just 2 blocks away from Mads' brother Gabe's apartment. When Mads lived in Rio for 3 months in 2007 she stayed with Gabe and was literally able to roll out of bed and be laying on the beach within 5 minutes. For us, from Lapa, we have to take a bus that takes anywhere from 45 min to an hour depending on the traffic. This isn't too bad when we wake up at a decent hour, but it is kind of a problem when we wake up any later than 2pm (which we often do after late nights out) as it is currently "winter" the sun begins to cool down around 4pm.

I put winter in quotes as it is typically anywhere from 75-85º here. However, ask any Carioca (person from Rio) and they will say it's freezing! Seriously, no joke. We see so many people on the street in long sleeves, pants, jackets and scarves as we are walking around in our bikinis and cover-ups. I don't know who looks sillier. One Thursday night we were drinking in the streets of Gavea (an affluent residential neighborhood in the Southern Zone of the city where young locals and tourists like to mingle) and we met a guy who literally said to us "It's a shame you came during the winter." Riiiiight. While we have expierenced a week of rain and a handful of windy days, with the beach days outnumbering the bad days I am a-okay with being here in the winter.

Gabe and his girlfriend Carol live 6 months out of the year in the Pantanal (tropical wetland of Brazil) studying the DNA of the giant river otters for Carol's doctorate. Typically this is the time of year where he is not in Rio, however we were in luck as he has been here two weeks helping his mom move. This is great because Mads and Gabe are super close so they have gotten to spend some time together. It is also provides us a place to hang out after the beach. We have done a lot of movie watching and Wi platying (Gabe just got Super Mario World!!!) Sergio (Mads and Gabe's dad) returned to the States last week, but before he left the whole family was able to get together to spend some time on the beach and go out to lunch at a rodozio.