Rio to Buenos Aires

The completion of our loop

My lovely friend Seema was flying out to Rio to meet up with us for two weeks to travel down to Buenos Aires where she’d fly home and we were flying onwards to Bangkok and 3 months in South East Asia. We had booked a very stylish Air BnB in Rio, a stones throw away from Copacabana beach and had 5 days here. We had a couple days planned on the beach as well as touring the sights. It was Seema’s birthday whilst we were here so we spent that day on a tour ticking off Rio’s most famous sights: Christ the Redeemer, the Sambadrome and Sugarloaf.

The above photo is sunset at Ipanema beach – worth the trip on the metro to see. People clapped this sunset which left us both amused and bemused- well done nature for doing what you do everyday.

We also spent a day exploring Brazil and the Escadaria Selaron, a famous set of steps brightLy decorated with various tiles which have been featured in various adverts and music videos.

It was all too soon time to leave the beaches of Rio behind and head south to Iguazu Falls. We started with the Brazilian side and spent the day there. The falls really are spectacular, they are both taller and wider than Niagara and you have the opportunity to explore the falls from another country!

We caught a bus a short ride over the border to Argentina to obtain our fourth Argentinian stamp.

The next day we were back at the falls, this time seeing them from an Argentinian perspective. This involved a very wet boat trip – you sail under the falls so worth wearing swimwear under your clothes and ensuring everything goes in the dry bag provided. The Argentinian side also allows you the opportunity to visit the point where three countries meet – Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay.

After Iguazu it was time to fly down to Buenos Aires for the last part of Seema’s holiday and our last few days in South America. We spent the time showing Seema our favourite haunts – Cafe Tortoni where cider is served in champagne glasses (our favourite cafe in the world), the bookshop that used to be a theatre, and our favourite cemetery in the world – the Recoleta, which is also the final resting place of Eva Peron. This cemetery achieves bonus points for being full of stray cats and many a ghost cat!

Before we knew it was time to say goodbye to Seema and we had two days left in South America.

We were sad to leave South America but excited for the next part of our adventure. We departed with so many fantastic memories. I developed a tenancy to add ‘perfecto’ to the end of any sentence and Joey is destined to try and speak Spanish whenever we are in any foreign country. Si!