A tinge of excitement ran through us as we boarded the plane to Sao Paulo, Brazil. Tonight was apparently the main night of the hugest and most famous party on earth. Carnaval in Rio de Janeiro attracts people form every corner of the planet, and we happened to be in the right place at the right time! After chilling on a coach with seats that doubled as flat beds for five hours, we arrived in Rio at nightfall. As soon as we reached the hostel we chucked our bags and made our way towards the action. The streets were filled with people donning all manner of wild and wonderful costume, and the tube trains were packed to overflowing. Fireworks could be seen not too far in the lit sky, and the atmosphere in the megapolis was electric. Huge numbers of people selling everything from beer to candyfloss and kebabs roamed the streets, music blasting from here there and everywhere. Total overload of the senses. While unsuccesfully attempting to take everything in, we followed the crowd so that we could see the world famous parade go by. In order to see the parade, we found out that we needed tickets and sheetal spotted a tout pretty much straight away. After some hard bargaining we wakllked tinto the thick of the action, into the Sambodromo tiered seating over looking passing floats moving slowly through the streets of Rio. The Sambodromo was already packed to the brim with passionatte Brazilians, waving flags, throwing streamers in all directions, moving to the beat of the Afro-latino drum.
A vast array of floats, every single one exquisitely designed, slowloy worked there way past us. It was now we realised how foolish it would have been not to have made the long journey from the other side of South America. The work that must have been put into the gigantic float is unimaginable. about fifty to a hundred people accompanied each float, allong with literally thousands of dancers from all over Brazil in crazy costumes. the hats were bigger that the wearers, and it seemed like every colour that ever existed was visble somewhere in the long trail of mayhem that was creeping by all of us. A huge disney style horse shaped float crawled by, and all of a sudden it came to an abrupt halt, huge doors opening on its legs instantly. Out poured hundreds of dancers all simultaneously moving the the rhythm. Fireworks going of in the background all the time and the crowd getting more and more frenzied all the time, the atmosphere reached fever-pitch and there it stayed until the end of the carnaval, at about 5 in the morning.
We got back to the hostel soon after, absolutely shattered since our few hours of sleep in Santiago airport the last night.
Rio by day seemed tlike the most boring place after last night. We explored some of the famous sights, (the eyesore that is called Copacabana Beach, and the Christ statue overlooking the city).
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