party central

Havaianas, samba, Copacabana, sushi...wait a minute, sushi in Rio de Janeiro?  Well, yes.  We were surprised too.  But Brazil apparently has the highest number of Japanese outside of Japan.

We tend to gravitate towards bookstores.  In Denver, we went to a very charming one called the Tattered Bookstore, and here in Rio, we had lunch and amazing desserts in this inspiring setting.

Vendors at the beach selling anything you may need for a stay-on-your-lazy-bum day at the beach, from prawn skewers to churros to bikinis.

The Copacabana beach with the Christ in the distant background.

And here we are visiting the site at close together with a whole lot of other people.

Sugar Loaf, view taken from the Corovado hilltop.

Rio is a beautiful city; we wish we had a couple more days there.

 Thanks papa, that was a great meal - even though you didn't quite cook it!

JB took lots of pictures at the beach, looking for the mythic Girl from Ipanema.

But here are our girls at Ipanema.

Sandcastles that put ours to shame, but to aspire to.