Rio Anniversary Trip: Day 4 - Museu do Amanhã, Escadaria Selarón

Friday, July 28, 2023

Our 18th anniversary! We woke up to the sound of "Fur Elise" playing in the street. Apparently, the propane salesman uses the tune to let people know he is nearby, much like an ice cream truck. He also shouts in his bullhorn "the gas man has arrived!" We had a nice, huge, multicourse breakfast that kept us full all day long. After breakfast we swam in our private pool for a few minutes. The water was still a little chilly.

Frozen aҫai with granola on top

Watermelon/Papaya juice, fresh fruit (pineapple, guava, kiwi, papaya, plum), fresh bread (whole grain, sweet rolls, honey oat), cake, and tarts

We took an Uber to the Museum of Tomorrow. There were lots of vendors outside. We stopped and talked with one guy who gave us a ton of samples of all sorts of Brazilian treats. We ended up buying some dôce de leche (Brazilian caramel) and passionfruit merengues. There were several displays inside the museum about Brazilian art, ocean currents, DNA, climate change, and other random topics. It was a bit underwhelming. The museum is almost on a pier stretching out into the bay, so we walked around the water after exiting. One guy tried to sell us some candy in several different languages. When we told him no thanks, he said "congratulations, you are a beautiful couple."

Inside the Museum of Tomorrow in front of the displays for ocean currents and DNA.

Walking around the museum.

The Island of Spadefish is involved in building and maintaining the marina.

Next, we took a taxi to the Municipal Theater. Erik was hoping to book a tour for the afternoon. However, when we got there, the tours were all sold out, so we were in the middle of downtown with nothing to do. We walked around a little and checked out some of the feiras (markets), but we didn't buy anything. Erik found directions to the Selaron Stairs close by, so we started walking in that direction. The Lapa Arches were on the way, which are the remains of the old aqueduct. Apparently, there is a trolley that has part of its track on top of the arches. We didn't get a picture of the arches because we were trying to get out of the area as fast as we could. There was a huge line of homeless people in the square receiving something from several nuns dressed like Mother Theresa. I don't know if they were taking food, communion, or a prayer card, but we didn't want to hang around to find out. 

O Teatro Municipal looked pretty impressive from the outside.

Floriano Square honors the second president of Brazil, Floriano Peixoto.

After passing the homeless people, we found some big crowds of tourists just outside the Selarón Stairs. There were more vendors selling souvenirs and food along the cobblestone street. The stairs were decorated by the Chilean artist Selarón as a tribute to the Brazilian people. Luckily, our bed and breakfast was about a half mile away following the stairs, so we started to climb. We kept climbing, and climbing, and climbing. Finally we reached the top, and we turned into some stairs that went down. Then we found our cobblestone street and had to climb up that hill. When we got to our bed and breakfast, we had to climb all the stairs inside the entry as well. Our legs were pretty tired.

Climbing up the Selarón Staircase.

Climbing down the stairs to our street.

Climbing up the hill to the bed and breakfast.

We decided to take advantage of our private pool one more time and go for a swim. The infinity pool below us looked nice, so we jumped in. Brrrr! It was at least five degrees colder than our little pool, so we jumped back into our pool for a while before dinner.

For our anniversary dinner, our host Claudio recommended we eat a romantic dinner at Aprazível, which was located on a hilltop overlooking the city. It took our Uber driver a while to figure out which street to take to get up the hill. Once we got inside the restaurant, we had to walk down a bunch of stairs. It was more of a collection of gazebos than an actual building. They seated us right next to the overlook. Claudio suggested we try the roasted palm heart, which took quite a long time to cook. It was kind of plain, but it was served with a pesto sauce. I ordered the octopus with potatoes and "ratatouille," and Erik ordered the spinach ravioli. For dessert we tried their specialty chocolate cake with cashews.

We had a nice view of the bleachers for watching the Carnaval parades and of the Yup Star (giant Ferris wheel).

We didn't know the roasted palm heart would be so big.

Left to right: Sambadrome (Carnival bleachers) in white lights, Santa Teresa de Jesus Parrish (cream-colored tower), Yup Star Ferris Wheel (pink-purple light)