Copacabana Ate My Bandana!

One very chilled-out day. Popped over to the Rio Sul (South Rio) shopping centre, to buy some swimming shorts (yes, I managed to go to Brasil and forget to pack my swimming gear, I´m a muppet, I know...) and then headed for Copacabana beach in the afternoon for some beach time. Sadly, whilst enjoying the really quite large waves which run into the beach, I got wiped out by a couple of unexpectedly large ones close to the shore, and surfaced to find my much-abused black bandana had disappeared in the swell. It had come a long way with me since Broome in 2005, but now our paths diverged.... My time on the beach with 3 English lads and Linda, the hostel´s resident irrepressible Norwegian, did however yield the amusing concept of the "Man-zilian" - John had noticed a guy who had shaved off all of his chest hair apart from a very long "landing strip" running straight down the middle. Very bizarre.

In the evening, we checked out the tourist night-market down by the beach (95% identical rubbish, the vast majority of it probably made in China...), then I headed over for a brief look around the bars in Ipanema, which concluded after I ended up in an "Irish" bar listening to a Brasilian group play Blues music (in English) and it started to rain. Back at the hostel, my companions were chatting with some of the Brasilians staying there, which helped pass a wee bit more time (assisted by a few caipiroskas - the bar had run out of cachaca again...) before bed (I had by this point finished being moved around between rooms, and was firmly and happily ensconced in a bottom bunk in one of the upstairs dorms).