Copacabana it isn't

Somehow we seem to have traded down from Carnaval in Copacabana to Clacton on Sea. It's a bit different to say the least.

Its been an eventful couple of weeks and we have achieved everything we hoped to:

• Picked up the new truck, brought it back to the UK and started the import paperwork
• Been out to Spain and got our residency cards
• Visited the house and dropped off some beachwear that we won't need for a while, especially here
• Caught up with a few friends and relatives around the North Essex coast

We get the ferry back to the Netherlands on Thursday to visit the campervan show on Friday to look for some ideas and inspiration for Campalot, then we are going to spend a couple of weeks at Johnmill's place near Eindhoven to wait out brexit and chill before we come back to the UK and visit other friends and family and then get the house back

Rio de Janeiro

I'm 2 weeks weeks late in publishing our final 9 days in Rio.

At the end of February we caught the overnight bus from Brasilia that was supposed to take 17 hours but instead it was more like 20. The roads weren't the best which meant we didn't get as much sleep as we had hoped but it all added to the experience. We met up with friends Yvonne and Tony who had flown out to join us and it was great to see them.

We visited Sugarloaf Mountain which is at the mouth of Guanabara Bay. It's name refers to the shape of a concentrated refined loaf of sugar. It rises 396m above the harbour and the views from the top of the cable car are amazing.

Copacabana beach (our beach) is to the left of the hill

We celebrated Yvonne's birthday (over many days) with a number of Caipirinha's :-)

Then there was the carnival parade in the Sambadromo, a purpose built venue designed by Oscar Niemeyer in 1983. The parade ground consists of a 700m (2,300ft) street with grandstands and seating for 90,000 spectators. There are 12 - 14 samba schools that participate each year and they are highly competitive (equivalent to the various divisions in European football) with each school presenting thousands of dancers in exotic costumes, its drummers and many floats. Each school has a preset amount of time, supposedly 75 minutes, but it took longer as the night progressed.
I had originally booked grandstand seats for us as tickets were quite expensive, however, there was a problem with the ticket agency as they ran out of the assigned seating, so they upgraded us to a box, only 10 feet away from the runway - result!

The parade started at 9,30pm and we watched 6 schools and all of them were fantastic. We didn't have the energy to stay for the last one and left at 6.30am, just as the sun was coming up. It's been a while since we had such a late night but it was totally worth it. Here are just a few of the 300 photos I took that night:

One day we all went on the Corcovado Train, a rack railway, to the summit of the mountain to see Christ the Redeemer and views over the city and beaches of Rio. The statue is Art Deco and was constructed between 1922 and 1931, is 30m high and the arms stretch 28m wide and is made of reinforced concrete and soapstone. 

The views of Rio below are a sight to see

We had a lovely time in Rio but in the end we had to say goodbye to Copacabana beach and head back to Europe.

Mark has already mentioned our hectic schedule of events since leaving Rio and amazingly, everything has gone to plan.

Land of my fathers.....

and of my father's fathers
and of my father's father's fathers.....oh wait - that was Wales.

and now mine - we have our Spanish residents cards :-)

We used to come to Spain every other year when I was a kid and stay at a campsite about 10km up the road towards Barcelona. The campsite has now been developed on and it has grown and expanded all along this coast, but its still a nice area to be in.

So now we are brexit-proof. We will spend a few weeks in the UK getting Mycenae Road tidied up and back on the rental market by the summer, then relocate here and rent somewhere else for a year while we chill out, build the camper and plan our next worldly adventures - 3-4 months at a time backpacking in India, Asia and taking the camper to Africa, alternating with at least 6 months every year somewhere in Spain until we can get permanent residency status.

Tigger II - Panzer division

Tigger II

Another heavy German tank

So we have bought a new truck - well, ex-demo truck - from Germany. As his main job will be to carry the camper (currently referred to as Campalot - "its only a model") we were going to name him Brian that is called Brian (for the foreigner and young, its Magic Roundabout by way of Monty Python). But as he's orange and black, and German, and armoured underneath with all wheel drive and locking rear differential and weighs two tonnes and is, well, a bit of a tank, we decided on Tigger II

And as my small companion quoted Piglit from the good book:

"I thought Tiggers were smaller than that."

"Not the big ones,"

Now, where do I mount the BFG?

It's been emotional...

To quote Vinne Jones in Lock, Stock....

After 6+ years on the road, and 14 months in Latin America, crime has finally happened - Maria got her chain snatched from her neck while walking back to the apartment this afternoon.

We've been sensible - she left her watches, engagement ring and other big jewelery items at home last visit, but she has worn a small pendant that my mother gave her on a fine chain for the past 30+ years. It's not particularly heavy or valuable, but it was the first gift my mother ever gave her, brought back from Singapore in the late 1980s when mum went back to where she had been stationed in the RAF in the '50s.

Open road literally in sight of our apartment windows, no crowds, daylight, and so small we never thought that someone would even bother.....

Guy snatched it from her neck from behind, Maria felt it and yelled " my chain" and I instinctively took off after the little bastard. Down the road, across the road, back up the road and around the corner. I kept on him for about 250-300m, shouting "thief" at the top of my burning lungs,  and a couple of other passers by joined the chase but we couldn't keep up. But at least he dropped the 2 cellphones and Havaianas that he had also grabbed by that stage. I've not run that far or that fast since I was covering a winger in the teachers/old boys Vs current students rugby match at school in 1982. And no, I never played wing - prop forward was much more my speed. Maria says she has never seen me move that fast, even with the trots.......

Scoured the route to see if he had dropped it or thrown it but no joy, so went back to the apartment. I then went down for a swim at the beach, and just got back to the beach bar when Maria showed up grinning like a Cheshire cat - she had found the pendant :-) She looked again on her way from the apartment and it was sitting on a metal grate about 15 feet the other way from where he grabbed it and started running - must have flicked off the chain when it broke and gone the other way. No sign of the chain, but that doesn't matter.

Couple of drinks, wait for the adrenaline to subside and a few tearful minutes thinking about my mum. I don't believe she is watching us or helped or anything metaphysical, but I hope she would have approved, that she would have thought I did the right thing and chased, that I would protect my own and fight back, the way she brought me up.

Greetings from Rio

Hope everyone is enjoying their pancakes.....