Arrival in Rio - March 21, 2013

We made it!  The 10 hour flight was a bumpy one, and neither of us got a lot of sleep on the plane, but we did arrive about 30 minutes early and, after about a 15 minute wait, had no issues clearing Brazilian immigration.

On the flight from Atlanta to Rio, we met an Estonian lady named Tess.  We found out that Tess was headed to stay in the Gloria area of Rio as well, which is not too far from our B&B in Santa Teresa.  The three of us decided to share a cab from the airport into town, which worked out very well.

Once we cleared immigration and collected our luggage, which took an additional 15 minutes, we exited the secure area and went looking for an ATM.  There are ATMs all over the 2^nd floor of the airport, and even though it took several tries, I was able to pull some reais.

Prior to coming to Rio, I’d researched the transportation situation from the airport to town.  The B&B offered us an arranged pickup for 85 reais ($42.50), but I knew that was too expensive.  A bus could be taken for 12 reais per person, but I didn’t think that would be a quick ride, nor did I like the idea of schlepping our bags around Rio to save a little money.  From what I read online, VIP taxis were available from the airport, but those would be around 60+ reais.  We found a booth inside the airport for Aerocoop, which is a regular taxis company and the lady at the booth initially told us that there “were no taxis”, a security officer that spoke fluent English came over to help translate and we were then told we’d just have to wait a short while for a cab ride.  The base price was 39 reais, plus the cost of our luggage, so they quoted us a price of 44.10 reais.  This seemed quite reasonable and with Tess joining us, almost as cheap as the bus.  Note: After we returned from Brazil, I saw this blog post that explained the real reason we had trouble getting a taxi to Santa Teresa.

The snarling traffic of Rio made the trip from the airport to Santa Teresa around 45 minutes.  Once we arrived at our B&B (Casa da Carmen e do Fernando), we were allowed to check in early and were greeted by both the staff and the owners and given a tour of the house.  We both got much needed showers, while Tess waited for us and Skyped with some people back in Estonia.

We finally made our way down to Gloria with Tess around 1pm to have some lunch.  After determining a solid lunch option and translating some of the dishes on their menu board, we finally had a chance to relax and watch daily life in Rio.  We all had huge quality meals for 12 reais ($6) each.