Rio de Janeiro
Rio was built around a bay where forested granite domes rise straight out of residential neighbourhoods, so the mountain is never a backdrop but a wall at the end of the street, and the forest of Tijuca is inside the city limits. Climb Morro da Urca on foot at dawn, take the cable car for the second stage, and spend the late afternoon on Ipanema, facing the two peaks the beach is named for.
Why go
Carnival — two million people a day in the street blocos, plus the sambadrome parade. Granite peaks inside the city — Sugarloaf and Corcovado rise straight out of residential districts. Beach as public space — Ipanema and Copacabana are used by the whole city, not just visitors. The largest urban forest in the world — Tijuca, replanted by hand from 1861, inside the city limits.
The character
Rio was built where granite domes meet the Atlantic, and the city had to fit itself between them — which is why neighbourhoods are separated by tunnels and mountains, and why favelas climb slopes that could not be built on conventionally. It was the capital of Portugal itself from 1808, when the court fled Napoleon, and of Brazil until 1960, which left it with imperial institutions and a habit of thinking of itself as the country's real centre.
Carnival is the clearest expression of what the city is. The samba schools of the sambadrome are neighbourhood institutions with year-round rehearsals and budgets in the millions, judged on a points system with the seriousness of a league; the street blocos, meanwhile, are free, enormous and largely improvised, with two million people a day in the streets at peak. Both come out of the same source: Afro-Brazilian culture that the city spent a century suppressing and now exports. Rio is unequal, occasionally dangerous and completely alive, and the beach is where all of it meets.
Places of character
Sugarloaf at sunset — two cable cars, and the second is the one that matters. Corcovado early — take the first train up; the statue is better before the cloud and the crowds. Ipanema at Posto 9 — the beach as social geography; every stretch of sand belongs to a different crowd. Tijuca Forest — waterfalls and trails in the mountains behind, with the Vista Chinesa lookout. Lapa arches and the Escadaria Selarón — the nightlife district and the tiled staircase above it. Santa Teresa — the hill of colonial houses reached by the restored tram, with studios and views.
The way to do it
Do the two peaks at the right hours — Corcovado first thing, Sugarloaf at sunset — and everything else around them. Use the beach as the locals do, by numbered posto. Take advice about neighbourhoods and phones seriously without letting it dominate the trip. And if you come at Carnival, pick blocos over the sambadrome for at least one day.
One perfect day
First train up Corcovado at eight with the cloud still below and the whole bay opening. Down and into Tijuca Forest for an hour of trails and a waterfall. Late lunch at a botequim — feijoada if it is Saturday. Afternoon on Ipanema at Posto 9, with a coconut and the mountains at the end of the sand. Cross to Sugarloaf for the second cable car at sunset, with the city switching on beneath you. Dinner in Santa Teresa, then Lapa: samba in a room with a live band and nobody sitting down.
Grand hotels
Copacabana Palace — 1923, the building that made the beach famous, with a casino era and a Hollywood guest list. Hotel Santa Teresa — a converted coffee plantation house on the hill, with the city below the pool.
When to go
Best expression: Carnival, in February or March, if the crowds are the point. Consider: May to September, the dry season, cooler and clear with the best visibility from the peaks. Avoid if possible: the December to February heat if you dislike humidity, and the rainiest weeks of March.
The frame
Ideal stay 5 nights · Minimum 3 nights · Best arrival by air into Santos Dumont, which lands beside the bay · Airport SDU 3 km, GIG 20 km · Walkability within neighbourhoods only · Best without a car yes, with taxis and the metro