Rio de Janeiro’s Famous Sambadrome
Visiting Rio’s world-famous Carnival has been on my bucket list ever since I first fell in love with the city back in 2012. I was 20 years old and, having won a grant from my university to pay for my flights, I was adamant that I wanted to visit the Amazon jungle to inspire my final-year project. I settled on Rio, applying to join a volunteering program so I wouldn’t be alone and could hopefully add a bit of meaning to the whole experience—rather than being perceived as a posh, rich tourist taking photos of leaves. It was the first time I had ever travelled solo, and it was also my first time experiencing Latin American culture. It was certainly a huge culture shock, and I loved it.
Now, with six years of Latin American travel under my belt, I was excited to return. I wondered if I’d still get sucked into its decaying beauty and the loudness of life there, or if I would now just shrug and see it as the same as all the other cities. Regardless of that, we had driven many, many miles to make it here for Carnival. So that, for certain, would be an experience.
I’m pretty sure the idea of sharing a house together came up the very first time we met Will and Stacey. We hit it off pretty quickly, and as they were currently house-sitting at the time, it seemed like a great idea to all rent a place together. This vague plan was way back in June, though—who knew how our plans would change over the next eight months?
We met again in Mario’s garage in August and we were both still interested. I didn’t know, though, if they really meant it and how committed they would be to getting there. It would be quite a drive. In the end, it was a lovely and pleasant surprise to realise that they wanted to go as much as we did. Around New Year, we started to look at accommodation. At the end of January, we bought some tickets to the parade. It was official. We were all in.
Then Kate, our Aussie friend from Ushuaia wanted to come with her current travelling buddy. That made six of us. We rented a decent-sized house, and the countdown began.
Of course, we had already reunited with Will and Stacey in Curitiba. Kate and Jesi were already in the city. By the time we were on our final approach, it was a blisteringly hot Thursday morning. Temperatures climbed as we drove further into the suburbs of the city. We crawled through busy side streets lined with speed bumps and traffic lights. The engine temperature climbed as the outside temperature approached 40°C.
After what seemed like an age, we turned down the street and the satnav announced we were there. We were the first to arrive, but not by much. We had only been there ten minutes or so when Solero (Will & Stacey’s van) rounded the corner. We opened the key safe and let ourselves in.
The place was not fancy, but we were under no illusions that it was going to be. Our requirements had been simple: cheap, air-conditioned, and pet-friendly. The first thing we checked was the AC, with units in three out of the four rooms working. There was a large amount of other people’s stuff around; it was clear that this was a family home and they had moved out for us to rent it short-term. Some of the cupboards had little bits of masking tape over them as a kind of "we’d rather you didn’t open this..." warning. There was a kitchen, two bathrooms, and three showers. A large patio out back had a small swimming pool. It was basic and not super clean, but it was cheap and it would be the perfect party pad.
We both set about unpacking and cleaning our respective vans, ready to put them in storage for a week. The only downside of the house was that there was only street parking. The neighbour assured us it was safe, but with our two rather conspicuous vehicles, we didn’t feel comfortable risking it, especially as we wouldn't be there a lot of the time.
We had been in touch with Rio’s Volks Club, who were going to let us park our campers for the week at their bar. Knowing we wouldn’t have access to Ruby for a while, we unpacked all our food and clothes. There is nothing more annoying than realising you're missing something because you left it in the camper.
Amidst the upheaval, Kate arrived. We met Jesi and Lucy (who had asked to join that morning). They would be leaving their camper outside as it had a much more "work van" look, but of course, they still needed to move some stuff in. Everyone grabbed a room. We shut the cats inside with the air conditioning while we continued to unpack. It was so hot we were literally dripping. I unpacked our fridge and cleaned it before turning it off, all while sweat ran down me in rivers. It was just too hot. I gave up on any other cleaning and retreated inside.
The washing machine was already in full swing, and Will was inspecting the pool. The water was so hot it was like a bath—hardly a place to cool off. We didn’t have long, though, as we were waiting for Anderson Pimenta, the local VW club owner, who was coming to pick us up. He arrived toward the end of the afternoon in his taxi. He was very, very excited. We got a lot of waving, excited Portuguese, and Google Translate.
He told us he would lead us over to the bar and then drive us back home afterwards. Pretty good service! But, as they are renowned for, he drove like a taxi driver—not like he had two campers trying to follow him through rush hour traffic. Ruby was dangerously close to overheating as I floored it once again to make the lights in time, before slamming on the brakes for a speed bump. It seemed that in Rio, red lights were an optional suggestion for any mode of transport. Cars drove right through them into oncoming traffic, completely oblivious. Safe to say, both Will and I were happy to reach the parking lot.
After a lot of gesticulating and shouting, the gates were opened and we pulled in. Will parked up next to a VW that was already there, only to be shooed across by Pepe.
"The VW must go next to the other VW," he said, nodding as we backed in.
"Not this orange Ford thing," he tutted.
Then he locked up, and we hopped in Anderson's taxi for the ride home. Will paid him R$50 for the trip and we were done. The party could officially begin!
As it was now getting a bit late, we decided to make do with what we had. Clearly, a large alcohol run would be needed, but that could wait until morning. We had some drinks on us already, and Lee decided to make us all some pizzas to slow our gradual descent into the kind of drunk you get when you haven’t eaten.
He was mid-pizza when a crash outside had us all running. Somehow, Kate lay in a heap at the bottom of the small flight of steps leading up to the patio. She’d missed her footing while climbing up, slipped, and bumped her head pretty hard. Her hip was badly grazed, too. The rest of the evening was spent making sure she didn’t have a concussion, with Stacey checking on her every half hour once she went to bed. It was certainly an interesting start to the week, but fortunately, she was okay—just a bit bruised and battered.
The following day was our day to see the parade. Rio’s Carnival is famous both for its huge parades with their enormous, elaborate floats, and also for its street parties (blocos). Tickets to see the main parade are expensive. It’s a competition, so as the week progresses, the tickets become pricier. For this reason alone, we went on the first night. We were warned that it would be a crazy, intense party that went on until 6:00 AM, so we went prepared: some rather loud outfits, huge bottles of booze disguised in water bottles, and spare toilet paper. I don’t think any of us imagined how the night would actually turn out.
With our drinks prepared, we piled into two separate taxis. Lee had made us a good litre of espresso martini for the drive in, which we passed around between the four of us. Kate, Jesi, and Lucy were in the other cab. We planned to meet up outside because we needed to use Kate’s data to load our tickets. The event is strict. There are no physical tickets and the generated one from your confirmation email apparently changes regularly. This is all to stop scams, but meant we needed to get internet at the door just before we went in.
As we got within a couple of kilometres of the event, it became clear that we were going to have to go the rest of the way on foot. All of the roads were shut, and a heavy military presence made sure they stayed that way. I’m sure our taxi driver would have been happy enough to drive us aimlessly around and around while adding to our bill, but as we started to drift further away again, we told him we would walk. It was only 2 km to the entrance. We stopped at a nearby petrol station to let the others know what we were doing with their wifi, grabbed a road beer, and set off.
Stacey and I brought up the rear, as we both struggled to drink and walk at the same time. At least I wasn’t the only one! Halfway down, we stopped to buy sparkly earrings, and the boys got some tutus (obviously). Before too long, we reached the entrance to the Sambadrome.
As its primary purpose is this parade, the Sambadrome is a long line of tiered concrete seating running down either side, leaving a street down the middle for the performers to pass through. Because it's so long, it has quite a few entrances.
We opted to head to a nearby bar to use their Wi-Fi and message the others to see where they had got to. Kate shared her location with me, and I watched her little blue dot jerk closer on the map. Then, it stopped moving. About ten minutes later, the live location ended. We tried to phone, but she didn’t answer. We waited. We ordered another round and waited some more.
Will got a weird message on Instagram which we assumed was some kind of scam, but it felt off. The person didn't say who they were, and just wanted to know our location. We didn't answer. After waiting another half an hour, we decided to walk to her last known location. She wasn’t there. We decided to head inside, hoping we could get internet access there to find each other. The queue to get in was huge, but it was moving. We went through security, alcohol successfully smuggled. We grabbed some food and headed off to find our seats.
Needless to say, having bought the cheapest seats, we did not have the best view, but it was still impressive to see the giant floats. However, the one thing we didn't expect from the experience was the massive gaps. We had expected some kind of non-stop, mad party, and when the parade did come through, people were on their feet dancing. But then, the parade would stop. It was definitely impressive, although the photos are not the best as we only had our phones.
We waited an hour before the next section came through. By this point, it was past 1:00 AM. We decided we’d had enough—and we weren’t the only ones. A huge portion of the crowd left at this point, clearly not wanting to wait another hour for 15 minutes of parade. We headed back to the bar, ordered a taxi, and went home.
The others were still not back, and it was pushing 2:00 AM by this point. They didn’t come in until over an hour later. Kate had been mugged, and her phone was stolen. The weird message on Instagram had actually been from the police on her behalf, if only she’d thought to put her name in the message! She was okay, just a bit shaken and upset. It was incredibly unfortunate; not only did they miss the whole event, but she was still feeling worse for wear after her fall the night before. At least she hadn’t been physically hurt, apart from pulling a muscle, but what a shame. We would have to find some other cool parties to make up for it during the week.
People gradually trickled to bed until it was just me, Kate, Stacey, and Will. The sun rose, and soon enough came the heat. More drinks were poured, and we got into the swimming pool. The drinks continued to flow. Once we reached midday, we decided there was no point in going to bed and that sleep would only make us feel worse, so we committed hard.
I think it’s one of the only times in my life I have stayed up all night and then through the entirety of the following day. I've got to say—it’s certainly one way to bypass a hangover!
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