Brazil 2022

Family Trip to Brazil

Views from the airplane during landing at Rio de Janeiro. 

I stayed at Hilton Copacabana hotel, across from the beach. This hotel has many rooms with ocean views, either a side or front view. I booked a side view room, but they upgraded me to a front ocean view. The hotel has a rooftop deck with panoramic views of the ocean and mountains. Rio de Janeiro reminds me of Honolulu, Hawaii - a big city with beaches, ocean, mountain, and forests nearby.

Video of Copacabana Beach

Beautiful chandelier at the Hilton Copacabana hotel.

The view from my hotel room

Sugar Loaf Mountain

Christ the Redeemer statue. Seen from the rooftop deck at the hotel.

Sunset over Copacabana.

Day tour of Rio de Janeiro. Booked through viator.com

Got close to Christ the Redeemeer statue. It was a foggy, rainy day.

Maracanã Stadium. Opened in 1950, in time to host the World Cup. Also hosted the 2014 World Cup. 

Cathedral of Saint Sebastian

Inside the Cathedral

Escadaria Selaron. Artwork of Jose Selaron, who visited many countries and visitors to Brazil brought tiles to add to the staircase. Many countries are represented, plus many states in the United States. 

Texas tile

Ready to go up to Sugar Loaf mountain

View of a harbor from top of Sugar Loaf.

For our Iguazu Falls trip we stayed in Foz de Iguazu, a small city near the Iguazu waterfalls. The Iguazu falls sits on the border between Brazil and Argentina. We visited both sides. Iguazu falls is horseshoe shaped, like Niagara Falls. Iguazu Falls consists of 275 individual waterfalls, which are as tall as 82m/269ft. The falls are 2.7km/1.7miles wide - widest in the world. 

Triple Frontier: Junctions of Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Iguazu and Parana Rivers converge here. 

Sunset over Foz de Iguazu

Brazilian steak dinner.

Argentina side of Iguazu Falls. The Argentina side of Iguazu Falls is bigger, with more trails. Lots of places to get close to the roaring water. There are three main hiking trails:

1) Lower Circuit, which takes you to the base of the falls. Some parts of this trail were closed during our visit.

2) Upper Circuit, which takes you around the top of the falls. Lots of places with dramatic views.

3) Devil's Throat, where you ride a train to a bridge that goes to the highest part of Iguazu. This trail was closed due to damage from recent floods. Yep, this means I plan to return to Iguazu in the future.

Video of Iguazu Falls in Argentina Side

We saw the Brazil side of the falls (left) in Argentina.

Two Sister Falls

Brazil side of Iguazu Falls. There is one main trail with several overlooks. Although the Brazil side is small than the Argentina side, the Brazil side has better views of the falls and makes for spectacular photos. 

Video of Iguazu Falls in Brazil Side

Panoramic view of the falls

Boats are available to get you very close to the falls. Prepare for a "shower"

We lucked out and saw a rainbow

We walked across this bridge and could fee the mist spray from the waterfalls.

Double rainbow

We visited Itaipu Dam, a hydroelectric dam on the Parana River. It is a major source of energy for Paraguay and Brazil. The tour is a bus ride around the dam and also goes over the top of the dam. The bus briefly enters Paraguay.

Visited the Bird Park, located near Iguazu Falls. The park is a conservation center focussing on caring for birds, some species are in danger of becoming extinct. We saw many different birds of many colors  including flamingos, hawks, parrots, owls, macaws, and toucans.