Stunning pictures of Carnival, 2009.

Take a look at these incredible photos of Carnival around the world, which do considerably more justice to the celebrations than my lousy shots. 

The parade of the Beija-Flor samba school in Rio, shown here, was one of the most spectacular that we saw - although it was not the winning school out of the fourteen competing. 

Picture 36 gives some idea of the scale and spectacle of the Sambodromo. 

(If turkeys have nightmares about Christmas, then Carnival must keep ostriches awake at night).

Ipanema to Leblon this evening.

Back at the beach.

Sugarloaf. Finally.

After several rather lazy, post-Carnival days (ie. recovery), early yesterday morning I finally dragged my backside up Pao de Acucar, or Sugarloaf.

It´s reached by two separate cable cars, with a smaller mountain between. At the 400m summit trails climb through lush tropical jungle where butterflies the size of your hand float past, and orchids and bromeliads cling to the trees.

I´ll let these pictures speak for themselves as I´m running short of superlatives for this place.

Carnivaaaaaaaaal!!!

It's half six in the morning and for the fourth consecutive day I've got home at daybreak, again taxi-ing through the city at dawn as sunrise casts soft pinks and oranges across the mountains and misty harbours. 

I am back from the Sambodromo where, surely, one of the greatest visual spectacles on earth unfolded in front of us.

Nothing - absolutely nothing - prepares you for the Samba schools astonishing displays of costumes, floats and choreography, and the electrifying atmosphere. And any preconceptions are quickly blown out the water.

14 schools compete for an hour each over two nights, starting at nine and finishing at six the next morning. Each parade is launched with a massive fireworks display.

The scale is unimaginable - the concrete catwalk alone is three quarters of a kilometre long - and tens of thousands of dancers and performers parade to loud, intoxicating samba beats, while nearly a hundred thousand people cheer them on from the stands of the purpose-built stadium, the Sambodromo.

Floats the size of large houses, with animatronics and fountains; spectacular Amazonian women (I think) in feathers and sequins on 8 inch heels, shimmering ahead of their schools; beautiful bronzed men gyrating to the rhythms; bands of musicians, 300 strong, beating drums, and thousands and thousands of choreographed dancers. 

The desfile, or parade, is an electrifying and relentless spectacle - it's everything you've seen broadcast around the world but a thousand times more incredible. 

There were moments of such overwhelming beauty and wonder that at times I stood with tears in my eyes. Like everything about this city, it is over the top and out of this world - and something to be experienced once in a lifetime.

And now I need some sleep.

(I'm dissappointed with these photographs. My little camera didn't handle the situation very well and the pictures do the event no justice whatsoever).

Return to Ipanema.

OK, I've tried to put up with the all-night street noise, the scratchy nylon sheets and the constant slight fear of being a crime statistic (the recent armed raid on a hostel that made the news - in which residents were intimidated with grenades, tied-up and had their belongs stolen - happened around the corner); but waking-up to a cockroach the size of a rodent waving at me from the bedside cabinet was the last straw.

I've got out of the Copacabana apartment - at least for the few days of Carnival - and am now renting a great little place one block back from the beach in Ipanema. It's perfect. It came my way through someone I met here, and I plan to rent it again in the future. 

What was I saying about meeting great people here?

Rio's Museu de Arte Moderna, or MAM, was built in 1948 and a visionary building in its time. With gorgeous views across the water to Sugarloaf Mountain, it squats amongst the trees of Parque de Flamengo, designed by the brilliant Brazilian Landscape Architect, Roberto Burle Marx.

Ipanema, 7pm this evening.

Returned to a clearer, cooler and less humid Rio than we left behind last week. 

Perfect.

It's great to be back.

Crappy photo*, but a nice tush...

And it kind of captures the moment.

Last weekend we ended up at Grande Rio, one of the Samba Schools gearing-up for carnival. 

It was packed with 3,000 people, about 100 degrees and 100% humidity inside, and an unforgettable few hours.

And at that point my mind was made up: I'm going to be in Rio for Carnival.

Now, what to wear?

(* taken with mobile phone)

The trip up to, and view from, Corcovado Mountain and Cristo Redentor is everything it's cracked-up to be. And then some. 

You ascend through jungle on a funicular railway - which in itself is a beautiful trip - and then gaze down the sheer drop on the city, jungle and beaches 800m below. 

I wish we'd gone up on day one as the astonishing perspective it provides helps you figure out what is where in Rio's crazy and complicated layout.