South America

Rio!

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Our final stop in South America was Rio De Janeiro.  We stayed at the Porto Bay Rio Internacional hotel in Copacabana.  It was a great place to stay, friendly staff, really good breakfast and the upgrade to a ocean front room was greatly appreciated.  Best of all was the roof top pool/bar, it was perfect for taking sunset and sunrise photos.

We spent a fair amount of time at the beach or pool.  We did go check out some sites with a private guide (Bruno) and did a super cheesy jeep tour to a Favela and Tijuca forest.  Bruno was awesome and helped us out a lot the rest of the trip.  The jeep tour should be avoided.

The food was better than we were expecting.  The Brazilian BBQ at Churrascaria Palace is not to be missed!  We also ate at a great cocktail and tapas bar called El Born.

Photo wise there are lots of great view points of the city; Tijuca Forest, Christ the Redeemer and Sugarloaf Mountain are all spectacular.

Overall I was very happy with the photo kit I brought.  The Fujifilm 18-135mm was very impressive and was used in the majority of the photos.  The weather sealing came in handy at Iguazu.  I threw in the Rokinon 12mm F2.0 at the last minute incase there was a chance to try some astorphotography and glad I did as it came in handy at Iguazu.  The Fuji X-E2 and 27mm got some use in Buenos Aires when it was a little cooler and a jacket was necessary, but otherwise was there incase something happened to the X-T1.  No regrets since ditching the Canon SLR gear last year!

Here are my two favourite photos from Rio.  The rest can be seen on Flickr.

Cristo comes through the clouds.

Morning run along Copacabana


Buenos Aires

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Finally completed processing the photos from our short trip to South America.  We stopped in three locations starting in Buenos Aires, then onto Iguazu Falls and finally relaxing in Rio De Janeiro.

We had a great time in Buenos Aires.  We stayed in a neighbourhood called Palermo at the Bobo Hotel.  The hotel was great, our room had a large balcony and jacuzzi tub.  All the front desk workers were very helpful.  I highly recommend this hotel.  Palermo isn't a touristy neighbourhood but there are lots of restaraunts/bars and good shopping close by.

Highlights from the BA:

  • Don Julio's: This is now a popular restaurant among tourists but initially was also very popular with the locals.  We had some of the best beef we every ate at this restaurant and it was only a couple blocks from our hotel.
  • Superclasico:  If you are ever in town when a superclasico is occurring you must go to this match.  I have never seen or been in an atmosphere like that.  I would not call myself a soccer fan but it was one of the best sporting experiences I have ever had.
  • Recoleta cemetery: Although a little creepy strolling through this elaborate/exclusive cemetery it is definitely a must see.

Photography wise the weather was too good during the day to capture anything great.  Recoleta should have been a haven for good photos but there was not a cloud in the sky and we were ushered out before the sun was able to set and make the lighting good.  I am sure there were good photos there but I just failed to capture anything I was happy with.

There was also a tonne of street art that should have made for great photos but I feel that I failed to capture them as well.

My favourite pictures were taken in Puerto Madero.  We stayed here past sunset and below is my favourite photo from BA.  You can also click through to see all the images from BA.


Superclásico Craziness

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Well we successfully made it to Buenos Aires and had no hiccups on our trip to Rio De Janeiro.  Overall an amazing trip and I now have over 2000 photos to sort through.  Before that though I thought I would share our experience at the Superclásico on our last night in Buenos Aires.

The Superclásico is a football match between River Plate and Boca Juniors.  These are the two top rivals in Argentina and has to be one of the biggest rivalries in all of sports.  Tickets are tough to come by but lucky for us due to the Copas Libertadores there were two Superclásico's while we were there.

It was a crazy experience. The fans are so passionate and start singing hours before the match and by kickoff the stands are basically a large mosh pit.

I brought the trusty Canon S95 and put together the videos below.  But first a couple of tips if you plan to ever attend one:

  1. Do not sit in an aisle seat if you are in general admission.  We arrived at the stadium three hours early and thought it would be a good idea.  However one hour prior to the match the aisles are full of spectators because they typically sell more tickets then there are seats.  We ended up standing on or seats for the entire match.
  2. Females should bring toilet paper.  Lauren was shocked when the ladies washroom didn't have toilet seats and there was no toilet paper.
  3. If you are taking pictures/video of the craziness be sure to hold onto your camera\phone tightly!  One of the guys in our group had his iPhone 6 accidentally knocked out of this hand while making a video.  He miraculously was able to find it at the end of the match under a seat in the section below.  It had a few dings but the screen was mostly intact.