Day 25: Rio de Janiero - Apartment hunting in Copacabana

We somewhat sadly left our home of eight nights, hopped into our tiny Chevy and drove to the airport.  Our flights to Rio were fine, the only issues were some indigestion from eating about 75 mussels the night before at our favorite restaurant Arante. 

 

We arrived in Rio to find that summer has arrived with a vengeance, it was very hot as we wandered out of the airport trying to find the subway station.  We finally found the station (a challenge because a lack of good maps at tourist offices in S America and a lack of knowledge of English or Spanish at information kiosks - even at the airport!, as well as a general lack of information, as in they did not understand the few words we did know in Portuguese--onde metro?--and also did not know where the subway was, just told us to take a taxi...?) and rode the metro to Copacana where our hostel was located.  We checked in, depressed at our room and surroundings, hot and hungry.  We ate some meat and pineapple sandwiches and hunted down the city of Rio tourist office and were pleasantly surprised to find extraordinarily helpful English speaking staff with awesome maps of the city (the lack of free tourist maps or subway maps everywhere we go has become a running joke...there were no maps to be found in BA and our experience at the airport in Rio made us fear the same here).  They also told us to talk to some people down the street who rented apartments on a short term basis.  We´d read about this company in the Lonely Planet and had considered renting an apartment, but were not sure about the logistics.  However, we´d become quite spoiled in our house in Pantano and already missed the kitchen.  So, we went to the office, and Tiago showed us a few places and now we´re the proud residents of a 12th floor one bedroom apartment on Ave de Copacabana, one block from the beach and a few blocks from the subway.  We have a kitchen, a living room, a doorman, AC and a few of the busy street far below for only modestly more than a hostel and far less than a hotel.  We live here until the 24th.  We´re thinking of cooking our own Thanksgiving dinner in our little kitchen.