EC-Rider Travels

This morning Analida and I went to Rio’s stunning Botanical Gardens. These date back to 1808 and were founded by John VI of Portugal who expropriated the land, intended for a gun-powder factory, to acclimatise spices, such as nutmeg, pepper and cinnamon, imported from the West Indies. It is over 140 hectares with more than…

I have had just the nicest day, but not too much to report as it has just been wall to wall chat! I met up with Niccy and Iain from RBS for lunch on the beach and caught up on all the RBS news. The cloud and even some rain has come in today, so…

Today we picked up two adorable girls, Constance and Mattie Maloret, daughters of friends of Emma and Hugh Graham who joined us on our trip up Sugar-loaf Mountain and to Petropolis. It is a cable-car ride to Sugar-loaf which is fun and the views are spectacular. The weather is sadly still not great so the…

We have had the best day! We started by visiting a Samba School – which I assumed would be like visiting The Royal Ballet School, but in fact it was visit to a ‘carnival factory”. The Cidade do Samba where the major Samba Schools have a space to design and build their floats, work on…

Paulo took us to down-town Rio today – again such a contrast of old and new, stunning modern office buildings interspersed with beautiful baroque churches and tumbling down colonial buildings. Covid has hit hard and many of the shops and restaurants in the business area have closed and market traders have moved in. Analida was…

My wonderful friend has booked Paulo to take us to see the sites while I am here – this is just the biggest treat as it has to be said, I am not the only tourist in town! The luxury of being driven to the door, skipping the queues as Paulo is an official guide…

Well this is a bit different. Analida’s apartment is beyond beautiful and more comfortable than words can say. It is on the eighth floor in the district of Flamengo overlooking the bay and Botafogo beach, with lovely parks between. Needless to say we have not drawn breath and she is spoiling me rotten. Today has…

Today was a travelling day, starting early with a 4.15 wake-up! With the exception of a long wait to get into the airport, it all ran extraordinarily smoothly, the airport ran like clockwork and Latam Airlines was excellent flying me from Cusco to Lima and then after a short wait to Rio. There was a…

Today Miguel gave us a tour of Cusco, the heart if the Inca dynasty. Cusco is another UNESCO site and sits at an altitude of 3,300m. It has a population of half a million but is growing fast, spreading up the neighbouring mountains. Property in ‘down-town’ Cusco apparently rivals London prices! We first visited the…

This is a very nice hotel set in the most stunning gardens within the cloud Forrest overlooking the river and the railway line. It was originally a tea and coffee plantation and the staff seem to take extraordinary pride in their hotel. They offer a number of excursions and I did the bird walk first…