Beach

I rise at 8:40. Alexei knocks on my door at 9:30 and we go downstairs for breakfast.

It's the usual fare: scrambled egg and bacon, followed by fruit. I’m painfully predictable.

As the weather is looking nicer, today will be a beach day. Alexei has brought his swimming trunks as he fancies a dip in the sea. So, we pick up a beach towel from reception.

On the beach, we get chairs and a brolly from hut 57X. Plus three giant caipirinhas. Obviously. Who would want to sit on the beach without a cocktail in their hand?

It’s also dirt cheap. Just 6 euros for 750 mil.

“Do you want it with just lime? Or with passion fruit as well?” Our friendly waiter asks. “It’s really good with passion fruit.”

“OK. You’ve convinced me.”

It does taste dead good. And fits in perfectly with the vibe of the beach.

It's quite lively. With a lot of young sculpted males. Who are very generously smearing each other with sunscreen. Quite a lot of moustaches, too. After a while, I twig. This is the gay section of the beach. Though not exclusively. No-one seems to mind, which is nice.

Alexei goes for a dip in the sea. It’s quite rough and there’s a red flag flying.

“The current is really strong. It almost pulled me over a couple of times.”

Rather him than me. I’m happy to sit and sip in the shade.

We while away a few hours, moving ours seats to stay in the shade. While vendors trail past with, empanadas, towels, prawns, BBQ meat and fags. The latter escalating quickly from fags to weed to coke. A gay couple just in front of us smoke a spliff. It's all very chill.

Of course, I send Mikey a photo of the beautiful beach. Just to make him jealous.

“I’m trying to get Mikey to come to Rio with me.”

“Have you convinced him yet?” Andrew asks.

“I’m working on it. The cheap cocktails might swing it.”

The kids swap over to beer. While I get a second bucket of caipirinha.

After a few hours, we head back to our hotel. And try to decide where to eat this evening. The kids find a craft beer place called Mad Brew literally around the corner. So we head there. It must be new, as I didn't find it in my search for beer places last year. Or I didn’t look very well. Which is also a possibility.

We sit outside again. It’s a fairly modestly-sized place. Though they have 15 beers on draught. A couple of Lagers, but mostly US-inspired stuff. As is the food.

The kids order wheat beer, while I stick to a caipirinha. I've only drunk one beer so far. Which is fairly typical for me in Brazil. I’m a bit dubious of beer quality. Though here would probably have been fine. The kids seem happy enough with their beer.

They have some awards pinned up over the bar. A couple are for a competition I judged.

“I wonder if I judged any of their beers?” I remark to the kids. “It depends very much on which of their beers won. I did mostly English-style stuff.”

“Then why aren’t you trying any of them?”

“I’m on holiday.”

“Yeah, right. That excuse again.”

Having a stupidly early start tomorrow, we eat quite early. First onion rings and chips to share. Followed by a burger for Alexei. Which he assures me is really nice.

“Dad, would you travel across America by train?” Alexei asks.

“Not in one go.”

“Why not?”

“It would be too knackering.”

“You mean because you’re old.”

“You have such a lovely way of putting it.”

“Thanks.”

After a bit of lazing around my room, we turn in pretty early. As we need to get up at 6:30. For our flight to Santiago. I hope Andrew can be roused. The only time he’s up at 6:30 is when he hasn’t gone to bed yet.

Cachaca is my new sleepytime chum.



Mad Brew Ipanema
R. Vinícius de Moraes, 120
Ipanema,
Rio de Janeiro
RJ, 22411-010.
https://madbrewtap.glideapp.io/dl/d0a5f4?full=t