After a pretty late night, I was surprised that I was ready to get out and about relatively early. Having been in Ipanema, it was time to check out the other fabled beach of Rio, Copacabana. While I could have walked there in about 20 mins or so, I decided to Uber there to save some energy plus it was noticeably hotter out.

There was definitely a different vibe than Ipanema, and I soon got why the locals I’ve chatted with prefer that to here. Granted, it was a sunny Sunday so that would naturally bring out more people but the word I’d use to describe it is almost oppressive, especially amongst the quiosquis which were crammed with beach revelers.

There was a nice steady breeze which definitely helped but after wandering around for awhile, I had had my fill of the madness. It was now lunch time and knowing the various spots right on the beach are almost never good and/or overpriced, I walked away from the area and found a couple of blocks down the road back towards Ipanema a brew pub that looked decent.

The breeze was still present which was much needed as was a cold beer. They had several beers on tap, including an intriguing German marzen. Ahh that hit the spot – a surprisingly good version of that style with nice notes of caramel and a depth of flavor that belies its relatively mild ABV.

It was a good thing the beer was so good because the chicken sandwich I ordered… was not. It’s not even worthy of a photo but at least the beer helped wash it down pretty quickly.

I walked back to my neighborhood, taking streets away from the beach for variety’s sake (and forgot to take pics along the way so mea culpa) The tree-lined streets are no doubt crucial to keeping things at least a bit cooler the much hotter months.

I got home to the now familiar sounds of bossa nova echoing down the street from Bar Vinicius. I opened the windows for some nice cross breezes and took a siesta… which turned into a couple of hours of deep sleep. By the time I woke up, my body was basically telling me it would be an early evening.

I walked a couple of blocks up the street to a gastropub and noticed they had a Brahma (Brazil’s main beer) on nitro for their black beer version. I was surprised to be served it in a style I had in Prague called “the sweet” – where as shown in the picture above it’s mostly head that eventually settles. Not exactly what I was expecting but pretty tasty.

Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for the just OK cheese empanadas I had with the beer. Again, not picture worthy either. So it was pretty much a bust of a day food-wise (apologies to my food porn fans out there) but I took it as a signal to get some rest. Tomorrow was supposed to be not great weather-wise so perhaps the rest would continue. By this point in my travels, my body definitely wouldn’t object.