Date: Jan 22, 2007 9:50 PM
Subject: Monday, January 22, 2007
Rio DE Janeiro, Brazil
We got up at 7:00 this morning, our time. That’s 3:00 or 4:00 AM your time. This is supposed to be one of the most beautiful ports to come into. We were supposed to start entering at about 8:00 AM and we didn’t want to miss anything. The scenery was to be on the port side of the ship. That’s the side our suite is on. I wouldn’t even have to get out of bed to see it. Wonderful. What could be better? It would have been much better if we could see anything. It was raining and fog covered. We could hardly see a thing and what we did see was gray. It was like looking at a black and white TV picture that was coming in with a lot of fog. We slowly went by all the land marks and mountains and saw just the lower parts if anything at all.Rio is the world headquarters of Stern Jewelers and the place where the 84 year old founder lives. Stern has had representatives aboard since Barbados. They have been offering free transportation and tours to their stores and plants at most ports. Since we couldn’t see anything, we decided to take one of their free tours. Another one of the stupidest moves I’ve made. I don’t know what is wrong with mw sometimes. Their headquarters and plant is in Ipanema, the nicest part of the city. We are docked in commercial and industrial part of the city. They call it the downtown section.
The Golden Princess is docked in front of us. Just walking past that ship in the rain is a job. Luckily, there was a tram waiting to go as we left the ship. It took us to the port building entrance where we could walk right in. We had gotten Stern tags before leaving the ship and the Stern people in the terminal recognized us quickly. We were the first to get on a large bus and we took the front seats on the right side. Perfect place to take pictures out the windshield. So of course it continued to rain and the pictures weren’t much.
The town was very interesting and was filled with many old and well kept buildings except everything was covered in hideous paint graffiti. Everywhere you looked was covered with weird painted markings. In the US I would say gang symbols. Maybe it was the same here, except nothing pretty. Only ugly black scribbling.
When we got to Sterns we bypassed the tour of the areas where they fabricate different kinds of stones and jewelry. We just went to the floor where they sell stuff. They make a ladies watch that no one else has. It has a black round or octagon face, and is very thin. It is all made of synthetic Safire and they have leather or titanium bands. I just wanted t look at one close up as long as we had nothing better to do. Dumb, dumb, dumb. Bobbi had forgotten her every day watch at home. As soon as they started selling the $49 watches on the ship, I was going to get her one. Now she takes one look and says, “OH! I REALLY LIKE THAT. IT’S BEAUTIFUL.” So I started looking for something good to hit myself in the head with. I really like that, really means, she will be bugging me 24 /7 until she gets it. They are not $49. Stern watches start in the thousands. Stern is one of the most overpriced jewelers I have ever seen. Too bad. I now am the proud owner of a Black Safire titanium banded Stern ladies watch. I just knew I always wanted one. I wanted to look at men’s ring too but they had only stuff that looked like junk to me. No nice men’s rings. Plenty of great lady’s rings.
I was really aggravated by now and didn’t feel like waiting for a bus to take us back so they got us a van right away. About 14 others joined us for the ride back to the ship. We went a totally different way to get back. It was a longer ride and took us right by Ipanema Beach and Coppa Cabana Beach. Kind of dead due to the weather but a very nice part of town. I would like to spend some time here. It looks great.
Tonight we are doing a Virtuoso dinner party thing. They picked us up in the lobby of the ship at about 6:30 PM and shuttled us and walked us through the terminal to waiting busses. After a long ride through town we turned off on a narrow one lane road the busses did not fit on. We went pretty much straight up a mountain to some very old and ornate buildings. I guess it must have been someone’s old mansion. It was quite medieval and very well kept up. They were serving drinks and Hors D Oeuvres as we entered. Later they walked us to another large room for dinner and a show. The food was good until the Filet. They were all medium well and so salty it just wasn’t good for you. The service however, was impeccable.
The show was excellent. Shirtless men doing various dances and other men playing a lot of unusual musical instruments. Women danced in several different costumes and ended up in some pretty scanty ones. Don’t you just hate it when they do that? Especially when their very large bottoms are completely hanging out there? Somehow I suffered through it and made it back to the ship. It was a great outing and everyone had a very good time.
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