Let the adventure begin

Tuesday, 15.07, was the long waited day to start our big Brazilian adventure. As we are masters at packing and time management we were first done packing at 23:00 on the night before and of course our journey started at 04:00 the next morning.

The trip went really smoothly until we figured out that we had to wait 4 hours before we could check-in our luggage. I don’t think I have ever spent that much time in Burger King before 😀

We decided to travel light and just take backpacks – better for moving around in Rio. Although, it was first when we checked-in our bags that we figured out exactly how light we were travelling. My bag weighs 7 kg and Stigs around 10. I plan to be in Rio for a month, going to be fun 😀

Apart from that it also seemed like everyone had decided to go on summer vacation that day. The waiting lines for security were exceptionally long, as they called it in the airport. It did take about 20 min to go through all the security process and of course my box was still pulled aside, just to tell me that the whole point with liquids in transparent bags is that you put them to the top, so they can see what you have – I had acidentally burried it under my jacket.

But as you all can see, we are both smiling and ready for what 32h of travelling and Brazil can offer us.

Hola España!

After ca. 3 hour flight we landed in Madrid. The airport was surprisingly empty and way smaller than i had expected. Still, as we hadn’t eaten in the past 6 hours, we found a restaurant to try out some local cuisine – paella and some kind of tapas. Our conclusion – salty and way too fishy. Hopefully the food will be better in Brazil.

We did see a restaurant with nice ceramic plates on the wall.

We waited around 6 hours in the airport. When it was time to board the plane, we really understood the spanish way of doing things.

There was a line of 200 people and no microphpne, just one guy shouting – in Spanish. Very efficient. The boarding was in groups starting from A and continuing with numbers. That seemed to confuse and anger a lot of older people that had formed such a nice line and were holding the first few spots.

But somehow, we all managed to board the plane.

Our 10 hour flight to Sao Paulo was ready for take off.

Olá Brasil!

The flight to Sao Paulo was filled with a lot of snoring people. Not that I actually can confirm that, as I was possibly one of them. We managed to get around 8 hours of sleep, what I think is amazing in an airplane, and played a bit of battle ship.

Brazil greeted us with amazing 14 degrees and almost lost luggage. We needed to claim our luggage as we entered Brazil and needed to do check-in again later. That sounded like a  great plan. The road to baggage claim went through security and passport control.

Here is the perfect place for a side note: We prepared well for our trip and made it as low-tech as possible. Even bought phones that can only call and send sms. You can imagine my surprise when standing at the line for passport control and everyone is looking at their fancy smartphones. Suddenly you start envying people that have a smartphone, no matter what kind. 😀

We were allowed to enter the country and all we needed to do was pick up our bags. But they weren’t there. Everyone else had received theirs and the company was already removing unowned bags from the line, but we still hadn’t gotten ours.

On our way to lost luggage counter we looked at the odd sized baggage counter. And what do we see, our bags lying on the floor and waiting to be picked up. Well that really was a relief. The adventure was ready to continue.

We expected to have around 8 hours in the Sao Paulo airport. We went to check-in our baggage and we were offered an earlier flight to Rio. The switch saved us 5 hours. After a day of travelling, that felt like a real blessing.

On our way to the gate we saw something oddly familiar 🙂

The last 30 minute flight marked the end of our 36 hour road to Rio. Now it’s time for well earned sleep.

Stay tuned for our first days in Rio.