Rio de Janeiro - Capuchin monkeys jump from branch to branch in the trees – eucalyptus, mahogany, rosewood – towering above. On the ground, coatis and lizards scuttle through thick mounds of decomposing rainforest biomass.
Hiking along, we haven’t seen any monkeys or coatis and I get only the briefest glimpse of a lizard – its tail the length of my arm – before it disappears into deadfall and underbrush, but their rustling is non-stop.
Because humans are also scarce, I don’t mind the hidden wildlife. Walking for seven hours smack in the middle of a city that has more than six million residents, we’ve seen only eight other people.
At 24km², the Tijuca National Park may be the smallest of Brazil’s national parks, which number about 60. But it’s smack in the middle of Rio. Any amount of green space in a city as populous as Rio is sweet. (To compare: New York’s Central Park is about 2km².)
Tijuca is one of the largest urban forests in the world.
The city’s famous Christ the Redeemer statue is perched on the summit of one of the dozens of peaks in the park. There’s a tram that takes you there, as well as a hiking trail to the top. Sometimes the wait for the tram is hours long, while the steep trail can be so busy it feels like a mule train.
Elsewhere in Tijuca, it feels like a national park.
Tijuca Forest is secondary Atlantic Rainforest.
By the mid-19th century, the original Atlantic Forest ecosystem that greeted the Portuguese when they arrived in the early 1500s had been cut down to make way for sugar and coffee plantations. In 1861, its Portuguese ruler, Dom Pedro II, was prescient enough to realise this deforestation would affect the city’s supply of drinking water. He ordered the continent’s first reforestation programme. In less than two decades, employees and slaves planted more than 110 000 seedlings.
A century after the reforestation programme was first ordered, Tijuca was named a national park.
I hired Anna Atz Asen of Free Tours de Aventura to show me around.
We meet at the Afonso Pena metro station and hop on to a bus (the 301, 302 or 345) so stuffed with passengers and climbing up a road so steep and twisting I many times wonder whether we’ll make it to the top. Nearly an hour after boarding, we get off at Bar da Pracinha, at the Praça Afonso Viseu in Alto da Boa Vista. And that’s pretty much the last interaction with civilisation we have for seven hours.
As an endurance athlete, I have asked Anna to come up with a challenging day hike, 40km if possible. A whip of a woman born and raised in Italy’s Dolomites, Anna obliges, coming up with a hike that is not only 32km, but takes us to the summits of eight peaks, several of which have 360º views of the city.
Instead of killing yourself – you have got to stay alive long enough to enjoy the beaches – climb only the Pico da Tijuca, the summit of which is so rocky and exposed that, in 1920, 117 stairs were cut into it and a chain railing was installed. The views from its summit are the best of the day.
Halfway up the stone staircase, we pass three of the eight people we’ll see all day: a mom, dad and their daughter, who couldn’t have been more than 4 years old. If you hike to Tijuca Peak alone, it’s between 10km and 20km, depending on where you start.
From Tijuca Peak’s 1 022m summit, I see Guanabara Bay, Bico do Papagaio Peak, Pedra da Gavea, Maracana Stadium, the Rock of the Topsail, Barra da Tijuca and the Atlantic Ocean.
I see Christ the Redeemer, too, but only after several minutes of searching. Seen from the north-west, it’s set in a sea of antennas and towers.
While we sit down and snack, I pepper Anna with questions about the Serra dos Orgaos mountains, their distant, pointy spires to the south looking quite fierce and intriguing. Part of another national park about an hour’s drive from Rio, 10 of the peaks in that range are higher than 2 012m.
A peak almost directly to our south blocks views of Copacabana Beach, but we see neighbouring Ipanema Beach and then Leblon.
It is from Tijuca’s summit that the extent of Rio’s beaches finally hits me.
I thought Copacabana and Ipanema were the biggest beaches in the city. They’re nothing. I mean, of course they’re great – Copacabana is directly across the street from my hotel, has the softest sand my feet have felt since visiting Zanzibar’s beaches nearly a decade ago, and the water’s warm enough to swim in – but, to the west, past Leblon, in the city’s West Zone, where much of the construction for the 2016 Olympic Games is taking place, stretch kilometres upon kilometres of white sand.
On my last day in Rio, I explore these beaches. Driving west out of the city with a crew from Rio EcoeSporte Adventures, we pass more beaches than I can count, much less remember the names of.
I do remember Sao Conrado, because that’s the beach where the paragliders and hang gliders who launch from Pedra Bonita land. And also Tijuca Beach, because it’s there where Sergio, a true Carioca (what natives of Rio are called) and Rio EcoeSporte’s founder, alerts me to the presence of caimans, alligator-like creatures, in the brackish lagoons opposite the beach.
“But these are Carioca caimans,” he says. “They’re relaxed, like the people here. They’re no problem to you.”
Evidently, the sharks sometimes seen off these beaches got the same memo the caimans did. “Sharks here are relaxed, too. No problem.”
I’m told Prainha Beach, about an hour along our scenic route from my hotel in Copacabana, is one of the best spots in the city to surf.
After the barely-there-ness of many of the bathing suits – worn by women and men – on Copacabana Beach, I’m surprised to learn Rio has only one nudist beach, Abrico, west of Prainha and east of Grumarí, the last beach in this stretch you can drive to.
We drive past Grumarí without stopping. We’re headed to Praias Selvagens, Rio’s wild beaches, accessible only to those willing to hike.
Two hours by car from Copacabana, we are in the suburb of Barra de Guaratiba, still in the city of Rio.
It does not feel like Rio, though, as we walk up a residential street, past double- and triple-storey houses painted every shade of the rainbow.
A white toy poodle looks down on us from an unfinished third storey. Houses spill down the hillside to the Atlantic, its water clearer and bluer here than at Copacabana, perhaps because we’re further from the mouth of Guanabara Bay and its heavy shipping traffic.
Making a sharp right at a tree decorated with bright buttons nailed into it in the shape of flowers, the street morphs from potholed lane to a dirt path.
“Tijuca Forest is nice, but now you’ll get to see the real wild,” says guide Julian Espinosa.
Cutting across a steep, vegetated hillside, we’re soon out of Guaratiba’s residential area and looking several hundred metres down on to the Atlantic Ocean, which fills the horizon.
Walking the 2km to the closest wild beach – several beaches follow one after the other, with increasingly exiguous trails linking them – something takes me back to a walnut forest I hiked around in Kyrgyzstan.
If I were to be transported anywhere, somewhere coastal would make sense. But Kyrgyzstan? I can’t figure out what here, 23º south of the equator, makes me think of Central Asia. It’s certainly not the salty air, the petrified dirt beneath my feet, or the dreadlocked guide with Christ the Redeemer tattooed on to the back of his muscular calf.
I puzzle over this until it’s time to hike up Pedra da Tartaruga – turtle stone in English. Turtle Stone looks like its name would suggest, a rocky double mound rising out of the ocean, attached to the mainland by an isthmus barely wider than some of the bikinis at Copacabana.
We do the steep walk up the shell part, although a trail does go to the turtle’s head.
Resting at the top of the shell, 100m above the ocean, we get the day’s best view of the wild beaches; four of them separated by rocky outcrops spilling down the hillside and into the ocean.
Walking back across the isthmus, we head for the first wild beach, Praia do Perigoso. Its sand squishing up between my toes, I’m no longer in Rio, but on some exotic, remote island. Or so I think. On a beach the size of five football fields, there are half a dozen people. This is not what I expect in Rio.
In the distance, islets rise out of the ocean. At our feet, emerald green waves – taller than those at Copacabana – crash into clean, white sand.
“Perigoso means ‘danger,’ so this is ‘Danger Beach’,” Julian says. “But I think the only danger here is that you won’t want to leave.” Sergio adds: “It’s Carioca danger.”
We swim, then find rocks to rest on. The sun dries us off quickly, and leaves a gritty layer of salt on my skin.
I look for a seashell to take home as a memento. There are none. But, where the beach meets the forest, there are nuts, still in their shells, everywhere. They could be walnuts – the Kyrgyzstan connection! – but I’m not sure.
I ask Julian. He doesn’t know the name, but says the energy bar he gave me earlier had a picture of one on its wrapper. Duh. Of course the forests around the wild beaches are full of Brazil nut trees.
Brazil nuts are an entirely different beast from walnuts, but evidently the trees they grow on are close enough to be reminiscent – at least for someone exposed to nut trees only when hiking in exotic places.
My time in Rio could end now, and I’d be happy. But Sergio has another adventure planned.
“It’s not hiking, or a beach, but I think you’ll like it,” he says, his English much better than he gives himself credit for.
Less than an hour later, we’ve dropped off our beach supplies at the car and are standing, feet hip-width apart, on stand-up paddleboards and making our way across the mouth of the Canal do Bacalhau in the protected area of Restinga da Marambaia.
Safely across – not that the crossing is at all technical – Sergio points deep into a thicket of mangroves, most of their rainbowed roots exposed because it is low tide.
He is indicating the spot where he once saw one of the prettiest birds found in the area.
I can’t bring myself to look for birds, though. Caimans live here, too. I may risk an afternoon on a beach that is dangerous Carioca-style, but I don’t know whether I’m ready to meet caimans, no matter how relaxed they are.
We don’t.
An hour later, we’re returning our paddleboards. We didn’t see any caimans, but nor did we see Sergio’s bird. Maybe it’s hanging out with Tijuca’s coatis and monkeys.
My day on Copacabana is wonderful, and exactly what would be expected at a major beach in a big city: reading a novel for the first time in more than a year and, with an attendant from the Copacabana Palace watching my lounger and belongings, getting up every so often to wade into the ocean to a point where it is just deep enough for the waves to knock me over.
There is great people-watching.
And every five minutes, someone comes over, offering to sell me a beach towel, or hat, or massage, or temporary tattoo.
The Washington Post
If You Go...
WHERE TO STAY:
Belmond Copacabana Palace
1720 Ave Atlantica, Copacabana
www.belmond.com/copacabana-palace-rio-de-janeiro
A block from the beach. It provides loungers, umbrellas and attendants to watch your belongings. Rooms from $590 (R7 000).
Mama Ruisa
132 Rua Santa Cristina, Santa Teresa
www.mamaruisa.com
This 19th-century palace, in hilly, bohemian Santa Teresa, is close to Tijuca Park. Rooms from $245 (R3 000).
WHERE TO EAT:
Casa da Feijoada
10 Rua Prudente de Moraes, Ipanema
bit.ly/1HveJr6
The traditional stew feijoada is available daily at this Ipanema café. Entrées from $50.
Le Blé Noir
19 Rua Xavier Silveira, Copacabana
Expect to wait for a table at this tiny creperie unless you arrive soon after it opens. No reservations. Open nightly at 7. Entrées from $11.
Boulangerie Guerin
920 Ave Nossa Senhora de Copacabana, Copacabana
www.boulangerieguerin.com.br
A bakery offering “revolutionised French classics”. Open daily. Entrées from $5.
WHAT TO DO:
Jardim Botanico do Rio de Janeiro
1008 Rua Jardim Botanico, Jardim Botanico
www.jbrj.gov.br
More than 6 000 species of plants. Open Monday noon to 5pm, Tuesday to Sunday 8am to 5pm. Over-60s and under-7s free, otherwise $2.50.
Rio EcoeSporte Adventures
www.rioecoesporte.com.br
Custom adventures. Hike to a wild beach, take a surfing lesson, go paragliding or stand-up paddleboarding. From $150.
Tijuca National Park
www.parquedatijuca.com.br
A forest in the heart of Rio, it has popular trails as well as kilometres of less-travelled hiking trails, howler monkeys and ocelots. Open daily 8am-5pm in winter and 8am-6pm in summer.
Christ the Redeemer
Rua Cosme Velho, 513, Laranjeiras
www.christtickets.com
Trams leave every 30 minutes or so to escort you to the 700m summit of Corcovado and the base of the 30m art deco statue of Jesus. The statue was designed by French sculptor Paul Landowski and named one of the New Seven Wonders of the World in 2007. Open daily from 8am to 7pm. From $17.
Free Tours de Aventura
www.freetoursdeaventura.com
Group hikes go out almost daily and focus on the city’s wilder places: Urca Hill, an easy hike, compared with the more popular and strenuous Sugarloaf hike; Primatas Waterfall; Corcovado; Pico do Papagaio; Tijuca Peak; Vista Chinesa; and Pedra Bonita. Group tours are free, but tips are encouraged. Private hikes are also available, starting at $75.
INFORMATION:
www.rcvb.com.br
www.rioofficialguide.com