Exploring Leblon

Clay had his day off yesterday and we had planned on having a Copacabana day, sitting on the beach, eating in the area and just sort of exploring the area. Well, luck would have it that we woke up Sunday morning to a drizzly, windy and COLD day. It was probably the coldest day we've spent in Rio and the wind made it feel colder! We were walking down the beach and it was so windy that sand had blown into dunes on the street! We had to go into the city to get away from what reminded us of Texas dust storms!

So, needless to say, we had to change our plans. We walked to one of the main roads in our neighborhood and started walking towards Leblon (the neighborhood just to the east of us). Neither of us has really seen that area before and we really liked it. The sidewalks are bigger so you don't feel like you're going to run into people all the time and it looked altogether a little more upscale. 

We ate at this great place near Lagoa called Via Sete for lunch. We shared their chilled tomato soup, that came out in cute little shot glasses with a mini sausage and celery and mushroom pate. Then we each got one of their combos. You pick a meat, a side, a salad and a sauce. I had the chicken (when I ordered they asked me if I wanted my chicken cooked "Medium" which is really strange, I just told them to cook it through, but I still got a chicken breast that looked like a steak in the center. Still very good, just an interesting difference here) with a caprese salad, grilled veggies and a creamy mushroom sauce. Clay had their picannha steak with brazilian sauce, a ceasar salad and fries. The best part were the fun cocktails they had. I didn't believe my eyes at first, but there it was, Margarita was on the list! I couldn't help myself and got one. A Brazilian margarita is VERY different from what we have in Texas though...it was more like a tequila martini with a salt rim. Tasty, but strong!

Then we walked down into Leblon and found a mall. We walked through it to see what a Rio mall is like. It was very nice and seemed to have some pretty high-end shops. They even had a Mac store! We also found a movie theater that has movies in english that are just subtitled in Portuguese. I think I'll be going back there some afternoon. Around 4 a futebol match between our new favorite team, Flamengo, and Sao Paulo was on so we ducked into a restaurant/bar to watch. The teams tied, but it was a fun game!  

That evening we tried a new place for dinner that is on our street. It's a chain they have all over the city called Koni. It's basically a restaurant for sushi hand rolls. We each had two, I had a salmon and mushroom and a Philadelphia style hand roll. Clay had a tuna and "hot steele" slamon. He couldn't pass up the name! It was gooooooood. And in keeping with the cone theme, they have desserts in waffle cones. I had a chocolate mousse and Clay had sweet coconut and nutella. YUM! 

Well, that was a long post, but we have to cram a lot in to the ONE day a week we have together! I'm off to the beach for the afternoon!