2021 Rio Camp: Day 2
Oct 26, 2021
Our schedule was straightforward today.
7-10am hotel breakfast
10:45am nogi training
1pm acai
1:30pm favela tour
5pm sushi dinner
7:30pm gi training
9:30pm acai
So that was the schedule but that's not how my day went. I had an awful night sleeping. Couldn't turn my brain off to fall asleep. I finally fell asleep late in the night and didn't wake up until 12:30pm! Endo also had a bad night sleeping I woke up to texts asking if I was ok, wondering where I was. I went to training which was almost wrapped up. I asked Caio if the acai had caffeine in it. He said no, but it had vitamins that they put in energy drinks that truck drivers use. It keeps you very alert. He said he never has acai after 6pm! So, no more nighttime acai. I did get afternoon acai and a hummus sandwich since I missed breakfast. Today's activity was visiting a favela. I've been to a favela on a previous Rio camp with Caio and that time we hiked to the top and trained at a gym there that is free for the kids in the favela. It was an unforgettable experience training with the locals. Unfortunately, this favela we were going to didn't have a gym and the prize at the top was the view. I asked Caio if we were hiking because if so I was sitting this out. The favelas are very steep and it's a crazy leg workout my 43 year old ass didn't want to do along with 2 weeks of 2 a days of bjj. Caio said we would drive up so i agreed. But when we got there we had to abandon the vans since they made us looks like police and we could become targets for violence. We met our lovely tour guides from Amastour that gave us some history of the Morro da Babilonia favela. Then the hiking began and I asked Caio if there was a way to go back to the hotel instead. A small group of us opted for the hotel and decided to hit the beach together. Our hotel had chairs and beach towels ready for us at the waters edge. The water was cold but refreshing. The weather has been warm but cloudy so far. About 75-85 degrees. After the beach we got dressed for dinner and headed to the local mall that has a very popular sushi restaurant. We started with veggie spring rolls and shrimp cream cheese spring rolls. They brought out popcorn shrimp, an appetizer they are famous for. It tastes much better than any "popcorn " foods I've had back home. They brought lots of sushi to us ensuring we were completely full. I tried a pineapple juice with mint that was perfect and I look forward to getting it again! Finally we went back to the hotel for gi training where we worked on lapel lasso with some inversion to a sweep. I trained with Caio where he tapped me countless times and made me feel like a baby that knows nothing about bjj. A pretty good day.
