Journalled on Saturday, 28 May 2024 | Santo Cristo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: 27 degrees, hot, sunny, and slightly overcast.
This was only Julie’s second full day since arriving Thursday evening.
After a grey, rainy Friday spent organising and enjoying each other’s company after six months apart, Saturday marked our first truly free day together.
I had arranged lunch for us at Rio Yacht Club, originally with Dona Regina and Roberto. Sadly, Roberto was very ill, so they could not join us. Regina insisted that Julie and I should still go, as everything was arranged and our names were already on the entrance list.
When I first arrived in Brazil and worked with boats, I often visited the Yacht Club for professional reasons, whether to meet clients, attend events or speak with suppliers. After leaving the industry, I stopped going, and membership remained far beyond my budget.
I have always said that if I decide to stay in Brazil, specifically in Rio, and have enough money, I would love to be a member, even more so if I could berth a boat there too.
In those days, the Yacht Club restaurant was relatively simple, serving good food at a reasonable price. Over the years, both the restaurant and the club have grown in status. The décor and service are more sophisticated, the food has reached a higher standard, and the club itself has improved enormously in the 30 or so years since I first began going there.
What has always astounded me about the Rio Yacht Club is its view of Guanabara Bay and the neighbouring neighbourhoods of Botafogo and Flamengo on the other side.
Everybody who knows me knows that I love dogs, boats and, of course, my daughters. Rio Yacht Club brings together one of those great loves with an extraordinary view across the Bay. Boats are berthed inside the harbour and anchored just beyond it, and simply spending a couple of hours walking around the club, looking at them and drinking a beer, cleanses my heart and soul for a good six months.
Our lunch reservation was for 1 p.m. Working backwards, I calculated that we should arrive at the club at about 12.30.
Before that, I wanted us to stop at Yasmin’s building so I could officially introduce her to Julie at 11.30. That meant leaving home at about 10.30 or 10.45, which we did.
We took the VLT tram from the station in front of our condominium to Central do Brasil, Rio’s main railway station. From there, we caught the metro to Flamengo. Botafogo would have been closer to the Yacht Club, but I wanted Julie and Yasmin to meet first.
We walked down Rua Marques de Abrantes to Praia da Botafogo, where Yasmin lives. Her building is in front of the beach and the Bay. As we approached, I sent a message to Yasmin, asking her to come downstairs and meet us in front of the entrance to her building.
Yasmin promptly descended, and I introduced Julie to her. Julie speaks no Portuguese, and Yasmin is very shy about her English. However, despite the communication difficulties, everybody got on like a house on fire, and nobody died.
I think both were very happy to get to know each other, because when I’m with Julie, I speak a lot to her about Yasmin and Jessica, and vice versa, when I’m with my daughters, I speak a lot to them about her.
After about 15 minutes, Julie and I left Yasmin. We crossed Main St in front of Botafogo Beach and walked towards the Yacht Club, about a 25-minute walk.
I showed and explained various things, sites, etc., in Botafogo, including the Bay, the beach, and Christ the Redeemer, which she appreciated and liked. We continued our walk up into Urca, and finally we arrived at the entrance to the Yacht Club.
If we continued to walk up Avenida Pasteur, we would eventually arrive at Praça Vermelha (Red Square) and Sugarloaf Mountain with its famous cable car, which was made even more famous by the James Bond film Moonraker.
We were warmly welcomed by the doorman at the entrance, and as expected, our names were on the list.
In less than a minute, we were walking into the historic club, with trophies and awards displayed in an enormous glass cabinet on one side of the wall in the main corridor and foyer. We walked through to where it opens out onto the quay and harbour, where many of the boats dock, and to the barn restaurant, which looks out over the boats and the people coming in and out of the club by water.
We stopped and looked for a couple of minutes. There were already a lot of people in the grounds of the club, and many boats were moored along the club’s harbour walls.
There are also the taxi tender boats that ferry, shuttle people, members, owners, etc., from the club to their boats moored out in the middle of the Bay. It really is a hive of activity, which, to me, due to my love of boats and what they represent, is quite sublime. It really is surreal for me.
After a little stroll around, we went to the indoor areas of the restaurant, where there was a reservation for us. I’m not really sure it was confirmed, because for some reason it wasn’t there, but they found us a table by a window overlooking the Bay.
Nowadays, the Yacht Club restaurant offers an à la carte menu, where you choose from various dishes prepared for you, or the buffet.
A fixed price was also offered today, with traditional feijoada. This is the norm in Rio, with Fridays or Saturdays being days when restaurants serve and specialise in providing feijoada.
Feijoada is a very popular and traditional dish in Brazil. However, it was originally brought from Africa to Brazil by slaves. It is a combination of black beans, assorted meats mixed with the beans, rice, cress, farofa and slices of orange. The orange slices may seem strange for a hot meal; however, with such a dish, they really refresh and cleanse the mouth whilst eating, and the taste is amazing.
We both chose to have the buffet and consequently the feijoada. This was Julie’s first feijoada, and she seemed to like it very much. I was impressed that she was open-minded enough to try something that is completely different from what she’s used to in England.
Black beans are not the most beautiful food to look at, but when you eat them, they really are quite delicious.
I remember once, when I was in Brazil, we were eating black beans, I think at home. We offered some to my mother, and she said she wouldn’t try them. She said she knows they’re tasty, but the actual sight of them isn’t very appealing. To be fair, you don’t have many black foods, and black isn’t really the colour for food.
I have always, when travelling, accepted 99.9% of what is offered to me in any place or culture, and when I began living in Brazil, I had no problem whatsoever with trying black beans or anything else that was offered. It’s really just a matter of trying something, and if you like it, great; if you don’t, OK, you never do it again.
We both went back to the buffet for seconds and thirds, and after all the eating we washed it all down with a couple of bottles of beer. We shared a dessert, and after just taking a moment from all the eating, I eventually asked for the bill and paid.
We had spent a good two hours eating, drinking and talking in one of the most special places to have lunch on a Saturday in Rio de Janeiro: Rio de Janeiro Yacht Club.
Not just because of its affluence and its privileged position in the Bay, the boats I love, and the good food and drink, but also because of the experience and the moments spent with a person who is very special in my life at this moment.
We had another stroll around the club and, by coincidence or luck, found a bench to crash out on in front of all the club’s harbour and its movements. We almost stayed for more than an hour, chilling out on this perfectly located bench. We almost fell asleep. I think it was a combination of the warm weather, a cool breeze, a couple of beers and half a tonne of feijoada.
Feijoada has a reputation for making one feel slow, sleepy, lethargic, and like curling up after eating it.
Eventually, and unfortunately, we had to leave. It was getting late, and if we stayed much longer, the club’s administration might have considered calling security.
We said goodbye to the porter, who had treated us so well when we arrived. A line of taxis was waiting directly outside the club, so I did not think twice. We climbed into the first available one and asked the driver to take us home to Santo Cristo.
It was not far and the route was straightforward: along Botafogo, through the Santa Bárbara Tunnel, then on to the end of the viaduct. From there, we were practically home.
What a pleasant day. More importantly, Julie loved it. It was genuinely memorable for me, and I think it was for her too.
In bed by 10 p.m.
Thank you.
Thank you for reading this post. Please explore my other writing and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
