The first day of my return trip involved me spending most of my day sitting down on first a plane and then a bus. Luckily my flight back up to Sao Paulo from Buenos Aires was from the domestic airport (contradicting the airports title I know), which is right in the city centre, rather than the international airport which is a good hour away. Yet again I had three seats to myself so it was easy to lie down and sleep for most of the three hour flight.

On arrival in Sao Paulo I navigated my way across the city to the bus terminal for buses to Rio. It didn’t take too long before I was enjoying two seats to myself on what was supposed to be a six hour ride back. Mostly due to the rush hour traffic getting out of Sao Paulo it ended up taking just over seven hours instead of six, which got in the way of my plans to meet up with a friend in Rio because I arrived too late. I also had to get a cab to get to the hostel since I ended up arriving after the metro closed, which was a nuisance mostly because the driver took me for a bit of a ride; I couldn’t communicate with him to tell him I knew what he was doing!

When I woke up this morning in Rio it was slightly strange to be back. I feel like I am more or less done with the city (for now), so I was in no hurry to get out. Therefore most of the morning and afternoon were spent enjoying my last spell of sunshine in South America down at Copacabana Beach. I then decided to get to the airport in good time in order to use my free access to the American Airlines Admiral’s Club VIP lounge. On arrival at the lounge I immediately began taking advantage of the free WIFI and free food, though thought better of taking too much advantage of the free self-service bar!

I’m writing this now from 30,000ft on my flight up to Atlanta. It’s only really just occurred to me that I’m spending both Friday and Saturday night sleeping in an economy class seat; it’s certainly going to be a good night’s sleep on Sunday! As for the flight, it’s by far the most basic long haul flight I have been on in as long as I can remember, with no TVs in the seats and rather cramped conditions.

Photo of the day: I haven't been anywhere new so no photos unfortunately!