1 destination · 28 things to do

Brazil

Rio de Janeiro is the city that looks impossible from the air and even better from the ground: granite peaks rising out of rainforest, a statue with open arms on top of a mountain, and long arcs of sand where the whole city comes to swim, play and watch the sun go down. It is also a city with deep Afro-Brazilian roots, the birthplace of samba, home of the biggest Carnival on earth and of a football stadium that is close to sacred. This guide books it properly — the train or van up Corcovado to Christ the Redeemer, the two-stage cable car to the top of Sugarloaf, a guided tour of the Maracana, a jeep day in the Tijuca rainforest, the Museum of Tomorrow on the revived port, the Botanical Garden and the big climb up Pedra da Gavea — and pairs it with the Rio that costs nothing: the promenades of Copacabana and Ipanema, sunset applause on the Arpoador rocks, the tiled Selaron Steps, the hilltop lanes of Santa Teresa, samba at Pedra do Sal in Little Africa and the sunrise hike up Dois Irmaos. Then it matches you to the right hotel, from the legendary white palace on Copacabana and a rooftop pool over Ipanema to a beachfront hideaway in Leblon and a big resort with its own slice of sand, because in a city squeezed between mountains and the Atlantic, where you sleep decides which beach becomes yours.