The beaches of Rio

I am not what you'd call a beach person. I don't go on holidays where lying on a beach is the entire aim (although if that's your thing, enjoy). I love water, I love the sea, and I quite like the odd hour or so of sitting on a beach reading or something.

So the fact Rio has a LOT of beaches wasn't really a massive draw, but somehow I've managed to spend a little time on most of them. And so, without further ado, here's a non-beach-person's guide to (some of) the beaches of Rio de Janeiro.

In common

All the beaches have a few things in common: the lifeguard posts, or 'Postos', at intervals along the beach. They're numbered and manned in daylight hours and they have showers, lockers and toilets (which you have to pay for).

They also have great wide pavements running along by the road with segregated cycle/running paths too, making the beaches popular places for cariocas (inhabitants of Rio) to exercise. There are little kiosks/beach bars at intervals, selling beer, fresh coconuts (they drill a hole and insert a straw for delicious fresh coconut water) and food.

Mainly all the beaches have people in common - people of all ages, shapes and sizes, enjoying the sand and sea. They play beach volleyball or Brazil's own 'futvolei', which is a mashup of football and volleyball; they sunbathe; they flirt; they run. And the majority are in the skimpiest of bikinis or shorts. It doesn't matter what your age or figure, a tiny bikini, preferably with a thong, is the clothing of choice on a Rio beach. The total lack of body self-consciousness is rather refreshing. 

Copacabana

The granddaddy of them all, a beach which everyone's heard of. Copacabana runs for 4km, or 2.5 miles, from Leme down to Fort Copacabana. During the Olympics it was the site of the beach volleyball arena and there are loads of beach volleyball pitches the whole length.

Copacabana

It's certainly a nice beach, but it's not my favourite. It's very busy with lots of sunbathers, tourists and hawkers selling you everything from capirinhas to sarongs to sunglasses. The sand is pretty good, but I found nicer sand elsewhere, and because it's so busy there's quite a lot of litter on the beach.

The public loos are good though; lots of them, mostly built semi-underground, clean and safe and only about 50p to use.

I paddled a little in the Copa wavelets but didn't swim. I've read differing accounts of how clean the water is off Copacabana and the general consensus seems to be it's all right but not brilliant.  The waves are biggest in the middle of the beach and towards Fort Copacabana the water is calmer, the beach narrower and a little quieter.

Ipanema/Leblon

Ipanema and Leblon from above

Technically Ipanema beach stretches from the Arpoador rock at the eastern end to the canal which connects the Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas with the sea, and then from the other side of the canal to the western-most end of the beach is Leblon. The Leblon end is narrower and I confess I didn't actually step foot on it, but if you sit on Arpoador at sunset (the best time) and look down the beach you can't see much difference!

Ipanema, in my opinion, is nicer than Copacabana. It's quieter and there are fewer hawkers to interrupt the sunbathing. The surf close to Arpoador is bigger and there are more surfers there, but it looked pretty calm in the middle (although again I failed to swim at Ipanema).

A word of warning though to tourists: Ipanema is, especially at weekends, a hotspot for thieves. A colleague had his wallet pinched while browsing a market near the beach and all his cards were promptly maxed out and I've heard of several other cases of theft from Ipanema beach and the surrounding area - which is nice, so attracts people with cash. Lots of good restaurants in Ipanema and Leblon.

Flamengo

Flamengo on a cloudy day

Flamengo beach, north of Copacabana, has a good view of the Sugarloaf and is a nice beach in and of itself, next to a park. However its waters are those of Guanabara Bay, which are more polluted than further south, and several guides recommend not swimming off it.

Barra

Barra beach, out west beyond Leblon, is incredible. It's 18km long, a vast stretch of the softest golden sand you can imagine. It definitely has the best sand of any of the beaches I've visited. It's deep and just lovely to sit or walk on.

Barra at sunset

I did go swimming off Barra; the waves are fairly big even on a calmish day and unpredictable in the sense that they come in from all directions. There are surfing and kitesurfing schools on the beach in addition to the usual beach volleyball pitches.


The road is also quite close to the beach and quite noisy, which makes sitting in one of the bars a little less relaxing than in other places, but only a little.

Barra is much quieter than the beaches closer to the city in terms of hawkers and it's got a more local feel. However development is coming fast - the east end of Barra now has a lot of hotels and the new line 4 of the metro runs out there - so I don't know how long it'll last. At the eastern end there are a number of fancier bars. Towards the west there's a whole section with no pavement, at the moment, and no lifeguard posts for several kilometres.

Pontal/Macumba

Where Barra ends there's a rock (the Pedra do Pontal, per Google Maps) and then a smaller, shorter bay and beach split by another rock in the middle. I think the eastern half is Praia da Macumba. Pontal/Macumba is framed by the Pedra do Pontal at one end and cliffs at the other end and you can drive along the coast road to some even nicer beaches, apparently. If you have a car, which we didn't.

I spent two rather nice days at Pontal, once alone and once with colleagues, and enjoyed them both immensely. It's much much quieter than the other beaches, all locals, lots of families and groups of kids, and the people running the bars along the path seem nicer and more relaxed too. The big thing on Pontal is fish, served fried and hot and eaten with your fingers. I had sardines both times; the second time the four of us shared a big plate of sardines with salad and chips and had a few beers each for R$70 (£16). The lady serving us was delightful, although we couldn't communicate properly, making sure we didn't order too much and keeping the cold beer flowing.

The sea at Pontal is calm and quiet by the Pedra and the surf picks up as you go along the beach, although not dangerously so. There are flags warning of currents but as a confident swimmer I felt very safe out beyond the first breaker - apart from finding it hard to get out of the sea as there's a bit of an undercurrent sucking the waves back out once they've broken on the beach.

Sandwise Pontal is slightly coarser than Barra but still pleasant to walk on, if tricky - it's so deep, it's a real effort to walk! Much better, perhaps, to stroll along the paved path - no cars running along this beach - and then find a spot for a bit of relaxation with the sound of the waves all that can disturb you. Bliss.

My footsteps on Macumba