Sugarloaf Climb Pictures

• Jacob's Ladder from Above

  Jacob's Ladder is the beginning of the climb. It's very interesting for two reasons. One is that the entire mountain is made of a particular kind of rock, that looks like a mix of small stones with cement. But this small fillet is very different. Some say it's a kind of quartz, but I believe it's raw metal. The person doing the climb is my friend Matusa.

• Jacob's Ladder from Below

  Same place seen from below. The fillet actually has a different color, something reddish, but somehow Matusa's digital camera didn't register it. That's me beginning to climb.

• Jacob's Ladder...

  That's me a bit higher in the climb, doing a particularly difficult part. The truth is that the hardest part is the start because it's 90 degree curved and there is almost no place to grab at.

• Costão

  That part of the climb is easily done just standing and walking over. It's very adhesive if you keep your weight properly distributed. It can only be seen from the neighbor city in the other side of Guanabara Bay tho.

• When the Dirty Waters Meet the Ocean

  It is well known that Guanabara Bay is incredibly poluted nowadays, but people usually don't have an idea of it. Here you can see the difference between these waters and the ocean's.

• Looking Left

  Stopping in the middle and looking to the left, that's what we see. A bit of Niteroi, the neighbor city, Guanabara Bay, and the Fort.

• Continuing the Climb

  There's still a long way to the top from there. Another 90-degree climb awaits. But this is me doing just a bit more of the "standing" part.

• Looking Down at Copacabana

  Already at the top, in this picture you can see the entire Copacabana Beach.

• A Bit to the Right

  Turning a bit to the right, you can also see Red Beach and the intermediate cable car station.

• A Bit More to the Right

  Now there's Botafogo and the Christ. Botafogo Beach was artificially created, I think it was in the 50's, and it's waters are Guanabara Bay's. You can guess how clean that beach is...

• Even More to the Right

  And here you can see Flamengo, Downtown Rio and the national Santos Dummont airport, which does only Rio - São Paulo flights. Santos Dummont is considered the true airplane inventor, rather than the US brothers, as he created the 14-Bis and presented it to the French Airclub Commission in 1904 being the first documented airplane flight in history. The Wright Brothers experiment in 1903 was not documented (Koogan/Houaiss Encyclopedia 1997, p.1448, p.1686).

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