A Rio day from Sugarloaf to a Copacabana sunset

Two cable cars up. Arrive at the base station for the 08:00 opening to skip the lines. The first stop (Morro da Urca) has a small café; the summit has the full view over Guanabara Bay. Ninety minutes total.

A quiet 1920s planned neighbourhood at the foot of Sugarloaf. Pastel houses, a small beach, a low seawall along the bay. Locals sit on the wall with beer cans at all hours; no tourist infrastructure.

A simple bar on the Urca seawall. Carne seca pastel, a cold Bohemia or Original. Stand on the wall with locals; the bar owner won't mind if you bring your own glass out.

A military fort at the south end of Copacabana beach, now a small museum. The Confeitaria Colombo café inside has a terrace with views along the full three-kilometre curve of the beach.

Walk the wave-patterned Portuguese-mosaic promenade along Avenida Atlântica. Beach stalls every hundred metres for coconut water, açaí, caipirinhas. Stop at the Copacabana Palace façade midway.

Take the cog railway from Cosme Velho up Corcovado — the original 1884 line. Thirty minutes. Arrive for golden-hour light on the statue; the lower observation deck has the best sunset view.

The bar where Vinicius de Moraes and Tom Jobim wrote 'The Girl from Ipanema' in 1962. Nothing fancy — a chopp beer, a picanha, a caipirinha. The pavement tables have Ipanema beach visible down the block.