Taking over the length of Lapa's Rua Lavradio with stalls, live music (from 3pm) and food, the monthly Feira do Rio Antigo provides the perfect antidote to Ipanema's Hippie Fair hotch-potch with a rather more genuine market feel. Crusty old desks and chairs vie for pavement space with classic '70s furniture while record stalls, crafts and live music fill in any unoccupied nooks and crannies along the road.

Stop off halfway up Lavradio for lunch at any one of several quintessentially Brazilian restaurants and bars (in other words lots of rice, meat and beans) or the rather more modern Barzinho for their monthly feijoada pork stew, then loiter in the neighbourhood until sundown to taste a truly different Carioca weekend. As dusk falls and the roadside barbecues are fired up, slugging down bottle after bottle of cold beer and playing the occasional strains of guitar are, rather admirably, the chosen way of life, while the good vibes and syncro-dancing to R'n'B classics at the Baile Charme fill Rua do Rezende until 10pm.