Rio Carnival 2012 Beautiful Samba Dancers

 Millions of revellers in Rio de Janeiro enjoyed the fun, sun and sequins of the five-day Carnival, a time of joyous excess when the streets fill with bands and people dancing and drinking.

Rio's star is rising of late, as the city prepares to host the final matches of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics, and this year's Carnival is forecast to be an even bigger blowout than usual, with 20 per cent more tourists expected than in 2011.


Rio officials say they are better prepared to keep the chaos under control, with more portable toilets, traffic guards and paramedics, as well as a new central command centre.

Although the carnival is most famous for extravagant costumed parades in the city's Sambadrome arena, many residents prefer to celebrate with local street parties.

Organisers said 2.5 million people took part in the street parade that lasted nearly seven hours.

Rio Carnival is a wild 4 day celebration, 40 days before Easter. It officially starts on Saturday and finishes on Fat Tuesday with the beginning of Lent on Ash Wednesday after which one is supposed to abstain from all bodily pleasures. Carnival with all its excesses, celebrated as a profane event, can be considered an act of farewell to the pleasures of the flesh. It usually happens in February, the hottest month in the Southern Hemisphere, when the Rio summer is at its peak.

There are carnival celebrations in virtually every corner of Brazil, the best-known ones taking place in Recife together with the neighboring Olinda (in the North of Brazil) and Salvador. But the biggest and most famous carnival is undoubtedly the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro.

Read all the details of the 2012 Rio Carnival - calendar, programs, events and venues with recommendations, schedule and ticket details.