Modern Rio: Museum of Tomorrow & Sambadrome Behind the Scenes

About This Experience

The port district of Rio de Janeiro — the area around Praça Mauá and the old harbour — sat largely derelict for decades, a relic of an industrial past that the city had moved beyond. For the 2016 Olympic Games, Rio invested heavily in its revitalisation: a new boulevard, new tram line, new museums, and a new aquarium transformed the area into one of the most interesting cultural districts in South America. The Modern Rio tour explores the best of it.

The Museum of Tomorrow (Museu do Amanhã) is the centrepiece — a Santiago Calatrava building completed in 2015 that has become one of Rio's most photographed structures. The Spanish architect's cantilevered steel and concrete design, with moving solar panels that track the sun, extends over the bay like a creature in motion. Inside, the museum is an immersive exploration of sustainability, climate science, and humanity's relationship with the planet — not a static collection of objects, but a sequence of interactive environments that require at least 90 minutes to experience properly. It is, by considerable margin, the most intellectually engaging museum in Rio.

AquaRio is South America's largest aquarium, opened in 2016 in a converted industrial building adjacent to the Museum of Tomorrow. The 8,000 animals across 350 species include the signature submarine tunnel — a 20-metre walk-through tube with sharks, rays, and large pelagic fish swimming overhead and on either side. Budget at least 60 minutes.

The behind-the-scenes visit to a Rio Carnival samba school is the most unusual element of the tour — and for many visitors, the most memorable. Carnival is not a spontaneous event. It is the result of year-round preparation by Rio's samba schools (escolas de samba), each of which has thousands of members working through the year on floats, costumes, music, and choreography for a 70-minute performance that will be judged by a panel of experts. The visit takes you into the galpão — the warehouse where the floats are constructed — and gives you access to the people, the process, and the scale of what Carnival actually involves. Available Tuesday to Saturday; if your tour falls on a Sunday or Monday this portion is adjusted.

The National Historical Museum, housed in a colonial fortress complex at the edge of the port district, covers 500 years of Brazilian history through one of South America's largest collections of historical artefacts, weapons, carriages, and documents.

Not available on Mondays. The tour runs Tuesday to Sunday.

Included: private door-to-door transportation, certified local guide, Museum of Tomorrow entrance, AquaRio entrance, samba school visit, National Historical Museum entrance, and complimentary bottled water. Meals are not included.