Santa Teresa Under the Moon

After dark, Santa Teresa's cobblestoned streets take on a different character. The colonial mansions' crumbling facades catch moonlight and streetlamp in equal measure. Samba drifts from bars on Largo do Guimarães with the authority of music that's been rehearsing for a century.

Aprazivel on Rua Aprazivel does dinner with a terrace view over Rio that turns the city's lights into a second sky below. The food is contemporary Brazilian — local ingredients treated with attention — and the descent from the restaurant to the Escadaria Selarón afterward, through quiet cobblestoned streets with music leaking from doorways, is one of the better walks in Rio.

The artist studios on Rua Dias de Barros keep doors open into the evening. Duck in. The work is local and priced for a neighborhood, not a gallery district.