Amazon, boat, Belem: check
Fri, 13 Apr 2007 07:43:22 -0700 (PDT)
Hi all!
Just another note from Brazil. We´ve done a lot since I last emailed, so I shall do my best to send the condensed version (Digger never has as much to do online as I do).
We got a 3-day jungle trip from a man who had an office right next to our Manaus hostel. Nice guy, spoke English. We took a 3-hour bus trip to get to a small settlement far north and east of town, then some guys who spoke a little less English met us there and we followed them to the river (a northern tributary to the Amazon, which is none to quiet as you shall hear about next) and boarded a boat with a motor and rode that for another hour upstream. At this point, on the river, we´re in the jungle. The river was wide, it was like being on Murray lake or so, for the Michigan readers. But on the edge we could see that the river was still in its high stage, so trees are almost submerged at some points--pretty neat to see. We beached at the edge of a small slope, and on top of that was our little base camp. Several huts, basically, the frames made of thin tree trunks and the sides and roofs made of woven palm fronds... you know, just like in teh movies! We slept in hammocks strung across the inside. The biggest was probably 12 by 20 feet. We hung out, had lunch (rice, veggies, chicken, and (surprisingly) spaghetti in a thin sauce). Got to know our guide a little. While we were waiting for lunch, we took a small wooden canoe down a cove on the river.
That was really cool. The cove was totally still water, so it was like gliding on a mirror. Trees stuck out of the water like in a swamp, so it was also like we were floating within the trees´ leaves. You could only see maybe 6 inches in the water before it was too murky. We saw birds and an unbelieveably blue butterfly, irridescently so in the sun. Mostly everything was shaded, though. We saw something big rush off away from the water´s edge, but we couldn´t tell what it was. You couldn´t hear ``ooh-ooh-ooh ah-ah-ah-ah´´ off in the deeper jungle like in the movies; it was surprisingly quiet. Bird sounds, though. One bird in particular though totally freaked out on us. `Omigod omigod omigod!!!´ it seemed to scream. `A boat!!!` Like it had never seen people before. Hehe.
We went for a walk in the jungle after lunch. And again the next day. I don´t really know how to describe this in email form. When you do it, it seems like the most natural thing in the world. Like a walk in the woods. Except all the plants are ones you´ve never seen before. Accounts of the jungle don´t exaggerate how many vines there are. There are a ton of vines. Also, tree trunks are generally skinny and straight up. About half are palm trees. Shorter plants have huge leaves or fronds... like as big as Digger, who´s over 6 feet. We didn´t see tons of animals. We saw monkeys far up and away in trees, and our guide brought a tarantula out of its hole in the ground. No snakes seen. Our guide could tell us a ton about the uses of everything, including smearing ants on yourself to hide your scent and a vine that you use for malaria. The part of the Amazon where we were isn´t as thickly vegetated as it is more to the south. This meant almost no mosquitoes, but it also (because of how far you could see) reminded me of woods at home. Strange. Digger commented that it felt more homey to him in the jungle than in the city. I had to agree.
We went for a long canoe ride along the edge of the river, too. We saw a strange mammal animal, parrots, spiders, and a turtle. We went fishing for pirhana. We went spotlighting and night and found a baby alligator that we got to touch & see up close. I hate to do it, but I´m going to cut this part short now, so I can catch up with where we are now.
We got back to Manaus and boarded our boat at 10 even though we didn´t leave until 4. We put up hammocks and so did everyone else and the result was CROWDED and also extremely visually stunning. Hammocks are next to each other in three rows, and the rows are also staggared, meaning if everyone´s facing the same way I have someone one foot to my right, one foot to my left, and someone´s head about where my knees are. As you can imagine, negotiating sleeping space was an issue.
Sometimes the river was wide, sometimes it was narrow. When it was wide, I could look out beind the boat and imagine we were just on a big lake... until there was one spot with no trees edging it, and just water. That, I would know, was where we had just come from. The boat had three levels. When the river was more narrow, you could go up top and hang out and look at the edges (a welcome relief for the claustophobia of the second deck). I saw a mama duck with babies, a few white herons, other birds, plenty of trees, and a surprising number of houses/huts.
That´s right, the Amazon river is totally civilized. This makes sense if you think about it. The Amazon is a lot like a watery highway that connects two cities (Manaus and Belém, where we were and where we are) of over a million souls. And people on the boats toss stuff overboard just as carelessly as some jerks toss trash out their car windows. It was strange. Of course, plenty of tributaries aren´t this way, but the Rio Amazonas is much more civilized than I had imagined it.
We left Manaus on Saturday afternoon and arrived in Belem Wednesday morning. It was comfortable to get off the boat, although both Digger & I had some strange version of sea legs for a good while. We like Belém better as a city, but are now anxious to head off to Salvador and the coastal beaches. Belém is definitely a port city: plenty of goods to be bought on the streets, and really interesting ones, at that. The Ver-O-Peso (check the weight) market, in particular, was really cool. Hundreds of booths, selling fish, meat, flours, herbs, crafts, çlothing, beer, snacks, poultry... just about anything you could want. Yesterday we saw a huge cathedral made in 1909 and gorgeous inside, marble, frescoes, gold...
But we´ve really got to get out of this internet place. We leave Belém by bus tomorrow afternoon. Ride´s supposed to be 33 hours and bad roads the whole way. Should be exciting. My Portueguese is getting better, but only marginally. We´ve also realized our camera film is ruined b/c we put it through with our checked baggage. Grr.
much love to everyone, of course,
Emily
PS Lille, i´m advertising your work to the Brazilians! I´m wearing the anklet and necklace you made me :)
Hi all!
Just another note from Brazil. We´ve done a lot since I last emailed, so I shall do my best to send the condensed version (Digger never has as much to do online as I do).
We got a 3-day jungle trip from a man who had an office right next to our Manaus hostel. Nice guy, spoke English. We took a 3-hour bus trip to get to a small settlement far north and east of town, then some guys who spoke a little less English met us there and we followed them to the river (a northern tributary to the Amazon, which is none to quiet as you shall hear about next) and boarded a boat with a motor and rode that for another hour upstream. At this point, on the river, we´re in the jungle. The river was wide, it was like being on Murray lake or so, for the Michigan readers. But on the edge we could see that the river was still in its high stage, so trees are almost submerged at some points--pretty neat to see. We beached at the edge of a small slope, and on top of that was our little base camp. Several huts, basically, the frames made of thin tree trunks and the sides and roofs made of woven palm fronds... you know, just like in teh movies! We slept in hammocks strung across the inside. The biggest was probably 12 by 20 feet. We hung out, had lunch (rice, veggies, chicken, and (surprisingly) spaghetti in a thin sauce). Got to know our guide a little. While we were waiting for lunch, we took a small wooden canoe down a cove on the river.
That was really cool. The cove was totally still water, so it was like gliding on a mirror. Trees stuck out of the water like in a swamp, so it was also like we were floating within the trees´ leaves. You could only see maybe 6 inches in the water before it was too murky. We saw birds and an unbelieveably blue butterfly, irridescently so in the sun. Mostly everything was shaded, though. We saw something big rush off away from the water´s edge, but we couldn´t tell what it was. You couldn´t hear ``ooh-ooh-ooh ah-ah-ah-ah´´ off in the deeper jungle like in the movies; it was surprisingly quiet. Bird sounds, though. One bird in particular though totally freaked out on us. `Omigod omigod omigod!!!´ it seemed to scream. `A boat!!!` Like it had never seen people before. Hehe.
We went for a walk in the jungle after lunch. And again the next day. I don´t really know how to describe this in email form. When you do it, it seems like the most natural thing in the world. Like a walk in the woods. Except all the plants are ones you´ve never seen before. Accounts of the jungle don´t exaggerate how many vines there are. There are a ton of vines. Also, tree trunks are generally skinny and straight up. About half are palm trees. Shorter plants have huge leaves or fronds... like as big as Digger, who´s over 6 feet. We didn´t see tons of animals. We saw monkeys far up and away in trees, and our guide brought a tarantula out of its hole in the ground. No snakes seen. Our guide could tell us a ton about the uses of everything, including smearing ants on yourself to hide your scent and a vine that you use for malaria. The part of the Amazon where we were isn´t as thickly vegetated as it is more to the south. This meant almost no mosquitoes, but it also (because of how far you could see) reminded me of woods at home. Strange. Digger commented that it felt more homey to him in the jungle than in the city. I had to agree.
We went for a long canoe ride along the edge of the river, too. We saw a strange mammal animal, parrots, spiders, and a turtle. We went fishing for pirhana. We went spotlighting and night and found a baby alligator that we got to touch & see up close. I hate to do it, but I´m going to cut this part short now, so I can catch up with where we are now.
We got back to Manaus and boarded our boat at 10 even though we didn´t leave until 4. We put up hammocks and so did everyone else and the result was CROWDED and also extremely visually stunning. Hammocks are next to each other in three rows, and the rows are also staggared, meaning if everyone´s facing the same way I have someone one foot to my right, one foot to my left, and someone´s head about where my knees are. As you can imagine, negotiating sleeping space was an issue.
Sometimes the river was wide, sometimes it was narrow. When it was wide, I could look out beind the boat and imagine we were just on a big lake... until there was one spot with no trees edging it, and just water. That, I would know, was where we had just come from. The boat had three levels. When the river was more narrow, you could go up top and hang out and look at the edges (a welcome relief for the claustophobia of the second deck). I saw a mama duck with babies, a few white herons, other birds, plenty of trees, and a surprising number of houses/huts.
That´s right, the Amazon river is totally civilized. This makes sense if you think about it. The Amazon is a lot like a watery highway that connects two cities (Manaus and Belém, where we were and where we are) of over a million souls. And people on the boats toss stuff overboard just as carelessly as some jerks toss trash out their car windows. It was strange. Of course, plenty of tributaries aren´t this way, but the Rio Amazonas is much more civilized than I had imagined it.
We left Manaus on Saturday afternoon and arrived in Belem Wednesday morning. It was comfortable to get off the boat, although both Digger & I had some strange version of sea legs for a good while. We like Belém better as a city, but are now anxious to head off to Salvador and the coastal beaches. Belém is definitely a port city: plenty of goods to be bought on the streets, and really interesting ones, at that. The Ver-O-Peso (check the weight) market, in particular, was really cool. Hundreds of booths, selling fish, meat, flours, herbs, crafts, çlothing, beer, snacks, poultry... just about anything you could want. Yesterday we saw a huge cathedral made in 1909 and gorgeous inside, marble, frescoes, gold...
But we´ve really got to get out of this internet place. We leave Belém by bus tomorrow afternoon. Ride´s supposed to be 33 hours and bad roads the whole way. Should be exciting. My Portueguese is getting better, but only marginally. We´ve also realized our camera film is ruined b/c we put it through with our checked baggage. Grr.
much love to everyone, of course,
Emily
PS Lille, i´m advertising your work to the Brazilians! I´m wearing the anklet and necklace you made me :)