Amazon Here We Come!

Well our captain has finally announced that with the few inches of rain that have fallen we will be able to navigate up the Amazon to Manaus.  We all figured it wasn’t going to happen with the record low river levels and drought.  No big ships had been making it up to Manaus and we were watching ship tracker almost daily to see what was happening. Finally a ship with a shorter draft like MSC made it through.  Our captain I’m sure spent days reading water levels, talking to pilot boats and getting all the information he could get to make the best decision.  From December 1st till around the 7th we will make our way up the Amazon stopping along the way.  The delta is just a massive area and the science and information about the Amazon boggles your mind!  I’m so pleased we have had all the speakers sharing so much with us.  Without their input we would be just taking a boat ride but with their knowledge we are inside and alongside the adventure. December 1st we actually enter the delta area.  

Coming off the tender up the hill with our tour group 

There were a few tents set up for shoppers



Here is one of the local boats that also brought passengers but it will be our tour boat 

Here is Pierre our guide.  I had this image in my head after corresponding with him that he would be a much older gentlemen!! He is 27. 

Our ramp was rustic. 

Our first stop along the low river is Santarem, Brazil.  It is a tender port and we use some of the local regional boats along with ours to get folks to shore. With the low water levels it can be a challenge for those with handicaps and difficulty doing steps and uphill climbs.  Our lecturer who prepares us with some of the history and culture says it is summer here and the nickname they give it Santa Hell!  We start to see the meeting of the waters here.  The blue water is the Tapajas River which is the largest river to flow into the Amazon which is brown from sediment washing down from the mountains.  You can see the line easily in the water where they don’t mix. The Amazon is much denser and has a lot of iron and gold in it.  There is a problem here because when they mined for gold they cleaned it with mercury which the fish ate from eating other fish and plants and then it poisoned the fish and the people who ate and eat the fish. So now most fish raised are raised in fish farms to avoid the mercury poisoning. 

The rivers also run at different speeds and temperatures which is very interesting. 

Soy bean production is the main crop and export for Santarém with about 30% going to Portugal and 70% going to China mostly as food for animals.  

In 1999 Cargill enterprises came here and bought huge sections of the riverbank area for their exporting company.  This riverbank was supposed to be all public but the mayor at the time made the deal under the table with Cargill then took the money for himself and his family.  He was fined but it wasn’t much and he sold the land for almost nothing.  Now the beach area is gone and no taxes have been paid from Cargill for 25 years which was part of the deal hence the city and its people have suffered and been cheated. The people tried to fight it but got nowhere. 

We have a tour here with Pierre Schultz I tried to prepay as many of our tours as possible so we wouldn’t have to carry so much cash and Pierre was one who took PayPal!  More and more companies are doing this and it was so much easier. 

Our tour includes a boat trip on one of the local two story transports.  We venture up a tributary to Maica Lake going as far in as we can but because of the drought we can’t make it all the way and the lake is almost just dirt. We hope to see dolphins and pink dolphins while Pierre fills us in on the area and we see how locals live and get around.  Everything here is by boat!  There are few roads really in the Amazon area compared to its size and land mass. We see some birds but nothing like what we had hoped.  The drought is most of the problem. We do spot the black hawk, vultures, kingfishers, the yellow headed cacique and were lucky to see a sloth, and Dan spotted a Great Potoo!!! This is a rare owl that is so camouflaged with the tree you would easily miss it.  We saw lots of giant termite nests, some magic mushrooms that grow in cow poop and the rubber tree nuts.  We were able to try and fish for piranhas but no one caught any but the guide.  The set up was a notched piece of wood with a string, bait and hook.  You just bob it on the top of the water and they snatch the bait quickly.  Piranha were such a big deal to all the crew!!!! Everyone was buying dried and stuffed Piranha to take home!  I got a few key chains with small ones and Dan made them into earrings for me!! Ha ha.  They were pretty big but eye catching and everyone wanted a pair.  I think the next stop folks were getting off looking for earrings or keychains to make themselves a pair. 

Our boat had very clean bathrooms and our lunch was served on the main level.  We had all the water, pop, juice and Caipirinhas we wanted which had vodka or rum in them and go down too easily!  They also served cold plates of fresh fruit, coffee and small cookies for dessert.  We had hoped to see more wildlife but even with a walk through the national park area it didn’t happen.  

You can see Santarem on this map and the Rio Tapajas or blue river 

This is our captain!

We all tendered to this barge dock.  

Dans in the background with his hat and sunglasses listening to Pierre.   But we have shade and cool drinks and a great guide 

And hammocks if you want to relax a bit!

 Passing by more of the commercial area where you can see how low the river is and how much of the bank is exposed. 

This is a small commercial shrimp farm 

Pierre told us he was born here and then moved to Switzerland where he became a librarian. He worked in arts schools too but taxes there were almost 50% and it was very cold in the winter. 

He worked at a hotel for two weeks when he moved back to Santarem and then worked as a photographer for tours.  It was then that he found his niche.  He loves learning and reading but needed an outlet to share with others.  The librarian position never offered that. He is very busy now with tours both from those coming by boat and also flying in. 

He tells us that the biggest  aquifer in the world is under the Amazon with enough fresh water for all the area for 250 years!!!

The Red Fish described below 

We captured this beautiful rainbow almost like a sundog

Then it changed to circle around the sun!

When the drought started many folks were unprepared for the drastic drop in the flow and lost their boats  

A snack before lunch 

This is the typical home and “car”

The black hawk 

The red fish is the largest fresh water fish and can weigh up to 200 km!  It is called the Pirarucu.  

Dolphins he says are born white but turn pink from sun although further research on our part suggest it is more from rubbing against rocks under the water that have iron in them.  

Pink dolphins have longer noses so they can swim between trees when it floods looking for food.  

Then there are grey dolphins with smaller noses.  They  don’t jump out of the water here high like in the ocean but more so bob and just skim the water unless they are in an area where they are being fed so tourists can swim with them.  There are just a few of these places where they allow that. 

Caicique black and yellow bird seen on our tour many times.  He doesn’t have his own songs but learns up to 20 songs of other birds and uses those.  She makes several long nests like these but only lays eggs in one as a distraction therefore predators can’t figure out which one has the eggs. 

Palm trees here are important for fruits that fish love to eat in high water.  The Tattoo wasp is  like an armadillo because of how it forms the nest.   

Magic mushrooms are now used to treat depression and they grows in cow poop.  He spots a few for us and they are tiny like the cap off a tooothpaste tube. 

Pierre finds a rubber tree pod for us and shows us how the seed is inside.  Of course we know how the rubber tree barons came to the Amazon and destroyed much of it by taking the sap from the rubber tree.  Another story!

Cows graze everywhere even in the forest 

Getting off for our forest jungle walk 

Lots of debris everywhere and be careful where you step.  Very dry

Giant termite nest

The cacique who builds these long narrow nests

The palms have these horrible sharp spines and when you walk you don’t want to step on the ones that drop off the bark

The sloth!!! 

Here is our photo of the Great Potoo owl that Dan spotted.  Pierre was pretty impressed with Dans eyesight and how he could find things even Pierre couldn’t see!!   The Mother of the Moon is his name because this owl only cries at the full moon!!

See the owl???

A sloth didn’t make it when it came down to go poop which they do once a week. Here is his fur :(

 The piranha the guide caught

Fresh pineapple!!

Our coffee!! Cute cups 

Our lunch area 

We learn about the legend of the dolphin that was told in each village.  The legend was that  in each village once a month there would be a party.  An 

old guy dressed in white with a hat would dance with some beautiful girl in the village.  Then 9 months a baby would be born to the beautiful girl. They later believed that man was a dolphin!  He dressed up as an old man with the hat and would  make a baby and leave!  The  hat would hide the hole in the dolphins head where his sonar is which gives the dolphin the ability to locate food easily underwater because their eyesight is poor.  The legend was to protect young pregnant women from shame if she had been raped and couldn’t tell who the abuser was.   Today we have DNA so we can’t protect the woman; she has to tell if she is raped.  

Pierre and the rubber tree nut

Another shot of the Potoo

Pierre gives each of us a small frog on a string necklace.  The locals would give this to the hunters to have good luck !!!  Pierre tells us that there are 

no mosquitos in the blue river because it is too acidic but on the Amazon River there are always mosquitos.  

You can walk along what they call the Malecon but it isn’t very nice like other places because of Cargill taking all the beach area and local docking positions. The regional boats are used as their hiway from one place to another.  When you travel this way you make a reservations and you hang your hammock up on the open deck to sleep on and your items go under the hammocks.  

Fish scales are used to file your  nails!!  There are at least 18 species of piranha in the Amazon!    The buses here have no AC and no PA system.    If you want to get to the National Park from here it is a 40 mile drive with no AC.  Your walk there could last for  two hours with a guide and you need spray for bugs.  The forest is  1 million 400, 000 acres!!  And like that we are back in the river with a nice night time shot!!