Manaus
& the Amazon
Tuesday,
January 31st
On Tuesday morning we woke up bright and early and
found ourselves already docked in Manaus, Brazil! I had an Amazon trip planned for 8am so naturally I woke up
around 7:45 and somehow met up with the group with 5 minutes to spare. We got off of our ship, walked to the
other side of the pier, and stepped on a little bit smaller boat for our cruise
past the city of Manaus on our way to the Amazon river. We had two very cheery tour guides who
spoke a rough mix of Portuguese and English. The boat took us to the spot where the Black River (where
Manaus is) and the Amazon River meet.
You may be thinking, “cool… the spot where 2 rivers mix… we see that
every day in Charleston.” But due
to the acidity of the Black River and the filthiness of the Amazon River, the
two waters don’t mix. It literally
was a definite line between the two, with black coffee and coffee with cream on
the other. I’ve never seen
anything like it and still just don’t understand how it works, but somehow
that’s just the way it is. In the
main part of the Amazon we saw some pink dolphins (cool, but to be honest they
were pretty ugly). The bigger tour
boat took us back into a little bit smaller part of the Amazon where smaller
boats were waiting on us. After
getting in the smaller 25 horsepower Yamaha propelled boats, we went further
into the smaller tributaries of the Amazon. I’m going to be honest… at first it didn’t look much
different from the creeks back home, but once we got into the small canal ways,
I knew I definitely wasn’t back home.
It was exactly what you might picture when imagining cruising through
the Amazon Rainforest. We didn’t
see many creatures, except we did see a line of massive ants carrying
leaves. It’s hard to explain, but
they were so big that we could see them even though we were in the boat and the
ants were a good ways into the jungle.
I
think one of the craziest parts of going through the Amazon was seeing the
little villages and how the locals lived.
They literally lived in falling down shacks that were floating on the
river (remember… the AMAZON river).
A school “boat” picks up
the children every day and apparently they are made fun of for being from the
river. I think they are kind of
like the Amazon version of a “redneck.”
After cruising through the Amazon, they took us to a floating restaurant
where a mile long buffet of freshly cooked food was waiting for us. What we ate… I couldn’t tell you, but whatever
it was I tried everything and everything was delicious. I know that I had some kind of fried
fish, which really hit the spot. I
wasn’t so sure about what kind of fish it was, but I think the mounted piranhas
covering every inch of the walls and sitting on every table just might have
something to do with it. After our
heavy mystery lunch we took a short walk back into the rainforest to a lake
with HUGE lily pads. The lily pads
were literally massive and our guides said that they could currently hold a
baby, but that they also will grow to be even bigger! After throwing sticks at an alligator in the lake for a
while, we finally headed back to the boat back to Manaus. Manaus has a bridge crossing the Black
River that looks like one tower of the Cooper River Bridge and it reminded me
so much of home! I would say that
was the only time I’ve felt homesick for Charleston. It just reminded me so much of cruising through the harbor
in the summertime.
After
we got back to Manaus, we walked around the city for a little while before
heading back to the ship. Manaus
was a very strange place. The
buildings were so pretty and old looking but everything was dilapidated. One of our teachers told us that when
Manaus was first being developed, there was actually so much rubber money
flowing through that they imported everything from Europe and modeled the city
after Paris. It’s hard to imagine
now, but when you looked past the trashy, vine-covered walls of the empty,
filthy, windowless buildings, you could see that the city was once really
nice. The streets were covered in
trash and jam-packed with people giving us the most absurd looks. Pretty sure they don’t get too much
tourism in Manaus.
Rio
de Janeiro
Tuesday,
January 31st – Friday, February 3rd
After
very briefly exploring Manaus we headed back to the ship to get ready for our
red-eye flight to Rio de Janeiro.
After washing off the Amazon, I jammed as much stuff as I could fit into
my backpack and headed out to meet the group for our 9pm departure from the
ship. That entire night was such a
blur. I’m not sure how long we sat
in the airport, or when our flight left, or how long the flight to Rio
was. All I know is that I woke up
around 7am Rio time, just in time to se the city and the beach before we
landed. Sleep or no sleep, it was
clear that no one was going to let us waste anytime in Rio. Our tour guide, Ricardo did not stop talking from the moment we
first stepped onto the bus until we stepped off at the foot of the beach at
Copacabana. The vivacious,
spirited, VERY Brazilian Ricardo led our sluggish group of red-eyed college
students on a 30 minute walk straight up a hill to where we were going to eat
breakfast. Just when everyone was
ready to sneak off for street food in stead of continuing walking we made it up
the hill where every kind of fruit and pastry were waiting for us. Definitely the best breakfast I’ve ever
had! I ate so much I could barely
move, which wouldn’t have been a problem if Ricardo hadn’t planned a surprise
hike through a favela (slum) to the top (yes, literally the top) of a
mountain. Thank goodness I
couldn’t fit my tennis shoes in my bad so had to wear them on the plane,
because there were kids doing this hike in their pjs and flip-flops. Although I felt like I was going to
die, the hike was definitely worth it.
A leader in this particular slum led us through his small favela. If I had been in awe at how the people
in the Amazon lived, it was nothing compared to everyone’s reaction walking
through this favela. And our guide
told us that this was one of the nicest and most developed slums in Rio. He also said that it was probably one
of the only slums that was safe enough for tourists to walk through. I’m guessing “safe” was a fairly
relative term for our situation considering we had four security guards
escorting our group. Once we made
it to the top of the mountain we could see all of Rio. In addition, it was the first time we
could all get a good look at the Christ the Redeemer statue that overlooks all of
Rio. Definitely worth it! After our surprise hike, we went to the
hotel, threw on our bathing suits and went straight to the beach! Never in my life have I seen so many
man bikinis and thongs!
Three friends and I just sat on the beach for hours
before heading in to get ready for dinner at a real Brazilian steak house. The amount of food I consumed at
breakfast was NOTHING compared to my meat intake at dinner. The only thing I can say about dinner
is YUM. After dinner we met up
with someone’s friend from home who was studying abroad for the entire semester
in Rio. He took us out and showed
us all around town. The next day
we woke up and walked around Copacabana for an hour or so before heading to
Corcovado to see the Christ the Redeemer statue. After a train ride, some walking, some escalator riding, and
some more walking we finally made it to the top of Corcovado and the base of
the statue. The entire experience
was very unreal. It didn’t
surprise me one bit that this statue overlooking all of Rio with open arms is
one of the 7 wonders of the world.
By the time we made it back to the area of our hotel it was time to get
ready for dinner again. Ricardo
took us to the Lapa District in Downtown Rio for dinner and for going out at
night. Since Carnival is only a
week or two away, they were having rehearsals in a lot of the bars in
Lapa. It basically looked like a
Mardi Gras dress rehearsal or something.
Since the next morning we had to wake up at 6am for our flight, we
decided to save sleeping for the plane and try to just stay up all night
long. I almost made it without
sleeping except for a nap from 5:30 to 6am. Although it felt like we were in Rio for weeks, we were
herded reluctantly back onto the bus only 48 hours after arriving in Rio. With about 6 hours of sleep in 72
hours, this was no doubt the most tired I’ve ever been in my life. But somehow Rio was so exciting that I
didn’t even realize my lack of sleep until I was waiting in line to get back on
the MV Explorer. Rio was one of the
most unique and beautiful cities that I’ve ever been too and it is one place
that I know for a fact I will return to at some point in the future.
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