Santarem

The ship had docked by the time we woke this morning, and over breakfast we could see the port we recognised from last year.  We were going Piranha fishing this morning, so when called, we joined the rest of the passengers queuing to get onto the riverboats. 

This tour took us out to Lake Maica, which was probably about an hour away (by riverboat) from the main port.  On the way, we crossed over the meeting of the waters Santarem style.  Here it is the Tapajos River meeting up with Amazon, and, for the same reasons as before, (acidity, speed and temperature) the two rivers don’t mix for some time. 

From there were taken along a small quiet river towards Lake Maica, which it turns out, is only there in the wet season, and not quite deep enough yet for our riverboat, but that wasn’t an issue, because we went on further to river inlets to fish.

The riverboat ride there and back was lovely with so much to see.  Cattle and buffalo farms, huge pigs, horses and goats (very rare here), great egrets, a blue heron, green parrots, a massive iguana, the plants and trees.  It was a real pleasure just to sit and watch it all go by. 

When the boat stopped we all had a go with our little bits of meat on a hook to see if the piranha would bite. Not the most successful of fishing trips, but our boat did manage to catch  two.  I think the plan was to cook what we caught on the barbecue, and share among everyone, but two small fish amongst 36 people didn’t work out very well, so they abandoned that idea and we got back to the ship for a late lunch.

We decided to go out in the afternoon for a walk around the city itself, but it was exceptionally hot, so we held off for an hour until the day started to cool down a little.  Then we walked out of the port and along the riverside road of Santarem as before.   At the start, before you get to the main city, it is very shabby, there are black vultures everywhere, and plenty of rubbish too.  

But it gets better.  If you have the time, you can wander around the fish market, which is only open in the mornings, looking at all the different and strange fish. If you are really lucky, there may be a boy at the back of the market, enticing pink dolphins to follow the bait so that you can photo them.  We carried on past there and looking at all the shops which mostly seem like cash and carry, or selling provisions for boats.  

Eventually we reached the market with all the hammocks, and the local cathedral before we ran out of time and turned to walk back.  Santarem is colourful, and different, and interesting: we watched a man drag a very reluctant sheep from a river boat over to the road.  There, another man (presumably the buyer), tied it’s legs together to stop it struggling and then loaded into the back of a very old and rickety looking VW Beetle!

We also met a couple of students from Santarem University who wanted to practice English on us, which was delightful.   Lovely, lovely people.

So that’s it.  The end of our visit to the Amazon.   I’m quite sad about that, but it has been absolutely brilliant being here.  We have loved every day and all our experiences, and Peter is wondering whether or not he can find a way of getting us here again.

We have a couple of sea days now, and then Isle De Salut......... Devil’s Island of Papillon fame.  Peter can hardly contain his excitement!

Santarem, Brazil 2011
Santarem, Brazil 2103
Santarem, Brazil 2014