Day 8 - Belem, Brazil

Day 8 - Belem, Brazil

Highlights of the Day:

The Amazon River

Tender Boats

People who live in the huts along the river

Everyone sits in Belem

Fruits of the Amazon

The Long Summary of My Day:

The ship arrived in Belem and dropped anchor aways off shore because the water was too shallow. Therefore we had to take tenders, which are smaller boats, to reach the dock.  We were able to board a tender that way just one level and within 30 minutes we arrived at the dock. My first impressions where that they city was a little dirty and crowded. The beach looked like a junk yard for boats rather than a place to sunbathe!  The pier was crowded with individuals who lived in Belem and either they were resting up against the pier, sitting on their shipwrecked boat or trying to sell you some kind of cold drink.  There were stray dogs and turkey vultures on the beach - no sea gulls here!

Once off the pier, I was surprised at the stores that lined the street.  They were selling electronics that looked popular about 15 to 20 years ago. There were piles of clothes and surprisingly lots of underwear in other stores.  We saw people selling fruit everywhere - in stores, on carts, in wheelbarrows, although the bananas looked very ripe!  There was one guy pushing a giant cart of bananas up the street. There were eggs for sale just sitting on a counter. A car had piles and piles of clothes? mounted on top of it.  We walked up the street and went to a market - which wasn't want I expected.  They were selling every kind of meat and fish you could imagine as well as every part of the animal!  They were giant parts of fish lying on the counters, butchers chopping parts and bits flying in the air, and rows and rows of dead fish. I even saw one still breathing.  Yuck!  Then there were the butchers. I saw giant livers and hearts of some animal, as well as meat hanging from make-shift racks.  Although there is NO refrigeration at all! Just fish and meat in a giant warehouse and it was hot!  Yuck again!  The people loved posing for pictures and they liked it even more when you showed it to them! We went from vendor to vendor seeing the meats, the fish, grains, fruits, vegetables and more!

After walking around the town for a while, we boarded a bus for the city.  On the ride, I saw the houses in which people lived. They are very small and not well constructed. The streets were also lined with lots of little restaurants and outside there were colorful plastic chairs around small cardtables. There were also alot of car and bike repair shops, tires and garbage piled up outside on the sidewalks.  Tons of clothes hung from railings, clotheslines, balconies - everywhere you looked there were clothes drying!  I saw alot of people just sitting. Some were sitting outside a house or a business, others sitting along the sidewalk, some were sitting on concrete balconies or under trees.  No one seemed to be working, maybe because it was very hot and humid. I think the humidity was 86% today.  

Once in the city,I noticed it was alot cleaner.  There were many apartment highrises in view and many of the buildings were designed with Spanish tiles. We boarded a large colorful boat.  We passed the Ver-O-Peso Market and the Old Fort as well as some old churches. Many boats filled the piers, some were fishing boats, sailing boats, boats used to move products. The water was a muddy brown color and the waves were no too choppy and we were headed down the Amazon River.  As we went further down the river, small houses appeared on the water.  When the boat blew the horn, kids came running out of the houses. They would wave furiously, jump in the water, balance on the small fishing canoes, do anything for attention!  As we traveled down the water, more and more people came out of these small houses that looked more like shacks built on stilts.  I would see older people waving out of windows, sitting on porches or rowing very small boats alongside ours. It is crazy to think that families lived in these houses!  Apparently there is a school, but today was Friday and I saw many kids today!  These communities are made of a mixture of Indians and natives who live off the land, catch the fish, and pick the fruits of the Amazon. They travel to the Ver-O-Peso market each day to sell their catches.  We saw some pretty amazing things such as chickens, I think, bathing in the water and people drying the fruits they picked from the trees!

We then reached an area where the tributary emptied into a larger part of the river, and we docked in a local community. We went for a walk for about an one and a half into the rainforest with some people who lived here. We saw so many types of trees and fruits of the Amazon and I can't even begin to write them all!  The one that I was really impressed by was the Acai berry trees.  We tasted some of the local fruits as we walked. The one was really slimy!  You had to crack the shell opened and then you could pick parts of the fruit. You were not supposed to eat the seed, but just suck on the outside of it!  The locals also opened another fruit that is used to make hair dye and makeups and when the berry was smashed it made a bright red color.  We continued our walk, learning about the various trees and uses of the fruits.  We then watched two boys use a band of palm leaves woven in a circle around their feet to climb the acai berry tree in order to get the berries down.  The boys were about 10 years old and flew up the tree, grabbed the berries then practically slide down the trunk of the tree! It was really impressive!

We then had a feast of fresh fruit from the Amazon, including coca beans, Brazil nuts, pineapple, mango, papaya, some slimy thing, limes and others but I didn't know what they were!  We then continued our walk back to the boat, and then back through the city, the town and finally to the port to board the tender to take us back to the ship!  It was a long day, but really worth it! It was pretty awesome!