Global Health Adventures: Amazon Days 5-8

Finally, the remainder of the report on my trip to the Amazon...

On our fifth day, we awoke in the jungle and began the journey back to our base camp. This trip was relatively uneventful, but our voyage later that morning would prove slightly more interesting. We set out for a rubber plantation on two boats, and en route, the motor failed on one of the boats. We were able to tow the other boat the remainder of the way and continued with our trip.

Rubber was a huge industry in the late 19th century in the Amazon, but after the seeds for the trees were exported to Southeast Asia, the rubber industry in Brazil all but disappeared. Still, a few rubber plantations remain as tourist attractions in the region. We were able to visit one and view various creations such as gloves and rubber boots. We were also able to observe a demonstration of how latex is collected and used to make rubber objects. After this brief trip, we returned to our base camp for lunch, and returned to Manaus shortly after lunch.

In Manaus, we relaxed a bit before joining the Irish and Australian girls for dinner. We then headed to bed to rest for a very early flight to Santarém the following morning.

Day 6: Santarém
We arose at around 2 am to prepare for a 4:40 am flight to Santarém. Santarém is a smaller city than Manaus, but also lies at the junction of two large rivers, in this case the Rio Tapajos and the Rio Amazonas. After a long bus ride into town, we arrived in the downtown area and began searching for a hotel at which we could recover from the early morning flight. Our first two options proved to have no vacancies, but on our third attempt we found a hotel. After resting for a while, we went out in search of something to do for the day. After being offered some expensive afternoon boat tours, we instead decided to head to Alter do Chão, a highly recommended river beach. We rode a bus to the beach (about 1 hour) and arrived to find an incredible beach on the Rio Tapajo and Lago Verde. After sitting on the beach for a few hours, playing hearts, I noticed that there were many people kayaking, and then spotted a kayak rental place. I assumed that this would be an expensive activity, only to learn that the kayak rental cost only $2.50 an hour. Chris B and I immediately jumped on this opportunity, and spent the last hour before sunset kayaking across Lago Verde. This proved to be one of the highlights of the Amazon trip, and I only wish that we had discovered the kayak rental a few hours earlier. After watching an incredible sunset over the river, we headed back to Santarém to rest before another early morning flight to Belém.

Days 7-8: Belém
We spent our final two days in Belém, a city located near the mouth of the Amazon. nate had wanted to journey to an island near Belém famous for its parrots, but alas the parrots migrate before November, thus there were no parrots that weekend. Instead, we spent Friday resting as it rained in Belém, and played quite a bit of hearts. We visited the port that evening and dined at a converted warehouse that has been modified to house great restaurants.

On Saturday, we were able to go on a boat tour to an island near Belém. During the trip, we played more hearts, listened to live music, and watched Chris B attempt to dance forró. After having lunch on the island, we returned to Belém for dinner, and after dinner journeyed to the airport to wait for a very early return flight to Fortaleza (our third early morning in four days...). After a few hours of sleep in the airport, we returned to Fortaleza to resume our research, after an enjoyable week in the Amazon.

Returning to Base Camp after a Night in the Jungle