Pat and Norm's World Cruises and other adventures

Sailing and leaving the Amazon River

Posted on April 15, 2018 by patmathews

April 15, 2018

We were walking on the deck this morning when we felt and saw that the ship was turning around. At first we thought that we needed to make a turn so that the pilots could disembark, even though it would have been earlier than they told us it would be. Very soon Nolan, our cruise director, came on the speaker system to announce that there was a medical emergency on board and we turned back to allow the person to get ly the ship at a place that could provide medical treatment. This would take 3 hours back and another 3 hours to where we are now. ‘re on past experience We knew that it wouldn’t allow us to make the port at Devil’s Island, French Guiana. Around 1 PM the captain made that announcement. So that is a disappointment, we were looking forward to it. But as I always say, at least we aren’t the one on the stretcher.

I assume they will still be showing the movie Papillon tonight, and of course, it is all about the popcorn! So now they will prepare activities for a sea day tomorrow.

Yesterday afternoon Norm took this beautiful cloud picture.

We had dinner in Red Ginger last night. As always, it was terrific. I took a video of the magic towel they give us after the edamame. Very cool.

And this morning at breakfast we did spot several moths out at the terrace cafe. None as big as a dinner plate nor do I think they could pick up a rabbit, but interesting anyway. These are the things that amuse us at sea!!

Just one week to go and now we are heading to the Caribbean where we will visit Barbados, Antigua and St. Beats.

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Alter do Chao, Brazil

Posted on April 14, 2018 by patmathews

April 14, 2018

Alter do Chao is one of the administrative districts of the city of Santarem – we visited there on our way into the Amazon River. It was the site of several religious missions in the 17th and 18th century led by the Jesuits of the Franciscan order. Before that it was inhabited by indigenous communities Boraris. The area suffered great decline after the collapse of the rubber trade but is now the site for many day trips from Santarem and increasingly a location for people to buy vacation property.

It is best known for the Ilha do Amor (Island of Love) which is a small island with a white sand beach directly in front of the town. The island recedes now in the rainy season as you can see.

We went by tender to the floating dock and took a walk through town. We wanted to visit the local craft store that our enrichment lecturer, Don Klein, told us about. Luckily he was on our tender- he described the shop as one of the finest in the Amazon for the local products.

We first visited the church. Very simple and charming.

Then on to the shopping. I have a currency converter on my phone and can see what the price is in US dollars. In these two shops (Arariba), the number that looked like the price was actually a code that corresponded to the price. We assumed that the sheet that some people were carrying was a conversion sheet and I didn’t know until I went to pay that the price was different from what I was expecting! I bought two nice pieces of pottery there. Beautiful goods, Don was right.

One of the shopkeepers had her daughter there with her. Maybe she was the bookkeeper!

The town was very quiet and Don said they sleep till noon on weekends. At least the wonderful shop was open – I guess when a cruise ship arrives some people do get up early! There were also craft stands lining the area of the floating port, and here you could bargain.

When we got back to the ship, we saw lots of dolphins as we sat on our balcony after lunch.

After we leave this port at 2 PM we have a stop to let the pilots disembark tomorrow. But the 25% Brazilian tax is finished when we leave here – so I expect robust sales in the shops!

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Parintins, Brazil

Posted on April 13, 2018 by patmathews

April 13, 2018

Parintins is a city of about 100,000 and is on the right bank of the Amazon River on Tupinambarana Island. It can only be reached by boat or plane. It is known as the most hospitable cultural city in this region and we certainly found that to be true. We took a tender to shore and were greeted by their “boy and girl scouts” who smiled with us and helped anyone who needed any kind of assistance.

It was raining pretty hard when we got to shore, but we were intrepid walkers in spite of the many pedicabs that are here and really wanted to take us around town! Everyone we encountered had a smile and friendly greeting for us. We visited a very open modern church and walked through many markets where people were eager to show us their wares, especially the teeth of the piranha!

They have some unique planters – these are tires that have a variety of plants in them. Very pretty.

As we walked around, the rain stopped and we went to a craft market area where we bought a couple of things. I like to support the local people!

One of the unique features of this city is the Boi Bumba festival held in June – the biggest annual festival in Amazonas. It enacts the kidnapping, death and resurrection of an ox (boi), a metaphor for agricultural cycles. The event is turned into a competition between two Boi teams, each with several thousand members – Caprichoso in blue and Garantido in red. The rivalry apparently grew out of a “friendly” feud between two families over 90 years ago. Tens of thousands of people come here for the festival and virtually every citizen supports either red or blue. Even when it is not festival time, it is common to see the colors of red and blue and bull symbolism everywhere. One of the pictures below is of bull phone booths! It is even said that the Coke advertises the typical red can and also one in blue, the only place that Coke does this! We didn’t spot any blue signs or cans. But we did see the blue headquarters and some of the replica bulls on the street.

This costume on the back of the scooter is a typical Boi Bumba costume.

Very little graffiti was seen here – different from many of the other cities we visited. The sidewalks are often made of tile (slippery in the rain!) and there are some beautiful murals and buildings.

There are many fishing boats and transportation boats, in fact our tender docked next to a boat that we had to walk through to get to the dock. The docks and many houses are floating to accomodate the changes in height of the river in the rainy season. Yesterday, Francisco said that it is a good thing if you don’t like your neighbor. You can just attach your boat and pull your house to somewhere else!

Tomorrow is our last port in the Amazon. After that we head to Devil’s Island, French Guiana which is the site of the famous Papillion. Rumor has it that they will show the movie in Horizons on Sunday evening before we arrive on Monday.

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Manaus, Brazil

Posted on April 12, 2018 by patmathews

April 12, 2018

Beautiful sunset last night!

We arrived in Manaus at about 7 AM and our tour was scheduled to leave at 8:15. After breakfast, we left the ship to board the Amazon Explorer, a large riverboat in which we would spend most of the tour.

We were greeted at the pier by some energetic dancers! We heard and saw them from our balcony first.

Our leaders on the riverboat were Francisco, Gabriel and Julio. All were very good English speakers and very informative. The tour was called the Meeting of the Waters.

First we heard something about Manaus. It is a city of almost 3 million people, and like much of Brazil, they have a lot of people coming in from Venezuela and also from Haiti. Manaus is on the left bank of the Rio Negro. There are many industries here, almost 800, and a lot of them are electronics companies. Interestingly, Francisco says that if you want to buy a phone or a laptop, go to Sao Paolo – just because they are manufactured here it doesn’t make them less expensive – they are often twice as costly!

The wealth in Manaus originally came from the rubber trade in the late 1800s and at that time it was one of the richest cities on earth. It had streetcars, electricity and flush toilets before much of Europe. The citizens were so wealthy that they would give vintage wine to their horses and send their shirts to be laundered in Lisbon and Paris! By 1910 rubber seeds smuggled out by an Englishman called Henry Wickham and then planted in Malaysia destroyed Brazil’s monopoly. Manaus was literally plunged into darkness with no money to import coal for generators.

On the way to our first exploration of Lake January, we saw many homes on stilts and others that are floating houses, both allow the residents to stay in their homes during some of the rainy season.

We left the riverboat at a riverside restaurant and boarded 10 passenger motorized canoes that took us into narrow channels in the tropical forest to Lake January. We saw the giant water liles, Vicgtoria Regia, named after Queen Victoria. These plants have huge leaves measuring as much as 6 feet across – and there are spikes on the bottoms.

This is the beginning of the rainy season and the waters are high, but look at the dark part of these trees, by June, the height of this season, the water will rise 15-20 feet higher up to the top of the dark area! The animals here all live high in the trees for this reason.

There are manatees in these waters that eat the vegetation – but we didn’t see any. We did see some beautiful birds, flowers, etc.

We returned to the riverboat and had some time to wander through the local craft markets. One vendor gave me a paracau scale which she showed me how to use as a nail file!

We took the riverboat to the meeting of the waters of the Rio Negro and the Solimoes River where it forms the Amazon River. The Rio Negro is very acidic so no mosquitoes or birds live here. The water looks black because of the trees and the organic material. It is very clean even though it looks black and brown. The piranha here are only in groups of 3 or 4 so are not so dangerous as compared to the Amazon where they travel in groups of hundreds and could eat us in a matter of minutes!

The meeting of the waters is really dramatic to see!

Julio got water from each river to let us touch it to see the temperature difference – this is part of the reason the waters don’t mix, the other is the current. The Amazon is colder!

We again saw some dolphins but they are too quick for pictures and also don’t surface the way our Atlantic dolphins do. The reason for the pink color of the pink dolphins is that the blood vessels that run beneath their skin, which is thinner than that of ocean dolphins, are close to the surface. When they become happy or nervous, their color can change similar to when a human blushes. These dolphins are highly intelligent with brain capacities said to be larger than that of humans.

We saw some of the boats that take people from here to other cities – sometimes taking 4 – 6 days. There are few roads here so transport is by boat or plane. There are hammocks hanging all over in these boats for the people to sleep in during the journey. Talk about roughing it!

After our return to the pier, we had lunch and then went out to explore the city. Gabriel warned us that it would rain, which it does every day here in this season, so I don’t know if he is much of a weatherman! We did make it to the Opera House before it rained and we are so glad we did. We had a guided tour and it is spectacular. It is called Teatro Amazonas and has 670 seats. It was constructed beginning in 1882 at the height of the rubber boom. No expense was spared to make it the grandest opera house in the new world. Everything was brought from Europe. The wood is Brazilian but was sent to Europe to be polished and carved. There are 22 marble columns in the auditorium, each topped by Greek masks fo comedy and tragedy and inscribed with the grandest names of music and literature such as Shakespeare, Beethoven, Mozart and Goethe.

The wood floor alternates colors to depict the meeting of the waters. After the rubber barons left Manaus, the theater sat wasting in the tropical heat until a restoration was completed in 1990. Now all kinds of performances are held here.

This is a lego model of the opera house!

We also saw the customs house, the palace of justice and the cathedral. And, there are places where the facades of buildings are intact but the rest has been destroyed – trees and vines are growing inside!

After our visit to the Opera House, the rain came down like crazy and we took a cab back to the port where we boarded the shuttle through the pier area as you are not allowed to walk there. All in all a fun day in Manaus!

Posted in Amazon River, April, Excursions, South America | 2 Comments

Boca De Valeria, Brazil

Posted on April 11, 2018 by patmathews

April 11, 2018

Boca da means “mouth of” and is an entrance to the Valeria River and overlooking the Amazon.

We boarded a tender to go to shore. And here is Tom with the most unusual visor I have seen!

There were no planned excursions here as the town is the equivalent of about a city block and a half long. It contains a few wooden houses on stilts, a small one room school and a small church. There is a lot of wildlife. The people are called Caboclos, decendents of the Portuguese settlers who intermarried with the local Indians. They live off the land by fishing, keeping pigs and chickens and by planting vegetables in raised beds. The population is about 75-100 people. When ships stop here, people from nearby villages also come to participate in the tourist trade.

You can also observe the distinct line where the waters of the Valeria River meet the Amazon.

We brought lots of American dollars and gave them out to everyone we took a picture of. Here are some of the local people and their homes and school.

Here’s Alice in a local house.

And more shots of the house and the raised gardens. And, the puppies!

We did have a lot of interactions with the animals too!

Here’s a shot of the school where some of the children were having lessons. We were going to bring wrapped chocolates from the ship for them but were told that they do not have dental care, so we didn’t bring the candy.

Another hot Amazon day with a nice up close glimpse of Amazonian life.

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Santarem, Brazil

Posted on April 11, 2018 by patmathews

April 10, 2018

Last evening we were invited to dine with the general manager, Thierry, and the human resources manager, Ileana. We had an enjoyable dinner and as always, learned a lot about life on board for these professionals. Enjoyable but challenging as you can imagine. Ileana is the only HR person on board and doesn’t even have any clerical help.

We arrived in Santarem close to noon and the ship sailed out at 8 PM. This city is a river port with about 250,000 people so it is not a small village. It is located at the junction of the Tapajos River and the Amazon. It is an important trading center and serves as an export location for goods to the local population and transportation to longer distance locations like Manaus and Belem – which takes 2 days. There are many soy plantations and you see lots of barges being loaded with soybeans – mostly for export to China, we learned.

51% of the population is Catholic so you see some beautiful churches.

Santarem used to be inhabited by the Tapajos Indians and local legend has it that they used to drown adulterous women and mummify their distinguished relations!

Our excursion today was a cruise to Maica Lake. One of the things to see at many of the ports, and for sure today, is the meeting of the waters. The Amazon’s water, as I have mentioned, is colder and earth colored and the other river here, the Tapajos, is warmer and has a deep blue tone. What keeps these waters from mixing is the great difference between the water temperature and the currrent speeds.

Our guide told us a lot about the city as well as the nature along the route to Maica Lake. There are 2 species of dolphins here, the pink dolphin and the black or grey batos. We did see both but they disappear too quickly to get any pictures. We may see more of the pink dolphin in Manaus.

Here along the river, as it is now rainy season, many people have to leave their homes and move to the city since the area gets flooded. We did see some people but not many. Here are some of the homes – I wouldn’t want it to be my vacation spot!

Some of the wildlife we saw included many species of birds – the parrots and beautiful oriole blackbird, sloths (hard to see) and iguanas. There were also water buffalo and horses in places along the shore. We couldn’t get a close pic of the oriole blackbird, so our guide showed us one in a book…beautiful.

Here’s what some of the boats looked like. And one of the small fishing boats was also passing by. Notice that one of the boats has a satellite dish on top!

We stopped for about an hour to do some piranha fishing. Here’s the bait and the fishing line. And someone trying to get hooked.

I was one of the 2 passengers that caught one!

They have these small sharp teeth!

This is a scale from the paracau fish which can get to be 250 pounds in weight.

Here our guide, Nelson, holding a small catfish that someone caught.

We enjoyed our trip on the river and in the lake and certainly felt the Amazon vibe and the heat!

Posted in Amazon River, April, Excursions, South America | 3 Comments

Amazon River

Posted on April 9, 2018 by patmathews

April 9, 2018

We have had a series of lectures from Don Klein, as I mentioned before. With several more to come. Yesterday, Norm went to the lecture and I watched it on TV later and – wow – what a lot of facts we learned about the Amazon. We are really looking forward to the adventure.

Yesterday we crossed the equator. We have done it many times but we always go to the crossing ceremony where those who have never crossed are “initiated” and the ship is given permission from “King Neptune” to actually cross the equator. Here are some shots of the procession and the ceremony.

As you can see, there was a fish kissing involved and some pies in the face for 3 crew who had never crossed before.

We entered the Amazon this morning, and as I write this, we have dropped anchor and are awaiting the 2 pilots that will be on the ship for the entire week we are on the river, each taking 12 hour shifts on the bridge. We just watched two pilots board a cargo ship nearby. Ours have just arrived.

The first thing to say about the Amazon – it is BIG and the water is brown. Don Klein says that it may look dirty but it is not, you can drink it! Not that we will try.

The Amazon is the longest river in the world and here are some other things we learned:

It varies between 1 and 35 miles wide. The peak height is in June, the most rainy month. We are in the beginning of the rainy season now.
The Amazon basin is a huge rainforest and it is 80-85% still OK. But every year a part the size of Connecticut is lost.
It provides 20% of all the earth’s flowing water and at the mouth of the river, it discharges 7,000,000 cubic feet of water PER SECOND. 4.5 trillion gallons. That is enough water to supply all the homes in the US for more than 5 months.
The outflow would fill Lake Ontario in 3 months.
It is made up of volcanic soil and water.
The Amazon basin is mostly flat and is made up of 2.3 million square miles. The area covered by the Amazon river and its tributaries more than triples over the course of a year. In dry season 110,000 square km of land is water covered but in the wet season the flooded area rises to 350,000 square km. The difference in height of the river between dry and wet seasons is 90 feet.
Marajo island at the mouth of the river is the largest fresh water island in the world and is the size of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island combined.
There is little deviation in rain, sun, and length of the day because of the harmony of nature here. There are no natural catastrophes, there is a uniform climate (average only 5 degrees F variation) and it is located on the equator.
1/2 of the world’s species of birds are found here as well as the largest parrots, otters and fish – the 350 pound pirancu. There are 2500 species of fish and over 500 different species of catfish (who knew!) some weigh 200 pounds.
As a comparison, in every 2.5 acres there are 90 species of trees – over 500 trees. In temperate zones like where we live, the same area would contain 5-6 species and 90 trees.
The river is 250-300 feet deep.
We saw some pictures of moths that look like small plates – we might make that mistake if we eat in the Terrace Cafe while on the river!
There is a pink dolphin species that is more fish than mammal – no dorsal fin. We hope to see them while here. The boto is another dolphin we hope to spot – it is the largest dolphin in the world.
The big 3 to watch for are the Harpy Eagle, the jaguar and the anaconda. I don’t prefer the last 2!
The coati we saw at Iguazu are also plentiful here and they are apparently as smart as 10 house cats. Many monkeys and 3 toes sloths live here too.

Here are some shots as we entered the river. It was a bit rainy as we went for our morning deck walk but soon stopped. You can see how big the river is and how brown but not much else at this point.

Tomorrow is our first stop, Santarem, from noon to 8 PM. Two of the stops have no organized tours, Boca Da Valeria and Alter Do Chao. We also have a stop in Manaus. Much more to say after each, I am sure.

Posted in Amazon River, April, South America | 2 Comments

Fortaleza, Brazil

Posted on April 7, 2018 by patmathews

April 7, 2018

We had three sea days to travel from Rio to Fortaleza. Our original itinerary was to stop in Recife, but that got changed to Fortaleza. We did find out that the reason had to do with a problem the cruise line had with refueling several months ago, and now they won’t stop in Recife any more.

On the sea days, we relaxed, read, went to the spa, went to lectures and movies, did needlepoint, played in the casino, saw shows and of course shopped. We didn’t buy anything though because the 25% Brazilian tax is imposed on all goods until about April 16 when we leave Brazilian waters. You can choose items and have them put aside until then and charged at that time.

We had only 3 people for blackjack the other day and they usually won’t run the tournament for less than 4. We talked them into it and actually did three tournaments. My friend Tom won all three. I guess we should have stopped at one, but it was fun.

The enrichment lecturer, Dr. Don Klein, has been giving a lecture every day to provide context on Brazil.

Here are some of the things Norm has learned (He goes to all the lectures, I am often doing something else but they do replay them on the TV).

Brazil was the closest place to sail to receive African slaves. 60% of the slaves came here, while only 3% went to the US. We were surprised by this.
In the US, there were often 10 slaves for every white landowner and in the American south, people were afraid that if they let the slaves keep their customs, including the drumming and their costumes, that they would rise up against their owners. In Brazil, they didn’t have this fear and the dress, original dancing, drumming, etc, is very much a part of the culture here to this day.
There is economic diversity here, lots of poor people, but not racism as we know it. You often cannot tell who is white, black or mixed as they all spend lots of time in the sun and look pretty much alike and are treated as such.
Brazil’s relationship with China is getting much stronger and the relationship with the US is getting weaker.
Brazil is bigger than the US without Alaska. If you count Alaska, the US is bigger.

Much more we could share, I am sure, but that gives you an idea of the education we get in addition to the fun we have!

Yesterday there was a storm off our side of the ship – I could see it in the distance but we didn’t sail into it. I stayed and watched from our balcony. Here’s a picture of a small rainbow that appeared.

Now to Fortaleza. It is the third largest city in Brazil. And we heard it was 12th in the world for crime, but we saw no evidence of that. We don’t wear any jewelry here anyway, and are careful with belongings. We only had a short time here because of the tides – we arrived at 8 but the shuttles didn’t start till 9:30 and you have to depend on a shuttle – people cannot walk in the port here because it is a busy shipping port. We sailed out at 2. We didn’t have the time to do much as the city center wasn’t so close, so we took the shuttle to the shopping mall and had a nice comfortable walk in air conditioning. Of course I have a picture of an adorable little girl. And one of the sculptures they had on display.

And here are some of the beaches. There is diversity here – lots of poor areas but many beautiful new high rises too.

This is an old lighthouse.

The mall was new and modern with many of the same shops as we have in the US. Many things are much more expensive here – for example, most people do not have iphones since they cost twice as much as in the US. Some different things we saw – there was a perfume place that would make a custom scent for you.

And there was a coaching store! Lots of books but all in Portuguese, but the hats were in English (maybe the word for coach is the same in both languages??) I told the woman there that I was a coach in the US and she was delighted to hear it.

We came back to the ship for lunch and then saw the movie I Tonya while we sailed back into the Atlantic Ocean. Here is what this port looks like from the ship.

Tomorrow we are at sea, and on Monday we enter the Amazon River. Looking forward to that and the adventures that await us there. We will see if the moths really are big enough to lift a rabbit.

Posted in April, South America | 2 Comments

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Posted on April 3, 2018 by patmathews

What a fabulous 3 days we had in Rio. It is actually hard to decide which photos to post – the city is absolutely beautiful.

Sunday, April 1, 2018

Well, to get started, on Easter Sunday we were told that the pilot boat would meet the ship at about 6 AM for the spectacular view as we sail into the port. We were up but the ship was already almost in and we missed the sail in. We found out later that there was a medical emergency on board so we came in very fast. We did see the ambulance at the dock and someone with an IV being wheeled out – we don’t know who it was. But at least we saw the sunrise – and it wasn’t us on the stretcher.

Anyway, after breakfast we left for a full day tour of Rio. We were worried that it would be very crowded on the holiday. We started with our guide, Cecelia. She told us that it is largely a family holiday so actually the sights we would see would be less crowded today. She also told us that the city has 17 million people. Our first stop was to Sugarloaf Mountain – one of the two most popular landmarks here. We rode one cable car for the ride to Urca Hill with its beautiful gardens and view of the city.

The picture above is two of the older kinds of cable cars they used to use. The cable car system was opened in 1912 and was the third of its kind in the world.

We took another cable car to the top of Sugarloaf Mountain which is 1300 feet above sea level. Amazing.

After a wonderful visit, we went to a Brazilian Churrascaria for lunch and it was even better than the previous one.

We then took a drive to Tijuca Forest which is a 47 square mile sanctuary away from the city. It was cut down in the 19th century to make way for coffee plantations but was reforested beginning in the late 1800’s. This included the planting of more than 100,000 trees. We took a cog train up the mountain – Corcovado – which means Hunchback Mountain. The railway opened in 1884 and passes through 2.5 miles of the Tijuca National Park. Our destination was the amazing Christ the Redeemer statue which overlooks Rio. It was constructed on the mountain and completed in 1931. It is 120 feet high and weighs 700 tons. It is the largest art deco statue in the world and one of the 7 modern wonders of the world. Only the head and hands were made separately and attached after the statue was complete. When you get off of the train there is an elevator and an escalator that takes you to the statue. Again, the views are wonderful.

These are the flags of all the countries in the train station.

There were many orchids growing naturally on the trees.

On the way back to the pier we passed by both Copacabana and Ipanema beaches. Ipanema has bigger waves but is a much smaller beach. And we learned from Cecilia that the “girl from Ipanema” is now 75 and lives in Sao Paolo!

The unusual sidewalks are made of stone and they have black, white and red stones in in many patterns. This represents the black, white and indigenous people of this city.

Tired but happy, we returned to the ship for dinner and then I saw the movie – The Greatest Showman while Norm went to sleep early! Our butler, Rehman, always brings us snacks and keeps our refrigerator full!

Monday, April 2

Today we didn’t have a tour booked. Gabe Hazan, a man we met on board, has a lovely beautiful jewelry store in Rio and when I told him I wanted to get my nails done in the city, he arranged for his driver to pick us up at the port and take us to the shop where his wife, Vanessa had made an appointment for me. There was a big line of people getting off the ship as it was changeover day and only 84 of the passengers are going to Miami so the rest were getting off to return home. We will have 600 new passengers embarking, so it is a good day to stay off the ship! We did get off in time for him to take us to the shop for my 10:30 appointment where we waited for a while and then were told that the manicurist called in sick! So the driver came around for us again and took us to Hazan where we had drinks and snacks. Vanessa made a 2:00 appointment for me at another shop and we decided to go to see the Copacabana Plaza hotel which is right next to Gabe’s shop. We had a lovely lunch by the pool. We had fast wifi and backed up our devices while we ate.

We also walked along Copacabana beach. During the nail appointment, Norm had fast wifi there too. He also visited a pharmacy for drops for his blocked ear! And google translate works very well!

We decided not to bother Gabe’s driver but took a cab back to the ship where we had dinner in the wonderful Red Ginger restaurant.

There, they have a choice of what chopsticks you want, a tea menu and after the complimentary edamame they pour a bit of hot water on a small quarter sized thing that expands to be a small towel for your hands! Here are some of our chosen dishes. The beef teriaki was some of the best I have ever had.

Our show tonight was a local music and dance troupe – Brasileirissimo. They put on a great performance which incorporated Samba, Gafieira and Capoeira plus a look at the world famous Carnival. It was amazing!! I do think all the women had breast implants, though. Not a jiggle among them and Nolan, our cruise director, said we would probably not see that much flesh in a long time. The pics aren’t great, wish I had video, but believe me, it was a great performance. They even got the crowd involved.

Tuesday, April 3

Our tour today was an open air jeep tour of the Botanical Gardens and the Tijuca National Park. Our guide was Marcello and he was really great. There were 7 of us in his vehicle.

We went up to the National Park first. As I mentioned earlier, it is 8200 acres and has 9000 species of plants. We stopped at several highlights, including the Taunay waterfall and also the Chinese lookout where we again have wonderful views of the Corcovado, Sugarloaf mountain, Ipanema and Leblon beaches and the Rodrigo de Freitas Lagoon.

We headed down the mountain to the Botanical Gardens which was inaugurated in 1808 by King Dom Joao. We had a leisurely walk through the gardens, the orchid house and among the 90 foot royal palms. This garden is half natural jungle and half gardens. We saw many varieties of plants and trees. We also learned about the butterflies that need salt and there is not much in the forests to they will land on us for the sweat.

This is a unique sundial with open numbers that allow the sun to project the time on the stand below.

We learned a lot about Brazil and Rio over the 3 days we spent here. It was the capital until Brazilia was built especially to be the capital, and many people still think this should be the capital. Real estate here is varied, the closer to the beaches, the properties (mostly high rises) can be 10 times as costly as elsewhere in the city. Anything public is free, including university educations. Marcello said that it is a paradox because the public universities are better than the private ones but to get in, you may need a private school education because at the primary and secondary levels the private schools are better than the public ones.

The favelas are the kind of slums here – they were where many of the African people settled once slavery was abolished here. They are crime ridden in many areas, lots of gang wars, and we saw many armed police in some areas although we did not go directly into the favelas. We were told that the preferred word today is “community” not favela. Many of the people there don’t pay anything for their residences if they were some of the first settlers, and they have great beach views! Samba originated with the African people and there are many samba schools here. Lots of graffiti here too, some good and some just a mess. Marcello said it is mostly teenagers with nothing to do.

Here are some other sights of Rio. We saw some of the Olympic venues and many others are outside the city.

This last one is how they air condition the terminal!

Next, we have 3 days at sea before going to Fortalezza. Originally we were scheduled for Recife but a couple of weeks before sailing we heard from our travel agent, Pam, that they had substituted Fortalezza. Many passengers hadn’t heard about the change! We don’t know why but heard that it might have been because of the yellow fever here in parts of Brazil. We did have the immunization before our first world cruise, so no worries from us!

Relaxation and massages are in order and probably a blackjack tournament or two!

Posted in April, Excursions, South America | 1 Comment

Buzios, Brazil

Posted on March 31, 2018 by patmathews

March 31, 2018

The Passover seder last night was well done! Tom did a great job organizing and running it. There were 104 people there, well over expectations. Quite a few weren’t Jewish but wanted to experience the seder. Here are our tablemates, the booklet with the service and the menu. The staff did a wonderful job. Tom said he averted a crisis when he found out that our Italian chef made special challah for us and they were sending out the baskets full. Normally on a Friday night they make it but he didn’t realize that at Passover you don’t eat it! I hope the other passengers and the crew got to enjoy it because it is delicious.

Today we are at anchor at Buzios, Brazil. It is considered the St. Tropez of Brazil because it is reminiscent of the French Riviera. It gained international fame when Brigitte Bardot vacationed here in the 1960’s and was photographed on the beach. Now you see a bronze statue of her along the Orlat Bardot Boardwalk, which is a stone sidewalk that extends along the beach.

We had a great walk along this boardwalk. There are lots of restaurants and shops but today only the tourist shops seemed to be open while we were there. Many people were taking water taxis and schooner type boats to the many beaches here. Some are also close to where the tender docks.

Here’s a sculpture of fishermen, when we arrived it was low tide, later after our walk the tide had come in. And some tourists went out for a picture with them.

Lots of boats, beautiful water and a nice town. Here are some of the other sights.

We had a nice time – headed back to the ship for some relaxation. Oh, and I forgot to post a picture of Isabella – we bought her in Parati.
And she will live in Harvey Cedars!

Tomorrow we arrive in Rio for 3 days. We are doing a full day tour the first day (Easter, so who knows how crowds will be). The second day we will take a shuttle to Copacabana Beach and Hotel and will do some walking around the city. It is changeover day so some passengers will be getting off and new ones coming on. The third day we have a tour of the botanical gardens and Tijuca National Park in an open air jeep.

I may post all of the adventures together when we leave as we have 3 sea days before we reach the next port. Stay tuned!

Posted in Food, March, South America | 1 Comment