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Arriving in Belem
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Tuesday October 16th, arriving at Belem
Pete, who rarely gets bored, was now looking Fed Up. Foul food, filthy toilets, blocked handbasins, we have had enough. The river is much wider and very choppy, and children are being sick. A grey-looking little girl who had just chucked must have said 'Mum I'm hungry' because next thing she is eating a bowl of noodles. We leapt out of the way in time !
Enterprising sellers paddled their canoes from their houses on stilts and tied up alongside the boat, then handed up bags of shrimps and açai juice, took their money and paddled off home. A huge bag of shrimps cost only 2R.
After enduring the morning by going upstairs, then downstairs, then upstairs again, at 1pm we saw what looked like a town. Pete went to the bridge and asked if this was Belem. Sure thing buddy. The liars. We were another 5 hours on that damned boat, pulling into Belem just as it was getting dark. But the last few hours we were between fairly close banks, and it was very pretty. The river at this point consists of hundreds of channels and islands with riverside houses. We would get lost in 5 minutes.
You would not believe how we had to get off the boat. It pulled up alongside another boat and there was a steep gangplank with low headroom, but with difficulty and hitting our packs on the roof we reached the other deck. The exit from this other boat was on to the dock, but through a gap only 1 metre high, up a plank with wooden bars to stop you sliding back down. This was totally impossible with a backpack. There was no headroom. Pete lay down and was pulled up the plank, then Barb crawled out on hands and knees. Hands heaved her back on to her feet the other side. Some passengers would have been the wrong side of 80, and with walking sticks. Long live boat travel Brazilean style !
5 of us negotiated for a taxi and headed off to the guide book rock-bottom hotel. Luxury it is not, but at 27R we cannot expect much, and the bathrooms are clean and stink-free and our room has a window. The market is close and a fellow cooked dorado for us. After all that horrid beef, fish was a luxury. The old dock buildings have been done up as an upmarket shopping complex where Pete and Karin tried some of the local brew, Amazon Red and Amazon Black. The black smelt like Guinness. We finished off with an ice cream cone, Brazil Coffee flavour. It was at the Adelaide price but delicious.
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