Historical/Background Info:
Manaus, the “Paris of the Jungle”, is the capital of Brazil’s state of Amazonas. It is by far the largest and most populous city in the Amazon rainforest with a population of over 2.5 million. The Solimoes and Negro rivers meet here in Manaus and join to form the Amazon River. As you will see in my photos, many river boats are loading both supplies and people that will be taken on up to smaller villages along the tributaries of the river. I can only imagine what living conditions are like further up river.
The colonization of Manaus began back in 1499 when the Spanish discovered the mouth of the Amazon River. The Portuguese built a fort here in the mid 1600’s and it functioned for more than 100 years. In the late 1800’s Manuas was at the center of the Amazon’s rubber boom. The rubber barons were very rich and spent their money on extravagant things. One was the “Teatro Amazonas” or now called the Amazonas Opera House. Now fully restored, it was inaugurated in 1896 and seats 700. It was constructed of bricks brought from Europe, French glass, and Italian marble. It is truly beautiful!!
All good things must and did come to an end when some British citizens smuggled out some rubber tree seeds. The seeds were planted in Malaysia in the early 1900’s and within a few years rubber was being produced less expensively there. Manaus’s rubber industry died.
The Brazilian government made Manaus a duty free zone which stimulated the economy and attracted tourism. Today it is a center for ecotourism and biology tours. Also important to today’s economy is Brazil nuts, oil refining, soap manufacturing, electronics, and chemical industries.
The Port of Manaus is located right downtown on the banks of the Negro River. It is the commercial center for ocean going shipping. This is as far up river as these ships can go. The river boats I mentioned earlier take supplies up river (and bring goods back down river) from here. This is bustling port with lots of action.
What We Did Today:
We are docked here for two days. This port is one of the highlights of our cruise. Only problem is, again, it is very hot and very humid. Afternoon thunderstorms here can be torrential downpours. Yesterday we were told that we would be at "the Meeting of the Waters" at 7:00 am today so I was up and went up on deck 12 to take photos of it. When I got up there they said we were running late due to stronger than normal river currents. So had to wait over a half hour. You will see it in today's photos. I came back down to the suite at 8:00 am and watched our sail in from the balcony. The police boat following us in made noise so I could not hear Terry Breen's commentary as she pointed out sights. At lunch there were some customs officials and our port agent having lunch so I went over and told them I did not appreciate the police boat.
Our breakfast showed up exactly at 8:30 as usual. It took our Captain until after 9:00 to get docked so the tours departed ship 30 minutes later than scheduled. Over 500 were going on tours this morning. We only have 600 passengers now.
There is a port shuttle that takes us from the ship to the cruise terminal so I took it at 10:30. I wanted to just walk around on my own and take some photos. I think you will enjoy them. I went to one place no tour will be going. It was a small fish market right on bank of the river and next to some of the many river boats. I also visited the Mercado Adolpho Lisboa (market). It was built in 1880 and recently restored. Now it is a very lovely place with many stalls selling everything. Since it is Sunday, many were closed. There was a meat market and fish market on each end. I left there as wanted to get some photos of a large cathedral. It had a metal wall all around it as it was being restored. Had a hard time getting photo of it, sorry. Before long it started sprinkling so I headed back to the cruise terminal. It started raining just as I crossed the street to terminal. I had an umbrella in my back pocket because I know weather changes often here.
I was back on the ship at 11;30 and Rebecca was still doing her workout. The rain shower last about 30 minutes and sun broke through clouds. Now 2:30 and will be raining again soon. We met Susanne up in La Veranda to do a "burger day". We all had hamburgers which are soooooo good here on the ship.
This evening at 5:00 there is a local group, "Grupo Imbauba", coming aboard to do a show for us. It is billed as, "The Sounds of the Amazon Rainforest". We heard them back in 2012 and it was a fantastic show. So we will be going again. Tonight we will be dining in Compass Rose with Captain Serena and our social hostess, Caron. There is no late show this evening because some people are going on a night tour to see caiman (type of alligator) and some have bought tickets to attend a concert at the beautiful Manaus Opera House. They will be showing a movie, "The King's Speech", in the showroom. Tomorrow I have an 8:30 am tour, "Rubber Museum & Indian Community".
Here is the link to the over 100 photos I took:
https://goo.gl/photos/QQXhBKu8FhRaYDA98
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