Heart of the Amazon

After surviving the roads that led us out of Guyana, we crossed over the border and found ourselves back in Brazil. From here, it was a relatively short journey on tarmac roads that led us into Manaus. Lots of people have heard about the city of Manaus – it is built on the banks of the Amazon – it was the centre of the rubber boom, one hundred years ago but it is most famous for its theatre – built slap bang in the middle of the jungle but still able to attract world class acts in its heyday. There is often opera or ballet being shown and you can go for theatre tours. When we were there however, they were showing something far better. It was The Lion King.
We put on our glad rags and went to watch a Brazilian version of the show. Most songs were in Portuguese but occasionally they sang in English! Those songs must have been too much trouble to translate. From our boxes in the gods, we were able to see the spectacular ceiling close up. I really enjoyed the show but even better was to come. Afterwards all the cast came into the foyer to meet the audience and take photos with them. They should do this in England!
It was carnival time whilst we were in Manaus and we did all go to a few bloc parties – these are street parties with stages set up and different performers performing. You have to pay entrance fees to get into all these areas. One night the entire group got partied up – ie we were completely covered in glitter, grass skirts, wings, carnival masks etc. Unfortunately we missed the parade floats at the sambadrone (that was on a different night) but we did all dance to extremely loud Brazilian music.
It was in Manaus that we hit the logistical problem. Originally our truck trip was to go through Venezuela. It was clear over a year ago that the truck would not be able to enter due to the civil unrest that has devastated the country. That left the problem of how to get from Guyana or Amazonion Brazil into Colombia. The only solution was to separate from the truck. The passengers would take a boat up the Amazon from Manaus to the Colombian border and then fly up to Cartagena. Unfortunately the truck could not do the same route as us as quite simply there are no roads out of Manuas (only rivers) and if they truck did make it to the same Colombian border we were heading too, then it would get stuck there too because there are no main roads for 800km around the border town of Leticia. In this part of the world it is all waterways. The only solution was for Bob and driver Paul to take a cargo ferry down river, practically to Cusco in Peru. He would then have to drive all the way through Peru, Ecuador and Colombia and hopefully meet up with us in Cartagena. Oh yes and cargo ferries go even slower than passenger boats. The cargo boat was going to take 10 days and the entire journey was going to be at least 21 days. So on the 2nd March, Paul drove off to board his ferry and left us all wondering if we would ever see him or Bob again!