Manaus to Belem via ferry: riding the Amazon to the east coast of Brazil.
Manaus population 1.6 million people. Belem population 1.3 million people.
This is a major shipping route for the Amazon and there are many stops along the way, which in part makes this a long journey.
We arrived in Manaus around 10:00am to ensure we had plenty of time to find the correct ferry plus Brent was determined to try and find a ship that left that night.
Brent did a fabulous job driving into the city and straight to the shipping docs with no real map and the GPS is never any help in a major centre as it is a general world map (not one specific to Brazil). Although one thing we had on our side was common sense. We did know that the shipping docs had to be on the Amazon River which should basically be straight a head of where we entered the city and according to the foot prints book it was part of or very close to the city centre.
One good thing about Brazil is for the most part the next city is marked along the highway, the city centre, and the airports are all well marked. Mind you nothing else, such as street names within the city, highway numbers or highway names and forget local addresses. good luck chuck
Anyway I had only been riding for two days on the bike (still with my cast on) so we parked a street over from the docks and Brent went out to find out more info on the boat.
There are signs up that state the classes of boats (the best boat is the Amazon Star). After talking with a few locals, that is if you can call it talking when you know maybe 5 words of Portuguese, Brent strikes up a deal where as we would board the boat that day, it was a drive on boat for the bikes, free meals for the journey and we would have a air conditioned cabin instead of a open hammock (the cabin was recommended by everyone that we came across) for 1,110 Real, or $654.00 US or $130.50 a day and that included transportation of the bikes.
So away we went in an attempt to get on the boat early. The guy who Brent did the deal with sees us and then a friend of his comes out and starts to direct us through a slightly hairy ride and a maze of trucks that are cueing up so the can get on to the shipping dock and load their cargo.
We make it to the first check point with the police, he asks for the bike documentation and passports then tries to tell us something else (all that I got out of his conversation was the number 4 and there is another area that we had to stop).Away we go and sure enough we are stopped by a second guy dressed the exact same as the first guy less than 50 feet away where he asks for the same info when all that is complete he says something else and we explain we do not understand, he motions with his fingers for money. Brent thinks he is asking for a bribe and tells the guy no, he the motions for us to take a hike and go back to where we started. We then attempt to drive onto the docs and he stops us eventually 3 other guys come out a a building and one was able to communicate with me that there is a $40 Real or $23 US doc fee for the two of us. 
It all makes sense we pay and then the guy who was directing us through the maze of vehicles is waiting for us as we enter the main docs and motions us over to our boat.
Now things get a little interesting.
Upon our arrival there are 5 men standing around and there are no loading ramps for the bikes. Brent explains to our new guide that his coworker the guy who sold us the tickets was told and reassured us there was drive on. Simply the answer is no. We take the entire luggage off the bikes while the men place a broken pallet from the dock which is higher by about 2.5 feet than the boat.
The first bike is taken by the guy who has shown us the way through, Brent and two other guys. This was quite the sight as the bike is much heavier and taller than they are used to so coming down the board Brent’s bike does not quite clear and hits the top of his mirror plus the guy who had the handle bars smashes his face into the boat as he tries to squeeze the brakes to prevent it from getting out of control. Brent hurries down and takes over from inside the boat. Second time is a charm and my bike goes down much better. Once on the ship they explain that they would like to lower the bikes into the ships holding cargo area about 20 feet down via ropes. We tell them no we would like to tie them in place on the main cargo deck. Eventually after going back and forth Brent says well I guess you will do what you want anyway.
They assist with getting the luggage up two decks t our cabin. While I am inside they corner Brent and want money for helping. After a banter occurs Brent gives one on the boat workers $20 Reals and tells the other guy (who was being over pushy) to go back to his co worker friend and collect as the trip was to be a roll on/roll off as sold and who knows what is awaiting us in Belem; pissed off he leaves (he was an asshole) and the boat worker shakes Brent’s hand.
We arrange our tight little cabin,
change and order up a few beers. We had read the boat leaves at 6 pm so we try and get some food on the main dock, all that is there is deep fried pastries so that will have to do as we were not allowed to leave the docks once we entered. We sat for hours watching the trucks pull up and unload their cargo 
amazed at how much weight was being placed on the boat. 6pm comes and goes we try and ask the bartender when the ship is leaving she says 2 hours, yeah no. Then we ask again we some how get 11pm, ya no. We go to sleep with the door open as it is so hot and muggy. Morning comes and they are still loading cargo by 2 pm people start to arrive on the ship and set up their hammocks, so it appears that we are finally leaving. 3pm we finally set sail, but false alarm, we go 100 yards and dock again
to load more people and to allow the vendors on board were we sit until 6 pm. At this point we have been aboard to 28hrs, so much for leaving that night.
Once we were off it was great. The breeze kept the bugs to a minimum and the heat to a bearable point (although we did have AC in the cabin)
Amazon is very wide about 2 km but by the second last day it narrows to 30 feet wide, just a little tight.
A few of the major high lights were:
ü Sunsets were amazing
At Santarem the yellow Amazon waters swirls along side the green blue Tapajos- the meeting of the waters.
ü There is an area deep in the Amazon where there are a thousand islands, there are passageways through this maze of inlets known as the Narrows and is the nicest part of the journey.
Also in this area all the natives come out in their dugout canoes looking for people to through items overboard to them. People will tie items such as clothing, dish rags, bubble gum, candy etc.. In a plastic bag and then throw it overboard at one of the boats. This can be quite heartbreaking as for the most part there are small children out in these canoes.
Our stops along the way from Manaus to Belem included:
1. Obidos
2. Oriximina
3. Santarem (for 18hrs)
4. Prainha
5. Almeirim
6. Breves
7. Barcarena
Arrival in Belem, good timing it was about 12:00 noon and we could roll the bikes right off the boat-yahoo. We packed up in record time and drove over 1600km in 2.5 days.
5 days down the Amazon river –how many people can say they did that!
Manaus population 1.6 million people. Belem population 1.3 million people.
This is a major shipping route for the Amazon and there are many stops along the way, which in part makes this a long journey.
We arrived in Manaus around 10:00am to ensure we had plenty of time to find the correct ferry plus Brent was determined to try and find a ship that left that night.
Brent did a fabulous job driving into the city and straight to the shipping docs with no real map and the GPS is never any help in a major centre as it is a general world map (not one specific to Brazil). Although one thing we had on our side was common sense. We did know that the shipping docs had to be on the Amazon River which should basically be straight a head of where we entered the city and according to the foot prints book it was part of or very close to the city centre.
One good thing about Brazil is for the most part the next city is marked along the highway, the city centre, and the airports are all well marked. Mind you nothing else, such as street names within the city, highway numbers or highway names and forget local addresses. good luck chuck
Anyway I had only been riding for two days on the bike (still with my cast on) so we parked a street over from the docks and Brent went out to find out more info on the boat.
There are signs up that state the classes of boats (the best boat is the Amazon Star). After talking with a few locals, that is if you can call it talking when you know maybe 5 words of Portuguese, Brent strikes up a deal where as we would board the boat that day, it was a drive on boat for the bikes, free meals for the journey and we would have a air conditioned cabin instead of a open hammock (the cabin was recommended by everyone that we came across) for 1,110 Real, or $654.00 US or $130.50 a day and that included transportation of the bikes.
So away we went in an attempt to get on the boat early. The guy who Brent did the deal with sees us and then a friend of his comes out and starts to direct us through a slightly hairy ride and a maze of trucks that are cueing up so the can get on to the shipping dock and load their cargo.
We make it to the first check point with the police, he asks for the bike documentation and passports then tries to tell us something else (all that I got out of his conversation was the number 4 and there is another area that we had to stop).Away we go and sure enough we are stopped by a second guy dressed the exact same as the first guy less than 50 feet away where he asks for the same info when all that is complete he says something else and we explain we do not understand, he motions with his fingers for money. Brent thinks he is asking for a bribe and tells the guy no, he the motions for us to take a hike and go back to where we started. We then attempt to drive onto the docs and he stops us eventually 3 other guys come out a a building and one was able to communicate with me that there is a $40 Real or $23 US doc fee for the two of us. It all makes sense we pay and then the guy who was directing us through the maze of vehicles is waiting for us as we enter the main docs and motions us over to our boat.Now things get a little interesting.
Upon our arrival there are 5 men standing around and there are no loading ramps for the bikes. Brent explains to our new guide that his coworker the guy who sold us the tickets was told and reassured us there was drive on. Simply the answer is no. We take the entire luggage off the bikes while the men place a broken pallet from the dock which is higher by about 2.5 feet than the boat.
The first bike is taken by the guy who has shown us the way through, Brent and two other guys. This was quite the sight as the bike is much heavier and taller than they are used to so coming down the board Brent’s bike does not quite clear and hits the top of his mirror plus the guy who had the handle bars smashes his face into the boat as he tries to squeeze the brakes to prevent it from getting out of control. Brent hurries down and takes over from inside the boat. Second time is a charm and my bike goes down much better. Once on the ship they explain that they would like to lower the bikes into the ships holding cargo area about 20 feet down via ropes. We tell them no we would like to tie them in place on the main cargo deck. Eventually after going back and forth Brent says well I guess you will do what you want anyway.
They assist with getting the luggage up two decks t our cabin. While I am inside they corner Brent and want money for helping. After a banter occurs Brent gives one on the boat workers $20 Reals and tells the other guy (who was being over pushy) to go back to his co worker friend and collect as the trip was to be a roll on/roll off as sold and who knows what is awaiting us in Belem; pissed off he leaves (he was an asshole) and the boat worker shakes Brent’s hand.We arrange our tight little cabin,
change and order up a few beers. We had read the boat leaves at 6 pm so we try and get some food on the main dock, all that is there is deep fried pastries so that will have to do as we were not allowed to leave the docks once we entered. We sat for hours watching the trucks pull up and unload their cargo amazed at how much weight was being placed on the boat. 6pm comes and goes we try and ask the bartender when the ship is leaving she says 2 hours, yeah no. Then we ask again we some how get 11pm, ya no. We go to sleep with the door open as it is so hot and muggy. Morning comes and they are still loading cargo by 2 pm people start to arrive on the ship and set up their hammocks, so it appears that we are finally leaving. 3pm we finally set sail, but false alarm, we go 100 yards and dock again to load more people and to allow the vendors on board were we sit until 6 pm. At this point we have been aboard to 28hrs, so much for leaving that night.Once we were off it was great. The breeze kept the bugs to a minimum and the heat to a bearable point (although we did have AC in the cabin)
Amazon is very wide about 2 km but by the second last day it narrows to 30 feet wide, just a little tight.A few of the major high lights were:
ü Sunsets were amazing
At Santarem the yellow Amazon waters swirls along side the green blue Tapajos- the meeting of the waters.
ü There is an area deep in the Amazon where there are a thousand islands, there are passageways through this maze of inlets known as the Narrows and is the nicest part of the journey.
Also in this area all the natives come out in their dugout canoes looking for people to through items overboard to them. People will tie items such as clothing, dish rags, bubble gum, candy etc.. In a plastic bag and then throw it overboard at one of the boats. This can be quite heartbreaking as for the most part there are small children out in these canoes. Our stops along the way from Manaus to Belem included:
1. Obidos
2. Oriximina
3. Santarem (for 18hrs)
4. Prainha
5. Almeirim
6. Breves
7. Barcarena
Arrival in Belem, good timing it was about 12:00 noon and we could roll the bikes right off the boat-yahoo. We packed up in record time and drove over 1600km in 2.5 days.
5 days down the Amazon river –how many people can say they did that!
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