We are seriously enjoying our time in Brazil - we have no schedule, we are incredibly relaxed, we wake up whenever we wake up, go to sleep when we cannot keep our eyes open any longer, and just enjoy our surroundings. I can't say that we are doing anything productive or meaningful, but we are the most relaxed we have been the entire trip. It's an amazing feeling to literally not have a care in the world. I hope you all can enjoy this feeling at one time or another in your life :)
Our ride into Jeri
Welcome to Brasil!
Beach in Jeri
Donkeys Donkeys Everywhere!!!
Boats on the beach in Jeri
Dunes!
Footprints in the sand
Loving Life. Everyday.
Making our own path
I wonder where the mommy bird is...
The main road in Jeri
Sunset in Jeri
After spending eight days in Jeri we decided to head to another beach known for its red dunes and wind! We took an awful five hour bus in the middle of the night and arrived early in the morning. However, we stumbled across an amazing Pousada (hotel) with a pool, an amazing breakfast, A/C, and a comfortable bed. We crashed for a few hours and were good as new! As a treat to ourselves we had our first Brazilian rodizio (aka all you can eat meat), I think we decided that Scott ate almost a pound of steak! I am pretty sure we got our moneys worth :)
We spent the next 3 days swimming in the pool and kitesurfing at the beach with some friends we met from Argentina. It turns out that no one speaks Spanish or English in Brazil so we end up speaking some form of Span-guese, Spanish/Portuguese!- which is funny but not easy. I am constantly accidentally saying Mucho Obrigado (Mucho being Spanish and Obrigado being Portuguese), which always gets a laugh....
The red cliffs of Canoa
View from our hotel
Scott kitesurfing in Canoa
Sunset at the same spot
After Canoa Quebrada we decided to head further South to Praia de Pipa. It is yet another gorgeous beach spot. We are camping above Praia de Amor, the beach of love!, with these beautiful cliffs leading to the sea. Our first morning here we were eating breakfast when all of a sudden a monkey popped up right next to us. We fed him some bananas and before we knew it we had many monkey friends and no more bananas :) Tomorrow we are heading to swim with the dolphins and maybe do some surfing in the afternoon....
We will post more pics of Pipa when we get a chance... but for now here are a couple of my favorites.
Feeding our new monkey friends...
Two feet from our tent... I love this guy!
Praia de Amor... we are camping on the cliffs above this amazing beach
And yet again we have spectacular sunsets here as well... I won't ever get sick of these!
We FINALLY made it to Brasil!!!! Scott and I have both wanted to visit
Brasil since we were in high school.... and we are soo glad we finally
made it! After our adventure down the Amazon we took 2 flights, a 7
hour bus ride, and a 2 hour buggy ride to get to the infamous
Jericoacoara. This is a magical place with sand dunes right on the
edge of the water and sunsets that rival anything we've seen in months.
We have spent days relaxing on the beach, walking along the water and
the dunes, and of course kitesurfing! We have met some amazing people
and drank way too many caphirinias. I mean, how can you say no to a
$1.75 for a drink?!? ... I have a feeling we are going to love this
country!
Just like Antarctica....Sunset on the dunes
Capoeira Circle.... Its part martial arts part dance, amazing
On May 30, 2012, Scott and Lisa Zengel were taken aboard the MS Bandeirante II as Prisoners of the Amazon. The sentence was for four days with 197 other Brazilians and Columbians, moving from Tabatinga, Brazil to Manaus, Brazil in the heart of the Amazon.
Our four day jail
The jail kitchen
Our jail cell...
The mess hall
Rice and beans...every single day for lunch and dinner...for four days. YUM. ha.
Luckily, Scott and Lisa were released on June 2, 2012 in Manaus, Brazil with no major injuries, only bloated bellies and sore backs from spending four days in hammocks!
So I
somehow convinced Lisa that we wanted a bit more of a cultural experience (just
being in the Amazon wasn`t enough!), and our guide said he could arrange an
overnight stay with a local indigenous family. He told us that the family lived
in a small community of only a few houses on a beautiful lake, and that the
accommodations were pretty good. They even had an over-the-water bungalow that
we could stay in. Done.
Pedro (our
guide) whisked us away mid-afternoon, and the adventure was on. After a 45 minute
boat ride up the Amazon we were dropped off at a small dock with noone around.
Of course, Pedro isn’t much of an over-communicator, so we were left to wonder
what the heck was going to happen next. He explained to us that this indigenous
community identifies themselves by “clan”. Check out the side of the house…they
are the “ant” (“hormigas” in espanol) clan…hilarious.
"Over-the-water bungalow"...just like Tahiti!!
So we make
it over from dock to the local house and Pedro doesn`t say a word about what is
going to happen next. This family`s house is more than basic. They are very
poor, with literally the bare necessities in the house, ie: “kitchen” – indoor
area to cook, made of a barbecue (with no ventilation) and the
kitchen/multi-purpose table. This room also doubled as the only other room in
the house other than the bedroom (where both parents and all three kids sleep).
Oh, and there is NO BATHROOM. So Lisa and I are wondering…where the heck are we
going to sleep?? In the kitchen/main room, because there are no beds…? While we
are waiting for something to happen we just played with the kids, they wanted
us to go swimming in the Amazon with them, but we thought better of it
(piranhas!?!)
All of a
sudden Pedro shows up again and asks us if we want to sleep in here or another
house that actually has a bathroom. Of course, we chose the one with a
bathroom. We get rowed over to this second house (our "over-the-water
bungalow"), which is completely soaked everywhere. I gathered that while they
weren’t communicating anything to us (and we were playing with the kids) they cleaned out this spare “bungalow” because it had been flooded by the river
water. Perfect, we have our own little room, life is good, right?
Our deluxe accomodations...notice the mosquito net...
Great view from the side of the river
Sunset from our cabana...pretty beautiful
By now it`s
dinner time. Pedro had told us before we left that they do a ton of fishing here, so
we`re excited for a great fish dinner. He then mentions that the family just
got back today from visiting another community, and there is no food for
dinner! Obviously it`s not like you can just go to the store here…we are in a
community of a few houses, on stilts, in the middle of the Amazon, with no
running water or electricity. The nearest big town is a 45 minute boat ride
away. What the heck?? Luckily, they scrounge up some eggs and we have eggs,
plantains, and rice for dinner. So, we`re wondering what`s going to happen for
breakfast now…
One of the other
reasons we went on this adventure is to go on a night adventure to spot Caymans
(like crocodiles). After we eat we go back over to our bungalow to pack a few things for the night adventure. Lisa walks into the room and there is a GIANT BLACK TARANTULA sitting on the wall above our pillows on the bed. This thing is HUGE. She asks me if it is a joke, as if someone planted it there to scare her. This thing is huge, black, and very furry. I kind of thought it looked like a teddy bear. Anyway, remember, Lisa is deathly afraid of spiders (anyone remember Costa Rica??). Luckily, the owner hurries in and kills the thing. But this is NOT a good way to start off the night for us.
So, now that the adrenaline is pumping we get in another canoe (this one at least has
a motor) and go on our night adventure. We motor for about 30 minutes, then they cut the motor. Picture this: we are on a canoe in the middle of the Amazon at night, with not one other person around, and a full moon. It was cool and creepy at the same time.
All of a sudden our guide starts "calling" the caymans. Yeah, it was hilarious. They actually answered him too. After about three hours of cruising around looking for these things we finally catch one (I got to hold it, it was awesome!).
Cayman numero uno
After we catch the first Cayman the local guys tells us that his kids love to eat Cayman, and do we want to keep it? Of course, what are we going to say? This family is poor and there is no food in the house.
Cayman breakfast numero uno!
To be honest, it was pretty tasty though...even if it was for breakfast.
So we tucked in for the night underneath the mosquito net (thankfully we had this, there were all sorts of creepy crawlies that night!). We wake up first thing in the morning and are greeted to this on the wall:
This should keep the tarantulas away!
At least it was a beautiful day the next day. I think we were both pretty happy to be leaving this "local" indigenous experience. I guess there are just some things that sound better than they actually are. There is no question that we did learn a bit...we got to experience the local family`s everyday life, and the other saving grace was that the money we paid for the experience went directly to the family, and hopefully that will make a small difference for them.
View from the window of our over-the-water bungalow
The ride back to "civilization"...away from the crazy bungalow!
Lisa
and I met up with our guide, Pedro, who walked us to a small house behind the
giant communications antenna. Of course, we were wondering what the heck was
going to happen next…and we were treated to an AMAZING local breakfast. Imagine
chickens running around = fresh eggs, hot chocolate ground from fresh cacao
trees in the yard, plantains (delicious!), and fresh tropical fruit.
This is freshly ground chocolate. YUM!
After
the hospitality of our new friends and breakfast, we headed off for our first
Amazon adventure…PINK DOLPHINS. We hopped in a very very small canoe made out of a cut down jungle
tree, and off we went. The first part of the adventure was navigating our small
canoe across the Amazon and into the submerged jungle (this time of year the
waters are literally 30 feet
higher than normal because of the rainy season). Just imagine slowly paddling through the jungle with branches overhanging, fallen trees, and spiders jumping on the boat
because we`re inside the swampy jungle. Supposedly this is where the anacondas live, but we didn't see any, thank god because they are up to 45 feet long...and they really like to cuddle!
The submerged jungle
The normal jungle
We finally made it out of the jungle and into a huge open lagoon. After
picking off the branches and spiders from our clothes, Pedro starting making
some odd dolphin call and literally 3 minutes later we had both pink and
gray dolphins swimming around us. They are a little prehistoric
looking, but are incredibly smart and so interested in people! After I
almost tipped the boat over because I was too giddy with excitement,
Pedro told us that we could SWIM with the dolphins. We thought about it
for about 2 seconds (there are piranhas in the water...) and then
convinced Pedro to jump in first... and off we went!!! We could see the
bubbles of them all around us and there were hundreds of dolphins
everywhere. I just wish the water was clear so I could have seen them
swimming. So amazing!!
(Okay, we don`t have the good camera anymore so you may have to zoom in to see them...)
After our dolphin high we tried to do a little piranha fishing, with no
luck and then started our journey back to Puerto Narino. We were
greeted at the dock with a fresh fish lunch & of course, rice and
beans :)
