Riding the coast of Brazil - Belem to Sao Luis

Sorry for the very long delay since my last blog post.  Life has been in the way.. changing countries, changing continents!!

Backtracking again to Brazil, this is a post starting from Belem where we disembarked from our 4 day journey on the Amazon River.  We met another Brazilian rider on our Amazon boat who will ride with us for a bit and we are now traveling south along the Brazilian coast. 

Still close to the equator it is very HOT, HOT, HOT!!!!!

I was tempted... very very tempted, to pull this guy over. Do you know why?  If you've been to Brazil you'd know..! That's the beer truck (uh hum.. I mean beer bike), SKOL!!  I bet it's cold too. How good is that?!

I am so upset to report about the photo below with the horse.  I took 4 photos and what was interesting is this young guy was cooling down and bathing his horse. (Which I thought was nice.. yet odd at the same time!) He was quite the naked boy and he wasn't so shy to keep his parts below the water line!! And I had a photo that probably wouldn't be appropriate to show anyway, but it went missing from my camera!!! Urgh!

We desperately needed to pull over for a cool drink and a little break in the shade ourselves.  If one of us passes out due to the heat, there are plenty of vultures waiting to finish you off.

This was our shaded part of the break and I didn't realize until we had our drink that it's where the Moto taxi's come to pick up passengers.. I hope we didn't disappoint anyone! ;-)

You know if you can't bear to wear shoes while riding, you'd go for the flip-flops, right?  Nah.. the flip-flops are nicely hanging off the mirrors, because they can be a bit hot too (?) So why not ride barefoot.  I saw this so often, I finally took a photo of it. But he does get points for the helmet.

After an over night stop, James wanted to attach a little pet tiger to my bike.. too cute!

This is the look of feeling very proud and accomplished of zip-tie work.. ;-)

A big thing you can't avoid in all of Brazil is loud speakers spewing all kinds of things.. If it wasn't for the music, they are being much used to promote the upcoming political election. So we get double speaker duty!  And I was most drawn to how innovative the people are with what THEY want us to HEAR!!!!!

The speaker up the post is not so unusual... the big speaker on top of the car is doing the job.. so loud!

The speaker on the bicycle?  So important..

A speaker that takes up the entire truck.. now we're listening!!!!  Urgh, I wish I didn't have to!!!

We sort of came to the end of the road where we needed to take a ferry to continue on to Sao Luis, Brazil.  Here our friend said his goodbye's while James and I boarded the ferry.

Catching the ferry late in the day made for a beautiful sunset.

James donated the black and white photo he took on the ride.. with my new Amazonian $5 sunglasses.

There was a man speaking to me on the boat about motorcycles in Portuguese.  I was understanding bits and pieces, but not a full conversation.  However, I kept hearing the world "azul", which means blue in Spanish, so I assumed the same for Portuguese.  And then he'd mention Tenere.  One thing I know, is most of the Yamaha Tenere's I see on the road are blue, so I must be on the right track. And then I think I understood that he has one and want's us to follow him once we get off the ferry.  When we arrive Sao Luis, it's quite a large city.  So I think he just wants to help us navigate getting out.

And sure enough, when we left the boat there was a blue Tenere waiting for the man (his son driving) and they motioned for us to follow them.

The traffic was ridiculous, so I really appreciated that.  They ended up driving us home! 

So it turned out this guy was part of a motorcycle club and he just happens to have a spare house across the street from the house he lives in..  He invited us to stay in the spare house as long as we want!

He was so nice and so keen to have us there and encourage us to go explore his city, particularly the historic old town.  Sao Luis was founded by the French, taken over by the Dutch and eventually fell under Portuguese rule.  With those tiled walls, I would have only guessed Portuguese, not French.

Don't ask me how I'm understanding our Portuguese host enough, but he also told us about a place where we can ride on the beach.. so we went there next!

Don't tell anyone but we did stop at a little table to enjoy sharing a beer with our bikes.  Very cool...

 As you can see, it's just normal!

Our host is a Professor of Veterinary Medicine.  He also happens to enjoy raising the Siamese Fighting Fish for sale.

Early in the morning he takes me through his back garden where all the little ponds are set up for different colors of fighting fish.  From the time they are just little specs of moving objects, to the time they are ready to be separated into their own little jar.

Then we head into the garage where he wants to change my front tire for me.  I've been carrying a new tire since Cusco Peru, just in case I needed it in the Amazon.  My old one wasn't quite ready to change then, but it is now!  Going with the TKC 80 again on the front.

We planned to pack up and leave today but the motorcycle club called Animais do Asfalto (Animals of Asphalt) is gathering and invited us for a day ride.  We didn't see any problem to have an extra day out and enjoy Brazilian biker culture, so we said yes!

Look where they snuck the loud speakers in this time... on a boat!  So all of us can be sure to enjoy the same music that they want to hear while we have a look at the river below.. woo hoo!

On our way out to this park area, I heard a loud clank on my bike and a bump which really scared me so I pulled over.  What the heck was that?

I'm having a look around the bike, thinking the chain broke, a pannier fell off, I don't know!  James said he was following behind me and it was just a piece of trash I ran over, he saw it.  I said, "that is so strange. I thoroughly don't remember seeing any trash big enough to cause me to unknowingly hit hard so much that it would startle me!"  He said, "Yeah yeah, don't worry about it".. So I got back on my bike and left.

When we were stopped, I was still puzzled and annoyed, and finally figured out what it was.  My bash plate was missing!  I ride enough rough roads, that I need that thing!  I'm going to have to go back and find it.  There is no way I want to order another one way down to Brazil.  I wish I had trusted my instincts and known that it wasn't just a piece of trash that I hit.  Now I have to do my best to figure out where on the road about 30 minutes back did I loose the plate.  Everybody in the club wanted to help me look though, so I feel the hope!

And sure enough, a husband and wife in the group eventually saw it after our 3rd swipe over the area.. thank goodness!

The boys got to work straight way on returning home to put it back in the proper shape to protect my engine.  They did a great job.. good as new! Thank you!!

I get a chuckle out of the faces men make when hammering.  ;-)

See ya!

Manaus to Belem - Cruising the Amazon River

Welcome to the heart of the Amazon, Manaus! The largest city in northern Brazil with around 1.85 million people.  It was hard work getting here on a motorcycle, I can tell ya!  So we plan to take a break for a couple days.

The largest reason Manaus is here is due to the all important rubber industry.

A view of days gone by and wealth that used to be prominent in this remote part of the world.  I expected the Amazonian city to be quite rough, hot and humid.. not stylish and wealthy!

I like this bit of write up from Wikipedia below:

"Manaus was at the center of the Amazon region's rubber boom during the late 19th century. For a time, it was "one of the gaudiest cities of the world^" One historian has written, "No extravagance, however absurd, deterred" the rubber barons. "If one rubber baron bought a vast yacht, another would install a tame lion in his villa, and a third would water his horse on champagne." The decadence extended to a grand opera house, vast domes and gilded balconies, and marble, glass, and crystal, from around Europe. The opera house cost ten million (public-funded) dollars, but its foolhardiness was demonstrated by the death by yellow fever of half the members of one visiting opera troupe.

When the seeds of the rubber tree were smuggled out of the Amazon region, Brazil lost its monopoly on the product and Manaus fell into poverty. The rubber boom had brought electricity to the city before it arrived in many European cities, but the end of the rubber boom made the generators too expensive to run, and the city lost artificial lighting for years."

We took a couple days off in Manaus to allow James ankle to heal, to drink as much water as possible and fill up on Pizza and beer.. as well as the best Vegetarian restaurant we've found to date.  Life is good again.  I even got my tank bag zipper replaced!  That thing has been broken since Bolivia!

I loved finding this guy.  With the stereotypical hat, slow turning ceiling fan, a low raspy voice, gold chains and long fingernails, he did a great job on my Touratech bag.

Our next plan is to go shopping for a boat.  We can continue riding a ridiculously difficult roads through the Amazon, or we can get on a boat to takes us the length of it.  This appealed to us both.  For me, it has been a dream to experience the famous Amazon River.

This wall marker at the port shows the water levels each year... and check out the level for 2012!!  (top right corner). Hard to tell by my photo, but that put the water level over the walkway and into the shops.

We found a boat quite quickly, bargained a super good price with the captain, and we left the very next day.

When we show up to the dock.. these guys in blue shirts come and and took my bike out of my hands to load it.  They are going so fast, I'm like.. wait! Wait!!

Don't you dare drop that bike in the river Buster Brown.. I'm feeling very out of control.

They did load our bikes quickly and without flaw.  And then came up to me and asked for $300 USD..!!!! I actually laughed, they can't be serious. "Si, $150 per bike Senora."  Ain't gonna happen.  If you wanted hundreds of dollars to load our bikes you should have made the deal BEFORE you took them out of our hands.  We thought these men were the crew for the boat. Since there is no loading ramp, I assumed they were just doing their job. As they followed us around the boat demanding money, I continued to argue.  I finally gave them $20 to shut them up.  No, Senora!  "Okay... $200."  "I'm not paying it, take your 20 or leave it!" They finally gave up and walked away, thank goodness.  I hate that.

And the boat quickly departs Manaus.

The journey will be four days long, so we made friends with our fellow passengers.  I found this young guy snooping around the bikes.  And when I talked to him, I found out he is married.  He looks like he's 10!  He's actually a whopping 17 years old, however, he's already celebrated his 2 year wedding anniversary.  "So how old is your wife?"  She is 15, and they have a 1 1/2 year old son.  Wow...

Life on the Amazon River is fascinating to watch. 

You can get to where you need to go, AND do your laundry at the same time. I wish I could do that sometimes.. ;-)

We make several stops to small river towns along the way.  The passengers change, the crew load and unload deliveries.. this is the super highway for goods!

I prefer to stick around while they work the loads.. just to be sure a little KTM doesn't get mistakenly unloaded!

I have always said since I stepped foot in Brazil, that the people are strikingly beautiful. Case and point. I'm so disappointed this photo came out a little blurry, because Lord...... have...... MERCY!! 

Unfortunately this guy didn't get loaded on to our boat! ;-((

The way to travel on the Amazon is in your hammock! However, we chose one of only 4 cabins with bunk beds.  Bring-your-own hammock travel is super cheap as you can imagine, but it was more important for us to be able to lock up our cameras and computers.  It's quite common for thieves to take your things while passing a hammock just as they are about to get off the boat. 

The Amazon is super hot.. and we do tend to get a bit bored.. So we found a bit of relief at the next stop.

Beer!!  And lots of it!  Kevin would have been proud...! (We're not totally sure where the Swiss backpacker got her modeling skills.. but otherwise we had a fairly successful break from the boat!) And I found I speak Portuguese much better when on beer ;-)

The boat carries on... 

We stopped into another town and I couldn't help but to be mezmerized by that super size cloud.

Of which it did bucket down some serious rain once we reached it by boat..

The photo with the church is sunrise.. however, the sunsets are very nice on the Amazon too!

On board, I spent most of my time with this kid, Rudi.  He always always had a smile and would hang out with me so often.  I'm not sure why really, curious about the crazy lady who speaks English?

 

His mother had 2 smaller children, and Rudi was always yelled at from far away to take care of them.. but when he had time to come back, he would talk to me in Portuguese. Sometimes I understood a bit, sometimes I didn't.  But it didn't matter to him, he would just smile. I've never seen such a content (tranquila) happy kid, even amongst his chores with the younger ones. He showed me a great trick for eating the Castanhas (Brazil nuts). We would put one under the leg of a chair and sat on the chair to crack the shell.. the fresh castanhas are the best!  Such a cool kid.

It's been a long 4 day journey.  We arrived our destination on the east coast of Brazil, the city of Belem, during the night.  They threw up a couple of planks of wood to have us and the two remaining trucks manage to unload ourselves in the dark.  I couldn't believe it was possible and I didn't want to take a chance with my bike dropping into the drink.  But we did it.. as usual, it's all part of the adventure.  They needed us to do it right then, right there, because in an hour, the water level will be too low from the ocean tide.

Once the sun came up, we packed up the bikes to start our journey south.  Bom dia!!