Memories

I'm currently going through aaaall the Brazil pictures to make the selection for our trip's album... Seems like it might take awhile. I'm currently at day 4.

Day 4 was our second day in Ariau Towers in the Amazon. We were zooming around on a little wooden boat on the Rio Negro, enjoying the sun and marveling at the immensity of the Amazon forest. I remember we talked about how we can't even gauge how enormous the Amazon is without flying over it. Too bad both our Amazon flights were during the night. I guess we'll have to go back...

the Amazon, part I

Time for some more pictures of the Amazon! These are of our first two days there, the first in Manaus, the second in Ariaú, in the middle of the forest.

Fresh fish at the fishmarket by the banks of the Rio Negro. Beauties, aren't they?

O encontro das águas, the place where the Black River (Rio Negro) and the Solimões river meet to form the Amazon river. Both rivers have different temperatures, speeds and chemical compositions, so the water doesn't mix instantaneously, producing this bizarre phenomenon.


Medicin made of snake oil at the market. Cures everything including cancer (says the lady).

Relaxing the the Hotel Tropical. A nice change of pace at 35 degrees Celsius.

Arriving at the Ariaú hotel, in the middle of the forest.

All transportation is done by boat. Kobe and I were lucky and had a guide and boatsman assigned just to the two of us. If we'd chosen an English-speaking guide, we'd have been stuck with a large group of 10 Americans. Nothing against Americans, but you know.... if you can have a private tour, why not?

Pirana fishing! First catch of the day!

They have mean little teeth.

And at night... pirana soup! It feels very manly somehow to eat what you've caught earlier in the day. The stock is delicious, by the way.

Exploring the jungle. The dark, lower part of the tree, marks how high the river rises in the rainy season.

Lauren, the parrot that visits the hotel every day, to see if anything interesting has been deposited in the garbage cans.

the Amazon, part II

Why yes, why not start with part II? I like to mix things up from time to time; keeps things fresh, don't you think? Ok, the real story is some weird problem with the internet has made photo uploading really slow after these first pics, and I was uploading the pics in reverse chronological order, so basically, now you get the second part of our 4-day stay in the Amazon forest.

This is the Ariaú Tower hotel in the middle of the Amazon forest where we've stayed for 3 days. Basically, it's the view from our room in the Imperial Suite (how we got to stay in the Imperial Suite, long story short: electrical shower in our original room caught fire, I made a poker face at reception and asked for a different room and it better be an upgrade, and boy DID WE GET IT!)

On our private boat with our boat "driver" (what do you call these guys?), Jesus. We were in good hands, obviously.

Our guide, Paulo, climbing an Acaí palmtree.

A native preparing yummy tapioca pancakes for us.

The sunset on the Rio Negro (one of the affluents of the Amazon river).

We went crocodile hunting one night, and Jesus caught a young crocodile (about 0.5m long) with his bare hands to show us). This beauty will grow to be about 1.5 meters long.

Those are some sharp little teeth!

We both held the crocodile, but as always, the boyfriend is the more photogenic of the two of us.

The last day, we went swimming in the Amazon river to meet the pink sweetwater dolphins. Might animals, and such slippery soft skin! Just unreal that we got to be so close to them.

And to top it all, we even tamed a leopard! Ha ha... kidding. There are leopards in the Amazon, but the closest we got to seeing one was this plastic version at the Manaus hotel.

Ok, so I owe you pics of pirana fishing, exploring the forest, and the parrot that paid a visit to the Ariaú hotel (to rummage through our yummy garbage, haha!)