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Published: October 25th 2005
Sandy has had enough
It was another long dayA PS at the start...thats novel...but I cant take responsibility for the pix...dont know what happened but they look shite to me...but its really hot, sweaty and Im meeting my new little friend in 2 mins...so.....read on...
But its not really the Amazon...but it is amazing...its the Rio Negro and the confluence with the Amazon is 20 something kms downstream...
But, back to the start...early start again and off across the deserted sabana...
The road is perfect...lovely new bitumen, long straights and long curves, no one else around...have a bit of a fang to enjoy the newly serviced machinery, cool of the morning air, off to the side the blue outlines of higher tepuis, unbelievable square and straight...the ruins of some giant city..definitely a movie set.....green grassy surface rolls off to each side, occasionaly a fall-off where another river plunges off the edge or just disappears down a bottomless gulch....the jungle below has in places clawed its way to the top and patches of trees cluster around the gullies and ravines.....the whole place is in surprisingly good shape considering there are no mountain cattlemen to look after it (?)....
And then, fangsville again, down the twisting curvery, back to
the flatlands and on to Santa Elena, the last town in Venezuela......we wanted to fill up with the last of the cheap gasoline but uh oh..the only gas station in Sta Elena has a 2-day queue!!..I kid you not!...the Brasilianos come across and take gas back across the border!..oh well, we will be paying top dollar for gas for the rest of the way so we´ll bite the bullet and fill up across the border..
Fabulously straightforward (in a Latino way) to get out of Vene then up the road to Brasil..yellow fever check is the big deal!, then passport stamp...(why was there such a fcuking fuss getting the visa when at the border its all sweetness and light?....) politics!....
Then the bikes are checked in...friendly chica laboriously types all the same details as every other border...at least here she has a computer!...and thats it!!...100 metres down the road theres the currency converter touts...good rate...and the black market gasloine sellers!!...so we get 10 litres each...its about 50 times the Vene price...but less than half the regular Brasil price....cool McGool...and we push on to Boa (constrictor) Vista...another non-event city...but its halfway to Manaus so everyone stops here....
Got a so-so hotel..at
Manaus Waterfront
Another 10 metres of water would make a difference least they have a pool...and a group that had had a conference or something left and we pinched some cakes and drinks from their refreshment lay out!!...hit the street for street tucker..mucho meat....but also fruit!...early night as we´re pretty buggered....feeling just how much we´ve softened up after so long off the bikes....we´re all feeling stiff and a bit sore in different places....
Saturday morning...another early start because there´s a long stretch thru Indian country where you can´t stop along the way.....so its a 780 or so km day!!
Roads are just ok and lots of savage potholes...luckily our bikes handle it all fantastically as usual, and I find my aches in the back disappear when there´s more challenging riding...its the long straights that really start to kill.
One thing to keep us awake is waiting for the equator!...some have said 175 kms others differ...nobody sure...we are well past all expectations and thinking its a no-show when we come to the little town of Equator...small sign, nearly falling over...the boys are falling over themselves to take another 500 pix...but we are here!Surprising lack of anything more formal, permanent..as an old surveyor I[m scratching around in the dirt...gotta be a set point
Manaus Waterfront
Another 10 metres of water would make a difference of some sort...but nada!!
Another 10 kms down and theres a huge brass ice hockey stick, stuck thru a remarkably and unmistakenly giant stone cock and balls...its set in the middle of a faux druidic pattern of circles and crosses..in giant carpark..aha the real thing!...another 50 million pix later...Ted and Grant and I do the obvious boy thing over the actual line!!...Sandy refuses, quite rightly, to take a photo!!...off again!
And the road is surprisingly up and down, not mountains but just lots of rolling hills...I had thought it would be very flat getting down to the Amazon basin. We´re riding thru really thick jungle...through the ·Indian reservation we have a couple of hundred kms of no stop, no touch, no photo, no nada...and its your genuine, impenetrable Amazonian jungle...and no doubt the natives can slip thru it like shadows whereas we couldn´t get ten feet into it!!
We get thru and stop at a roadside shack-cum-eatery for truckers...looks like you´d be lucky to get more than a shit sandwich but hey...they bring out a plate of v tasty chicken, fresh salsa, rice and bowl of beans..truly gourmet!...a couple of tanker trucks pull up and the drivers check out the
Manaus Waterfront
Another 10 metres of water would make a difference bikes as usual!....they leave, we leave and the woman and her daughter are left, waiting for the next truck, in the middle of nowhere in their little run-down donga with a couple of kids playing in the dirt, a couple of chooks pecking at the bugs, unaware of their fate, are they wondering what happened to their mate (that we just ate)?......
In the last 50 kms before Manaus theres camps, hotels, resorts even..off to the side of the highway, swimming holes, dams, pools, bits of river..like the Manausians holiday resorts..big and small..bizarro!
Finally we get to Manaus...fantastic sense of achievement...not only fot the long day´s ride but I had always thought of Manaus as one of the defining points on this trip. Its much bigger than I´d expected, quite a city with probably +1 million people.....maybe even 3 mil! but we find our way downtown and find a hotel that lets us ride the bikes inside.
Today is Sunday and tomorrow is another bloody public holiday! but we´ve been down to the docks and a likely ship gets in tomorrow for a Wednesday departure for belem.
Its like any port but along the river...and its pretty low..I´d heard
Outback Gas Station
This could be the Pilbara...you dont have to be Lang Hancock to know this is Iron country its a 60 year low and theres a huge drop off the boardwalk to the actual water...there´s a 10 metre range from one year to the next!!.
....ok, imagine a day has passed...it as!...met a nice friendly local woman at the park at the top of our street...theres a sort of walk thru bottle shopbar where you order and pay at the little enclosed cash desk, then some one makes your caiparina or brings the beer...you sit at placcy tables and chairs, theres a guy with a keyboard and his mate they sing and play...some of the locals get up and dance around, some are pissed and falling over...all pretty friendly and cool...but there[s always a bit of an edgy feel to it all...at any minute something violent and painful could occur...theres a couple of [security[ guys, huge fckers with massive wooden waddies on leather straps...they are hitting up the customers for sort of protection money..Marciallo tells me not to pay nada!..theres a chica with a portable barbecue set-up...stacks of meat skewers with chook, beef, dog, tapir..who knows...she can raise or lower the grill with a small handle while the fire glows on...then the cheese guy arrives..he has a
Angel Falls
Tallest in the world..longest drop or whatever...in the dawn.. small burner, about 6 inches square..like te incense burners at te cathedrals..he swings it around to keep the coals burning....well above the fire is the stack of cheese strips...when you order he places a strip or 3 on the fire for a couple of minutes each side then gives it to you in a paper napkin with a squeeze of lime...fan tastic!!...sort of cross between fetta and mozarella..and some herbs ..matter of fact I feel like one right now!
Next day Marciallo takes me on the bus...with her 10 yo daughter Brenda a real bright spark, she knows much more than her Mum about so much stuff..cool......this city runs on busses!..millions of them..we drive thru the [burbs, thru the central bus station..about a kilometre of covered area, two-way..like a train station, then another 500 metres of single way station...unbelievable efficient..we just glide along..its one of the newer double busses with the squeeze box middle and air-con!...miles of burbs..when we pass the shmicko Audi dealer showroom I figure we are getting upper market1..the end of the line is Porto Negra..huge development, hotels, appartmentos, we stroll in and down past the tennis courts and car parks...lovely manicured laws and gardens....we come to
Angel Falls
Tallest in the world..longest drop or whatever...in the dawn.. an enormous reception area with mega swimming pool...totally deserted!..we wander around and fid a guy inside a darkened doorway...mumble, mumble..he leads us down thru the kitchen!!, along a paassage, out thru another door and we are in the zoo...just what we wanted...its a smallish zoo but all the bizarro animals and birds of the Amazon...cool...so we find our way out and head down to the beach..yes, a beach!..a couple of kms long and (because the level is soo low) 200 metres of white sand...hundreds of people with placcy lounges, umbrellas..Rosebud in January...and tere are little waves so its just like a beach...the river obviously is flowing v slowly..and the other bank is way way away..like a kilometre
maybe..beach indeed!
Up on the malecon...by necessity 10 metres above the current level!..eateries of all sorts...we have the [fish for four[ and coke...then Marciallo[s son and her sister join us hes a dead ringer for Ben...tall,, 21, works out at te gym, braces on the teeth, loves his Mum...they eat the rest of our fish..and v tasty..no idea what sort but BIG chunks, fried...then theres a v small shower of rain, barely touches the ground and like water in the sauna the ambient
temp rises by another 5 degrees..its already about 39 and 101% humidity..its all v dry..even without seeing the river so low you can tell its all drying up....
Marciallo takes me on the bus to the other zoo...this one is in a military area!..its the zoo of the military war training camp...go figure!..and quite a collection of leopards..the company mascot...a mountain lion with collar...for parade days maybe.....
Now heres an odd thing...you remember Barry in Panama, well, he has a brother with a restaurant just down the street from our hotel in Caracas...same excellent pizzas..but no beer licence so I wasnt able to go there too often...well, youre not going to believe it but theres another brother with a barrestaurant here!..absolute rubbish of course...but it has the same sort of atmosphere..very quickly you can become a local!..
This morning we slipped out a side door, dodged security and got onto the wharf to check out our boat..met the first mate, Voddi, who will get it all sorted for the bikes to go on in the morning...he showed us the front of the boat where the bikes will go...he showed us the dodgey planks, we saw the distance, the drop to
the water, the difference in heights, the lack of any lifting device...remembering the lack of insurance hehehe...an uneasy sleep tonight I think...always uneasy with 2 in a single bed anyway!..oops..
OK, Im off to get the laundry..but I[ll try and get some photos up first...
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