Today we are visiting the little village at “the mouth” (Boca) of the Valeria river, which is the closest we will come to “true” Amazonian river village life. The village reportedly only has about 100 residents, living in stilt houses with one church and a small school. While traditional, it is still a little bit of a touristy stop, because any cruise ship that sails the Amazon stops here, so apparently people from all over come to greet the passengers – particularly the children. Because Sandy, the guest lecturer has already prepared us for the spectacle, we strategize our visit and decide we don’t want to be on the first or 2nd tender, because we can already see from our balcony the tons of people who are onshore waiting for the tenders. They appear as little black dots, almost like trees, but they are increasing in numbers, so we’re pretty confident they aren’t trees!
No hurry! We relax, have a light breakfast, then finally head down to the tender, thinking we’ll be safe from most of the swarms. Au contraire Pierre! When we arrive and the tender dock there are hundreds of children all lined up to greet us – I only wish I could have had my camera out to video them! They are lined up like some sort of gauntlet we must walk through to reach the path to the village – with hands stretched out to pat us on the shoulder, or shake our hands. Its really heartwarming in an odd sort of way – even though we know they want dollars! At any rate, we reach the end of the child alley, and two little ones take my hand to escort us to the village. They are cute and silent (because they speak no English whatsoever), and somehow we pick up a third, older boy who tries to translate or at least speak a little bit of English.
It’s quite sweet. We walk along the sandy path to arrive at the front of the village where we take our pictures with the aforementioned sloth, and then with some other odd red furry fox looking creature, who decides he likes me and pokes me on the side of my face with his nose. Yikes! (We found out later that he was actually a South American coati, a member of the raccoon family.) At least the boys were in the coati picture, albeit one of them was none too happy about it!
We wandered past the church and the little school to the end of the “front” part of the village. We know there are more houses down the path, but we’re ready to let the boys go on their way, so we give them their guide “tips” and tell them to go get more people! Even though it’s early, it’s hot, so we figured it was a fine time for a beverage – and there just happens to be a bar at the end here, playing some fun Brazilian music with a “cold beer” sign. That’s for us! Up the stairs we go, to plop down on the deck with our very cold beers, watching the comings and goings of the kids, the passengers and the sloths that are turning up in everyone’s arms. Very fun.
As we hang out and relax, the only customers here so far, a German passenger walks up, gets his beer then turns to us and asks, “Are you from the ship?” Um, what could we say? That is just like all the Cruise Director jokes about passengers asking if the staff sleeps ashore! We managed to stifle our laughter and politely tell him yes, we are, and he proceeds to ask us if we’re nervous being here, he says he thinks “it’s a little bit scary.” We’re not really sure to what he was referring? The kids? But no, we aren’t scared, we’re actually really enjoying this day and we thought for sure we wouldn’t.
Finishing our beverages, we decide to go explore the path past the “front” part of the village to get a glimpse of “real” village life. Turns out, it really is a real village and there are tons of stilt houses lining this path that winds it way along the edge of the Valeria river. Once out of the cruise ship melee, it’s peaceful back here, walking amongst the houses with their fish hanging to dry, wood fired stoves cooking breakfast, men hanging about chatting on porches and all the cool hanging gardens that people have fixed up, some planted in old canoes and then hung about 4 feet off the ground. They do have power out here – at least the power lines are stretched through the village – and there are a couple of satellite dishes here and there – but there doesn’t seem to be much more in terms of basic amenities. Definitely no running water that we can see. So, wow, really, its a true little Amazonian village!
Once back in the front part of the village, we see that tons of people have finally come ashore. Our new friends Nancy and Margie are here, Nancy with a Macaw on her arm. We find another sloth (there are a shitload of sloths here) just hanging out on a chair watching a dog with her nursing puppies, looking like he wanted to join in on the fun. We are about to head back to the ship, when we see all the staff heading into the village to give out the items they have collected from the crew. Every visit, they bring donations – clothes, school supplies, things the crew themselves have donated, and also food the ship donates to the village. We figure we’ll stay to watch this – so we grab our stilt house beer table and watch the festivities.
It’s lovely to watch – all the kids do a good job of lining up, but still, they are so excited to get anything, and they come away with a pair of shoes or a shirt of shorts showing all their friends what they got. So sweet. We grab another beer while we watch – then buy a bunch more to take back to the ship – at a dollar, they are the best bargain so far! Then its back to the tender, and to the ship, and to another stunning sunset as we sail to our furthest port – 1,000 miles up the Amazon to Manaus.
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