by Mark Rice
To ensure we got seats to the next show, we walked briskly along the outdoor promenade until we'd reached the Pacific Lounge and re-entered through the sea door. Thus we bypassed the slow-moving, determined pensioners who always jam up the interior corridor between the two centres of entertainment. We sat in front row seats and were joined by Jennifer and her travelling companion Gwen. First up was Julie Decott who won the New Faces TV talent show thirty years ago. She is in her early sixties but still has a powerful voice and sang a Maria Callas number along with some Adele songs and a medley of Andrew Lloyd Webber creations. She was followed on stage by Colin "Fingers" Henry who again shone in both joke telling and piano playing.
We headed to the cabin feeling exhausted from all the laughter, a couple of hours later.
Day 36
Tuesday 7th February.
Docked in Manaus, Amazon, Brazil.
We had booked ourselves on the Octavian Cruise excursion Rio Negro Cruise, and we met up with, Jennifer and Gwen, outside the theatre and collected a yellow sticker with a number 2 on it.
The conversation continued to centre on the deaths and sicknesses on board. Several more passengers had recently become bed bound. Simply imagining, I’d guess, that they were suffering from some food poisoning outbreak. It’s far more likely that they were dehydrated as the humidity was running at 95%.
Still, Skyline, the daily newspaper, had written nothing about the happenings on board and instead continued to focus on the news headlines back home.
I started to complete the crossword in the paper while Margaret chatted away, hoping she might elicit what action the ship’s officers were planning to take.
Before long we were on our way ashore and we boarded a small double-decker boat tied up to the same pier as our ship. The way it worked was the first forty passengers boarded and climbed up to sit on the upper deck and the rest, about twenty in number, us included, took seats on the lower deck. Both decks had solid roofs and were open sided giving a clear view of the surrounding area and allowing a cool breeze to blow through. Unlike our previous Octavian Cruises excursions, no ship’s representative was on board this excursion and frankly, it showed.
The boat pulled away from its moorings and the cruise guide commenced his talk while seated on the top tier. He may have been giving some historical information about Manaus or the Negro river but his talk fell on deaf ears on the lower deck. Despite two large loudspeakers at the front and the back of the deck broadcasting his words the ship’s engine directly underneath our seats won the war of sound, hands down.
I notified the two guide assistants on the lower deck. I said we are hearing some of his words but not enough to make sense. The guides then spent some time trying to improve the loudspeaker volume.
After a short while we pulled in alongside a floating restaurant and transferred from the boat to six ten-seat motor boats, ever so slightly bigger than canoes. The river lapped gently against the low sides of the boats, a mere four inches above the piranha invested water. Our boat had a helmsman but no guide. There were life jackets attached to each seat but no one instructed us to wear them and we didn't. However, later we saw more small boats, like ours and all the occupants in them were wearing their life jackets. I began to feel a bit anxious as we motored at speed through the dark menacing waters. Then the engines were cut and we waited for all the other boats to arrive.
We had reached an area of reeds where gigantic green water lilies grew, their leaves the size of round kitchen tables. In their centre were delicate white flowers. The six small boats lined up to listen to some words, presumably about the lilies and plants that grow there. But once again, we couldn’t hear a thing.
We motored up the river and it widened into a broad stretch of water, similar to a lake. Our helmsman cut the motor for no reason I could fathom and we sat drifting in the vast expanse of water.
Suddenly, from within tall reeds on our left, three canoes emerged. They broke cover and raced towards us the occupant’s waving long spears and shouting loudly in our direction. It’s only as they drew nearer that I noticed most of them were children, in the main teenagers aged six to sixteen. The canoes split up and surrounded our boat, latching onto its sides with their fingers and drawing all the boats together.
In their canoes, the children held wild creatures taken from the river and forests, such as baby alligators, sloths and snakes and, by gestures they indicated they were seeking money. Some people paid to take pictures of the children and the unfortunate animals. Margaret gave money but didn't take a picture.
Eventually, our helmsman started up the engine which signalled the end of the encounter. The kids having extorted what money they could from us rowed away, jabbering excitedly amongst themselves.
A few minutes further upstream we passed what were probably their homes, wooden houses built on stilts where we could see women washing clothes or cooking a meal.
I felt we were unwelcome intruders, voyeuristically gazing into their lives from the safety of our canoes. It was a bit like visiting a zoo but finding the specimens on show were human. Maybe our helmsman lived there? He just looked inscrutable and remained silent throughout the excursion.
A little while later we turned away from the lake and entered a narrow stream that took us into the rain forest, a leafy backwater where we and another boat stopped to hear a lecture on Sequa trees and the Goa gum tree. It was the Goa tree that brought the rubber barons to the Amazon Basin back in the 1890s.
Our guide pointed out the blackness on the tree trunk that extended up for another fifteen feet above the present water level. “In July,” he said, “the rivers water will rise to that level and the forest will become a home to many more creatures and fish until the levels drop again in Autumn.”
It was astonishing and hard to imagine such a huge change.
“You heard of the monkey fish?” the guide asked.
We all shook our heads in the negative.
“It's a fish that eats birds and will jump up to two metres out of the water to catch one.”
Amazing, I thought. The guide didn’t manage to produce one of these birds so we’ll just have to take his word for it that they exist.
We return to the floating restaurant for lunch and we are given time to walk around a local gift shop. I hesitated to buy anything as, given the warnings we received regarding buying anything, most of the items on sale seemed to breach the rules. There were lots of wooden facemasks, varnished piranhas on mounted plinths, jewellery, children’s toys and of course T-shirts.
Luckily the four of us arrived back at the double-decker boat before the other passengers, so we took seats upstairs and enjoyed the commentary we’d missed on the outward journey.
We motored to the meeting of the waters where the black Negro water meets the brown water of the Amazon River. The two, because of varying temperatures and differing mineral content, travel alongside each other for ten kilometres before the Negro water dilutes into the Amazon water.
Once we had arrived at the meeting point, we spotted several pink and grey dolphins surfacing in the Negro black water a few yards from our boat. A rush of passengers to that side of the boat caused some concern but more dolphins were then spotted on the other side so the keel straightened up again. Eventually, we had to leave the unexpected, dolphin show and strike out for home.
On the outskirts of Manaus we passed many barges which were floating petrol and gas stations selling fuel to the passing boats. There are no motorways linking Manaus to other cities so boats and planes are your only options.
“I really enjoyed that,” said Margaret as she eased off her running shoes when we had got back in the cabin.
“Me too” I answered. “But what surprised me was the lack of wildlife, especially birds in this part of the Amazon,” I said.
“Oh, yes. I didn’t notice but now you mention it…” Margaret commented. She went on “Given the rich nutrition in the water there must be lots of fish. Why the absence of bird
s? Why no alligators or crocodiles? Are they there but just hidden within the vastness of the Amazon?”
“Good question, you should’ve asked the guide.” I replied.
We played two games of tennis in the oppressive heat and slipped down a level to play a game of table tennis. Dripping with sweat we retired to our cabin.
That night the ship was still moored in Manaus as a sticking fuel pump had delayed our departure. It was a balmy summer evening and although a very heavy downpour had occurred in the last hour, the decks were almost totally dry. The humidity post-storm had dropped sharply and a nice cooling breeze blew across the open deck.
I lay on a sun lounger listening to the Entertainments Manager, Laura, whipping up the enthusiasm in passengers to dance and clap to the perennial party song Hey Baby. She'd been on this ship for fourteen years completing six months of the year on board and six months at home. With a sail away party to lead, on average, once every three days, Hey Baby must feature in her nightmares.
Two hours later she and the Entertainments team ran out of inane dances to perform and the DJ packed up and left so a blissful silence descended on the upper deck. That was until the PA system crackled life and we were told that the departure had stalled indefinitely. It wasn’t a problem really as the ship was just going to retrace it’s way back down the Amazon River stopping in several towns as it went.
We were due in Parantins tomorrow which is just one hundred and ninety miles downstream. I'm sure we could do that on one engine if we had to. Another rumour doing the rounds amongst passengers is that some of the engines have taken in water and need to be stripped down and rebuilt. All the aforementioned proved untrue as by 17:40 the captain had confirmed our imminent departure. The SS Azara emitted three deep long vibrating touts from her funnel and we were off again.
Lying flat on my back on my sun lounger, the world appeared to rotate around me as the ship turned anticlockwise to face back down the river. There was hardly a vibration as the new Manaus river bridge swivelled into my view and still the huge ship turned. On board women emerged wet from the pool, waiters carried trays of drinks and people played pitch and put golf, all seemingly unaware of the ship’s rotation. A handful of passengers lined the deck railings to enjoy the experience and changing view.
The sun retreated behind a thick layer of grey clouds and wouldn't be reappearing today so I gathered my things and went below.
Dinner was well attended and we shared a few stories over the course of the meal. The table, and all things on it vibrated throughout. We continued to speculate the reason for the vibrations and the latest theory is that they are caused by the propellers bumping off the river bed below.
I longed to find out what was the latest theory for the sudden deaths of so many passengers was but nobody broached the subject over the dinner table and I didn’t want to be the one to show an abnormal interest.
At the Gaiety Theatre the Topstars presented Stop in the Name of Love, a tribute show to the music of the 1960s and 1970s. The singing and dancing was delivered in a series of relentless high-intensity sketches that chart the love lives of three all-American teenage couples. Our choir masters Aoife and Tony acquitted themselves very well with the accents, singing and dancing. Tony did a particularly good version of Me and Mrs Jones.
Day 37
Wednesday 8th February.
Parintins, Para state, Amazon.
Parintins, founded in 1793, is a small town of 100,000 people located on the Tupinabarana island about 420 kilometres from Manaus. Boats are the most common method of transport for locals, often sleeping onboard, as it can take fifteen hours to travel downstream from Manaus or twenty-seven hours upstream.
The town holds an annual “Boi-Bumba” folkloric festival on 12th June but we are told a smaller version is being put on for our ship this afternoon. Unusually, our captain has mentioned it several times in dispatches so the ticket sales must be slow on the only activity of the day. The town has no coaches or guides so no excursions are offered, except the festival which must be located in a venue close to the harbour.
Today the ship has anchored away from the quayside so we were to be transported ashore using tenders made up of lifeboats from the SS Azara and local harbour boats. It would be a slow affair.
Users of wheelchairs and mobility scooters needed to be assessed by the ship’s officers and they would not be allowed on the tender if the passenger lacked sufficient independent mobility.
The ships tender service started early in the day but almost immediately one of the three being used suffered from electrical faults brought on by the heat and was withdrawn. The Fred Olson ship, the Braemor, was docked offshore too and was using two harbour tenders to ferry passengers ashore. They would become available to us when she sailed in the early afternoon.
We ate breakfast and despite light rainfall, got our tennis games in before showering and factoring up for the visit ashore. The DEET that we use, leaves my lips numb and my skin tingles on receipt of the oil which I rub on top of the factor 30 suntan lotion.
We headed to the Atlas Restaurant on mid-ships only to find lots of people already queuing for the tender. After an hour, with no tender and a steady increase in waiting passengers, it’s revealed by the hotel manager, that there was a collision between two tenders alongside the SS Azara which had led to several broken windows and both being taken out of service. A passenger was injured so it would be a further half hour before service resumed.
The tenders can seat over one hundred passengers and we piled into one from deck 3 when normal service resumed. It took time to load that number of passengers in the stifling heat. Outside the current was pushing strong against the tender and the river waves were choppy and splashing against the boat’s side. Our tender battled for fifteen minutes to get across the river and reach the safety of the harbour pier and I for one was delighted to get off and onto dry land.
Many passengers were due to attend the Boi-Bumba show and the start time had been pushed back to facilitate late arrivals. It was being held, as I suspected, just a few yards beyond the terminal building in an exhibition centre and was expected to run for about an hour. The last tender was scheduled to exit the harbour at 17:00 but we were warned not to aim for that one as it may be full.
Once on the small island, we walked past the stalls and the exhibition hall and walked up a steep incline to visit a green church with a clock tower that supposedly contained an ancient relic. We found it bolted and closed so we proceeded to stroll around the town.
The town seemed poor to our eyes and featured many shops selling cheap clothes, souvenirs and little else. The main form of transport was motorbikes. There were hundreds of them racing along in all directions. Some riders wore helmets but many didn’t. Not much English was spoken or shown on signposts or posters but prices in US dollars were widely quoted and the currency happily accepted.
We stopped at a few shops, bought some more underwear for me plus some lemonade and shampoo. Then we rested at a cafe with two ice cold cola's and managed to communicate with two women who appeared to be a mother and a grandmother to a shy black-haired little girl who spent most of the time hidden behind her mother’s legs. She gazed out at us from her safe refuge, idly twirling with a small finger, one loose strand of her long jet black hair. She could only have been about three but she’s going to be a heart stealer when she grows up.
Aware of the short time window we had, we returned to the harbour. There, a steward on the quayside was giving out moist ice-cold hand towels to mop our brows, wet our faces and generally cool down with. On boarding the tender we found a singer from the Topstars troupe carrying out a new role, allocating the seats on the little boat. It seems they all step in where and when an extra body is needed.
The return journey across the river was much quicker. We left the wharf with passengers queued to the far end of the footbridge awaiting the next tender.
Back on board, we sunbathed. Then there was just time for a swim an
d down to the cabin for a shower and change for dinner. The captain came over the PA system to apologise for the tender issues and delays and said we would not set sail until 22:00 hours this evening because of the effect the engine’s vibrations had on the ship’s restaurants. Apparently passengers had complained the night before and he was keen to avoid similar complaints tonight. So we were not alone in suffering. Ali, our waiter, said tables all across the restaurant parallel to us had suffered from vibrations too.
Dinner was for six as Roger and Rose had chosen to pay extra and eat in the Beach House restaurant—part of the Palace restaurant that assumes a separate identity at night and carries a cover charge for presumably better food.
The interest in the recent deaths had now faded so much so that there was not a single mention of it over dinner tonight. The ships policy of not highlighting the occurrence appeared to have worked and unaffected passengers were continuing life on board as if it had never happened.
The age of the passengers I suspect was also a factor in this loss of interest, in that they have reached a stage in life where people are frequently dying and its not front page news for them anymore. Its just a fact of life.
We head to the Gaiety Theatre after dinner to watch the piano artistry of David Dunne, the ships musical director, who at short notice, put together a show. He showed off his own piano virtuosity and then accompanied the orchestra’s flautist Rebecca and three of the Topstars principal singers as each sang a different song from the musical Les Miserables. All of them were impressive as they sang with power and emotion. It just shows what they are capable of vocally if they got the chance to shine with their own material. He finished his show by premiering three of his own original piano pieces and they were surprisingly good.
