Statistical Trip Summary

For those of you who absolutely have to be fed the statistics of our trip, here they are;

Departure date from Palm Springs:      December 21, 2013
Return date to Palm Springs:               January 21, 2014

Total sea miles traveled:         6588 nautical miles
Total air miles traveled:          5162 nm
Total nautical miles:              11850

Home again, home again

Monday, January 20, 2014

All good things must come to an end and today was no exception.  Since we had a late 6:00 pm flight home from Ft. Lauderdale, we chose an excursion to fill the many hours following our 8:00 am departure from the ship.

We really grew to love Pacific Princess, her crew and our fellow cruisers, but we were eager to return to our California home.  The morning weather was perfect as we disembarked the ship in Port Everglades.  Customs was a breeze and we were soon on the bus to our first stop, Everglades Holiday Park, a location where we would ride an airboat and view an alligator show.

Haven driven past scores of “reptile gardens” across the Sunshine State, we carried with us a high degree of skepticism about this tourist attraction.  Surprisingly, we were actually educated and entertained by the extra effort that EHP has taken to make this a quality attraction.  The airboat ride was more than a high speed thrill ride across the River of Grass, but was actually quite informative. 

Following the airboat trip, we were entertained and educated by an alligator show where a volunteer, who stood less than five feet tall, handled 300 pound gators.

Our excursion also visited Flamingo Gardens, a privately owned plant and animal reserve.  True to its name, the flamingos were beautiful.

We arrived at the airport by 1:30 and passed some of the time before our flight catching up on our email.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.  Several decades ago, United Airlines, home of the Friendly Skies, was our premier carrier, proudly representing the United States in red, white and blue around the world.  The United 737 which we boarded in Ft. Lauderdale was a state-of-art aircraft, but the story ends there.  Not only was our 6 ½ hour flight uncomfortable, but it appears as if the airline had done everything possible to scrape every dime from the passenger, but providing only minimal service.  Not even a blanket or pillow could be spied.

Our seat had one broken armrest, an inconvenience that made it impossible to use the video screen in front of this.  On top of that, everything on the video screen incurred an extra charge.  Not one package of peanuts was provided.  Meals and snacks were sold, providing they hadn’t sold out by the time the cart had reached our rear rows of the coach class section. Compared to the Delta flights that we had taken on our eastbound trip, United’s service was quite substandard.

We finally reached San Francisco International Airport and sprinted our way to the other end of the airport to catch our connector to Palm Springs.  We could have taken our time, as the United Express pilots had not yet arrived.

Our commuter flight arrived in Palm Springs only a few minutes late and our friend and house-sitter, Gary picked us up and brought us back to our home at the Sands at 1:00 am.  We had been up for 22 hours, ready to crash in our own bed, the final chapter in a fantastic trip.

Travel Blog Jan 15-19, 2013

Travel Blog -Saturday and Sunday, January 18-19, 2014

Drawing to a close…at sea heading north---Go Seahawks!!

The last two full days of our trip were at sea. We left St Martin on Friday and continued our northbound voyage toward the home port of Fort Lauderdale, FL. Since these were not port days, we had two shows left to present for the guests. Our Friday show was scheduled for the afternoon so we spent the morning rehearsing and exercising on the ship’s track in lovely Caribbean weather. The winds were the same direction that the ship was traveling so no winds in our faces as we walked the track on deck 10. Very pleasant.

This next to the last show was our history piece on the Caribbean islands and we had a nice group attending in the main show lounge. Since we no longer have any ports to visit, we were not assigned any desk duty so we had the remainder of the day after our 1:30 show to read and relax on the lounges on the promenade deck. That has been our favorite hang-out since the start of the cruise as it is quieter than around the pool and usually has shade and a breeze blowing.

This was another formal night so we dressed in our formal clothes and had a nice evening with our great table mates and then attended the final production show. The singers and dancers on this trip are fabulous. With only eight in the whole company, we are amazed at the quality of the shows which they present twice a night. We know that they are young but even at that age, we wouldn’t have been able to do five minutes of their entertainment let alone two one-hour shows! We knew that we had to get up early for rehearsal for our final show so we opted to not attend the champagne gala at 11:00 pm.

It is the last full day of the 28 day cruise and we had one final show to present at 9:30 am in the main theater. We decided not to present our new pirate show but instead repeat the pirate show that we gave on the southbound journey as an encore presentation. We figured that only a few guests had probably seen our first pirate show as most of these guests did not take both cruises. We wanted to end with one of our tried and true shows so we could go ‘out with a bang’. It was very well received with lots of positive comments given to us after we were through. It was the last of 12 shows that we presented and we feel that we did not screw-up on a single show!

After the show, we changed into our shorts and tank tops and did our laps on the track and then went to lunch outside on deck. It was a pleasant and relaxing way to unwind. Next, it was time to start packing for the flight home so we went back to our stateroom and started to get all of our things back in our two suitcases, hoping that they will not be over-weight at the airport.

We spent our last dinner with our wonderful tablemates.  Baked Alaska was served or dessert.
At 7:30, Donna attended the show in the Cabaret Lounge and John stayed in our cabin to watch the NFC championship game between the the Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco team.  Donna returned in time for the second half and the thrilling finale as Seattle won in the last play.  GO HAWKS!

Travel Blog -Friday, January 17, 2014

St. Martin, yet again!

It seems as if every cruise to the Eastern Caribbean stops at St. Martin.  We cannot count haw much time we have spent there.  The harbor was jam packed, with six large cruise ships in Philipsburg’s harbor. Philipsburg is the capital of the Dutch side of the island.

We had put in to serve as an excursion escort and found ourselves together on the same bus.  We had taken this tour last year, but the quality of our tour guide, a charming woman from Dominica made it quite pleasant.

Marigot, the capital of the French side

Our stop in Marigot, the French capital, was much busier than on previous cruises.  We did get a short rainstorm as we walked around.  Many of our fellow passengers donned raincoats or opened umbrellas, but, since we are from Washington we weren’t about ready to let a bit of warm rain bother us.

We completed our tour in Philipsburg and set out to our favorite bar to read our email on their wi-fi connection.  Donna disposed of 75 emails and we returned to the ship after walking the length of Front Street, the city’s main drag.

Following dinner, we were entertained by a great comedian, went dancing and turned in by 11:00.

Travel Blog -Thursday, January 16, 2014

St Lucia; a Day at the Beach

This was our fourth visit to St. Lucia. Our daughter, Kari, had recently been to St. Lucia and recommended Rodney Bay for a beach day.  The bay is located about 20 minutes north of our ship and we negotiated a taxi fare to get there. 

The beach umbrellas at scenic Rodney Bay, St. Lucia

Rodney Bay is a very upscale area, surrounded by many condos and hotels.  It is more reminiscent of Maui than any place we have visited so far on our cruise.  We arrived about 9:30 and rented an umbrella and deck chairs with a beautiful view of the magnificent bay.  Dozens of watercraft were anchored offshore, a few only a bit smaller than cruise ships!  We tried swimming in the portion of the beach in front of us, but Donna found the uncertain footing in the sand a bit too challenging.  We soon noticed a roped-off area about 50 yards down the beach and gave it a try.  I was much better and we enjoyed swimming and floating the gentle, warm waves.

The time passed quickly as we read, chatted, and swam and by 1:00 we were dressed and ready to catch our taxi back to the ship.

We again served our hour at the desk in the evening.

We really enjoy our dinner tablemates and have many laughs during that time.

On to St. Martin tomorrow!

Travel Blog -Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Tobago Revisited

Donna mans the artillery at Fort St George, Tobago

We served as tour escorts on our bus tour of this beautiful and friendly island today.  Our stops included forts, an old sugar processing plant and a few other scenic views.  This is a case of the tour guide making the tour.  Donna’s guide was excellent and John’s hardly spoke a word.

We took a stroll through Scarborough, but really couldn’t find anything of interest to buy, with the exception of some laundry detergent. 

As on every other day, we served our shift at the Port Lecturers’ table and answered questions about the next islands.  

Travel Blog -Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Coasting the Guianas

Today was a sea day, which meant that it was a work day for us.  This was to be our last destination lecture, a presentation on our ports of call in the Caribbean; Tobago, St. Lucia and St. Martin.  We were familiar with each of these, since we had visited them on our southbound voyage.

Our program was very well attended and we received many positive comments from the passengers.  This program would be rebroadcast for the next four days on the ship’s northbound voyage.

This voyage has had wonderful weather, with very little rain.  Since we are now out of the Amazon, we can again eat on deck and go outside after dark without the fear of flying and crawling critters that made nighttime activities so challenging in the Amazon Basin.

Devil’s Island, French Guiana

Monday, January 10

Devil’s Island, French Guiana

We had been asked by the Captain to deliver a narration from the Bridge as Pacific Princess circled the Salvation Islands, of which Devil’s Island is a member.  We had not been asked to take on this task when we first signed on for the cruise, but agreed to take the responsibility for the benefit of the passengers.

We were well prepared to begin our program at 9:30 am.  While getting ready to leave our stateroom at 9:10, we received a call from the Cruise Director telling us that there was only space for one person on the bridge.  You can imagine how much this shocked us, since both of us did the narration on the southbound cruise!

With just a minute to decide, Donna volunteered to do it. Her narration was fed into the outside decks, the Pacific Lounge and stateroom televisions during the 90 minutes the ship circled the islands.  Donna received accolades from the Hotel Director and our fellow guests. 

Tonight’s show by comedian-musician Dan Riley was fantastic.  We really enjoyed it.

Our ship is now pitching and rolling considerable and, consequently, dancing in the Pacific Lounge is quite challenging.

We turned in with smiles on our faces and ready for our next sea day.

Out of the Amazon, into the Atlantic

Travel Blog - Sunday, January 12, 2014

Out of the Amazon, into the Atlantic

We are still in the Amazon, although the width of the river makes the shore invisible most of the time.  The warm, muddy, freshwater of the Amazon is detectable over 100 miles out to sea! Later in the day, we turned north into the blue Atlantic.

We had an excellent turnout for our Devil’s Island program. It has been shown on the ship’s television network all afternoon.  

Donna & John at Port Lecturers' desk

Today was our first formal night on this cruise. Donna dressed up in her purple and black cocktail dress and John wore his wool three-piece suit.  Everyone on board the ship looked so good.  We were proud to be part the cruise at dinner, and at the Captain’s Reception. Afterward, we attended the evening’s show and went dancing until late at night in the Pacific Lounge.

Traversing the Amazon Delta

Travel Blog -Saturday, January 11, 2014

Traversing the Amazon Delta

Today was a “sea day.”  We will be traversing the massive delta of the Muddy Amazon for the next two days.  We delivered our lecture on Darwin and South America and it was warmly received. We have really appreciated the wonderful comments from our guests.

The Cabaret Club, our lecturing venue

Return to Santarem, Brazil

Travel Blog - Friday, January 10, 2014

Return to Santarem, Brazil

Our ship is back to its first (and last) Brazilian port of call.  Instead of going on an excursion, we decided to kick back, relax and catch up on a few things.  We did some of our paperwork, took a break, and tried out the ship’s pool for the first time. The wonderful weather and comfortable water temperature made it a delight.

We took a few minutes off to check out the dockside souvenir stands, where we made a few minor purchases.

Our Amazon lectures that we gave on the way on the way upstream have been broadcast continuously on our downstream leg of the cruise.

After serving our hour at the Port Lecturers’ desk, as we do every day,  attended religious services. Afterwards, we dined with our delightful tablemates, attended the show and retired for the night.

Typical Amazon Riverboat

Return to Boca da Valeria

Travel Blog -Thursday, January 9, 2014

Return to Boca da Valeria

One week ago, we visited the village of Boca da Valeria.  We were enchanted by the simple lives of the people here, especially the children.  In many ways, the settlement is reminiscent of a century ago. 

We decided on today’s visit to take a ride to the backwaters of the area aboard one of the wooden canoes operated by the villagers. Unlike a century ago, the canoes now have outboard motors, of a fashion.  The chugging outboards more closely resemble lawnmower engines connected to very shank propellers.  Even without a reverse gear, they navigate the shallow backwaters handily.

The two of us were the only passengers in the canoe and the watercraft’s owner, Paolo, spoke no English.  We traveled through narrow channels, beneath overhanging branches and viewed homes sitting high on stilts, ready for the next rainy season.  This was a rare opportunity to view how so many of the residents of Amazonia live.

Typical Boca da Valeria home

Although threatening clouds that mark the start of the rainy season appeared to be heading our direction, they held off for us.  The temperature was much more pleasant than our visit last week and we returned after an hour, ready for some cold drinks, before boarding the tenders for our return to the ship.

The children, with warm smiles on their faces, gathered around us, ready for any handout we might have had.  Unfortunately, we had disposed of many of these on last week’s visit.  We didn’t think we could get away with bringing one of the little girls home, but the thought was on the mind of nearly every one of our shipmates.

After our one hour duty at the Port Lecturers’ desk, we headed to an excellent dinner and a fantastic music/comedy show.

We turned in earlier, ready for the time zone change and another busy Friday.

Parintins, Amazonas again

Travel Blog   January 8, 2014

Parintins, Amazonas

Our Return Trip

We are now on our way downstream with a new complement of passengers on board.  Our ports of call will remain the same.

We departed Manaus Tuesday evening for a 200 mile overnight trip to Parintins.  Since we are traveling downstream, the ship can make a bit better time than upstream.  For us, we know what to expect and our daily shift at the Port Lecturers desk has been much busier than on the upstream trip.

We anchored about a mile offshore in exactly the same spot that we used on our upstream voyage.  John logs each stop on his GPS and the captain was so accurate that he dropped the hooks within 50 feet of where we had anchored before!  That is some navigation in a river several miles wide.

The weather today was a bit cloudy with a hint of the oncoming rainy season, but much more pleasant than   We boarded the tenders and reached the shore by 1:30.  We were surprised to find such a contrast to our visit last Saturday.  The streets were not busy.  We surmised, correctly, that it was siesta time. 

Riverboats such as these carry passengers and freight between Amazon cities.

our last visit here.

The Brazilian cities we have visited are infamous for their motorbikes.  Donna came within inches of being run down by one, had she not put her hand out to divert the inattentive driver.

We stopped for cool drink at the same place that we had on Saturday and answered many questions from our ship’s passengers who spotted us.  At 2:00, the shops slowly began to reopen and we strolled back to the port after picking up a few items.

We arrived back on the ship in time to relax a bit before our 6:00 dinner.  I think we will enjoy our   What a difference it makes to have an earlier dinner seating!

Don & Jan Hamburg, tablemates

tablemates on this voyage.

The evening’s entertainment was a fantastic dance revue.  Only six dancers did the entire show.  What wonderfully talented entertainers we have on board.

Following the show we retired to the Pacific Lounge on Deck 10, where we went dancing for the first time since New Year’s Eve.  We really enjoyed the 60’s music and our friends.

We returned to our room and turned in, but Donna had trouble getting to sleep for several hours.  Perhaps the tea she was served at dinner was not decaffeinated.

Tomorrow, the village of Boca da Valeria.

Exploring the capital of Amazonas

Travel Blog   January 6-7, 2014

Manaus, Amazonas

Exploring the capital of Amazonas

Our next day in Manaus (Monday) was a busy one for the ship. All day long, guests were disembarking from

the first cruise on the Amazon on their way to their homes throughout the world. Many of them did not have flights until late at night but Princess Cruise Lines was nice enough to let them stay on board and not have to spend the day at the Manaus airport awaiting their flights. They let them have their meals and wait to leave anytime they needed to during the day or into the middle of night. There were about 100 of us remaining for the second cruise and we embarked about 500 new people who had flown in from their homes. All day, it was a revolving door with some leaving for the airport and others coming on board from the airport.

We decided to walk into town and see this city of one million plus people. The streets were teeming with people and there were shops and kiosks set up on every street. These were not for the tourists but were for the locals to buy everything they needed from fresh fish and produce to tools and toothbrushes! It was hard to walk downtown with so many people on the streets.

We made our way to the lovely marketplace which was built in the late 1800’s and styled after the Paris market. There we found a wonderful wood carving of the Amazon for the wall in our home in Lacey.

Next we walked about a mile to the famous Teatro Amazonas Opera House. It was also built in the late 1800’s for the wealthy rubber barons that were controlling the city. This opera house is exquisite and built with materials imported from all over the world and styled after the great theaters in Europe. This was the heyday of Manaus and the city was one of the richest and most modern in the world. It was one of the first to have electric street lighting and no money was spared to show the enormous wealth of the upper class citizens. The true 1% or the 1% of Brazil.

On Tuesday, after another night in Manaus, we were asked to escort guests on tour. Both of us were assigned the same tour but in different buses. We visited the opera house again and then the zoo which is run by the army for a training sight for them involved in work with native jungle animals. They have jaguars, anacondas, monkeys, pythons and a number of other animals and birds of the Amazon. Our tour group also visited the local Indian Museum. It was not as good a stop as the other two places as the objects collected were not displayed as well as they could have been but it was interesting to see some of the native pottery and weaving and poison blow guns.

We concluded the day with meeting a number of new guests while we were on duty at the port lecturer’s table and then went to dinner and met our new table mates. Four of the eight were new to the cruise and are Florida residents and are Jewish. All six of them seem very nice and it will be a pleasure to eat with them each night. We are especially pleased to be re-assigned the first dinner seating so we now eating at a reasonable time of 6 pm and not 8:15 as the last two weeks. We were able to go to the show at an earlier time and saw a good comedian who just joined the ship in Manaus.

Tomorrow we are off to Paratins again as we retrace our first cruise in reverse.

The Real Jungle Boat Ride

Travel Blog   January 5, 2014

Manaus, Amazonas

The Real Jungle Boat Ride

Our ship arrived in Manaus harbor early in the morning, traveling all night since the city of Parintins.  The city   We have traveled 960 nautical miles up the Amazon system after entering the outer reaches of its waters in the Atlantic.  It is still about nine miles wide here and oceangoing ships have no trouble navigation its waters.

Canoe along the bayou

is located on the Rio Negro, the Amazon’s largest tributary and almost as big as the main river, itself.

Manaus is a city of about 1.5 million and is the largest city in the state of Amazonas, taking in about half the state’s population.  We were informed that if we traveled up the Amazon for two more days at a present speed that we would reach Peru!  Imagine taking an oceangoing ship from Los Angeles to Denver.

jungle canopy

All transportation in Amazonia is by either water or air, as no paved roads cross the area.  People who wish to travel between cities and villages need to travel via small diesel riverboats, resembling miniature versions of the steamboats that were found in American waters in the 1800’s, but without the paddle wheels.  Passengers on these boats sling their hammocks over hooks in the covered, open-sided boats as they move up and down the rivers for days on end at a leisurely 8 knots or so.

Our excursion today started on one of these boats that was chartered for a trip across the  Rio Negro to an area of the rain forest called Lake January.  Rio Negro starts in Colombia and Venezuela and joins the Amazon here. It gets its name from the black color of its water, which is caused by its high acid content.  One of the benefits of the acid contents is that mosquitoes, present nearly everyplace in the Amazon Basin, find it difficult to breed in Rio Negro.

We were amazed by the many isolated homes and villages that lay on the shores of the waterways.  We even spotted a yellow school boat, taking the place of a school bus for those children in grades K-8.

We soon a reached a shallower area, where we transferred from our riverboat to a series of aluminum canoes.  Each canoe held ten passengers, as well as one helmsman, who operated the 40 hp outboard motor that propelled the watercraft.  A canopy over the top of each canoe kept off the sun and the rain. We now snaked our way into narrow, shallow channels that would be called bayous in the United   Most of the residents in this area make their living by fishing.  Some have electricity to their homes.  Very few have to pay rent, utilities or property taxes.  We saw no window screens and precious few glass windows in the homes in the area.

Wooly mmonkey shows off.

States.

Sadly, we did see some vast areas of the rain forest that have been burned off or clearcut to be used as grazing land for corporate cattle raising operations.

The food and medicine of the river dwellers comes from the jungle or waterways.  Medical care is scarce and education beyond grade 8 is only provided to city dwellers.

Bird and fish life was everywhere.  Returning to area where we had left the riverboats, we crossed a very rickety boardwalk about 30 feet above the jungle floor to get a view of the forest from a mid-canopy level.  Giant lily pads (actually lotus leaves) grew in abundance at a pond at the boardwalk’s end.  We also viewed a giant tree that was over 600 years old.

On the return trip to our boats, we spotted quite a collection of capuchin monkeys, who were spending their midday chasing each other above, below and around us.  When another group  of eco-tourists headed our direction on the high boardwalk, we were fearful of whether the aging one by fours that served as handrails would give out and tumble us down to the forest floor.

Our return trip to Manaus across the Rio Negro was uneventful and we arrived back at Pacific Princess, hot sweaty and happy. This was the last full day for 500 of the passengers on our cruise ship, who would fly back to their homes around the world on Monday.  We said fond farewells to our six tablemates, who we have really enjoyed during our fourteen day cruise and prepared for a new group who would arrive in Manaus on Monday.

We both caught ourselves dozing off during the evening’s folklore program and hit our cabin barely awake.

Parintins, Brazil, Home of Boi Bumba

Travel Blog   January 4, 2014

Parintins, Brazil, Home of Boi Bumba

We spent overnight in the city of Parintins and had the whole day in this little town. We were not asked to escort any tours so we decided to walk the city ourselves. It was Saturday so the shops didn’t open too early. We got into to town around 9:30 and noticed the shops started to open around 10:00 so we wandered

Horse cart in front of cathedral

in and out of many of them once they were opened. We knew that this small rather remote town is the location of the second largest Carnivale in all of Brazil after the famous one in Rio so we wanted to see how the locals celebrate this festival even though it was off season. We had read about the two teams that have a dance-off competition during this event in June which brings in about 20,000 visitors to the town. The dancing centers around a legend about a bull and one team wears red and the other wears blue during the celebration called Boi Bumba. All of the visitors and townsfolk take sides in support of their own dance team and the town is bathed in red and blue. Even Coca Cola is bottled in both red and blue cans and the people of Parintins are proud to say that it is the only place in the world with blue Coke cans and signs.

We were on a quest to find a t-shirt or a pop can with a blue Coca Cola label so we wandered in and our all L. Oh well, it was fun to look anyway. We did find some local shirts to buy and also some inexpensive vodka to bring back to the ship for evening cocktails on board.

Have your Coke in blue or red!

of the shops looking for these but to no avail. We did find lots of blue Coca Cola signs to photograph but nothing to take home as a souvenir. We finally were able to find someone who spoke enough English to explain to us that those items don’t show up until May

It was a hot and humid day of course but a good one as we had time to see this city. We returned to ship and pealed off our dripping wet clothes about three hours later and jumped in the shower and then spent the rest of the day relaxing until our assigned time to sit at the table by the excursion desk and visit with the guests for an hour. It seems a little ridiculous for us to have to do this each day before dinner but it is fun to meet people and answer a few questions. We also get a chance to hear what is going on at the excursion office. Kind of feels like we are little mice hearing the gossip J.

Off to the last stop and main destination on the Amazon tomorrow…Manaus, 1000 miles up the river from the point in which we entered the Amazon. We will be there for a number of days as we all get the chance to explore the jungle before most of the guests disembark for their homes and a new group of guests embarks for the return trip with us.

An Unbelievable Experience

Travel Blog   January 3, 2014

An Unbelievable Experience

Parintins, Amazonia, Brazil

There are thousands of tiny villages dotting the shorelines of the various rivers that make up the Amazon Basin.  Today we would get the rare opportunity to visit one of them, Boca da Valeria.  Perching on the shores of the Amazon, with the jungle to its back, Boca is a community of about 75 men, women and children.  Only occasionally do cruise ships stop here, but the residents were ready for us.

Unlike other stops on our cruise, no organized shore excursions were planned for us.  We could see the village on our own terms.

After navigating up a bayou off the main channel, our tender arrived at the rickety, wooden dock. We were met by scores of beautiful dark-eyed Brazilian children most of whom appeared to be of 100% Indian heritage.  The little boys and girls grasped at our hands as we began our walk around the village.  We declined their hands but were still adopted by two darling nine-year old girls, Liza and Eva, who politely accompanied us as we wandered the footpaths that made up the community.  We had been advised by our Desert Hot Springs friends, Ken and Lindsay, that school supplies were always appreciated and we came well supplied with an assortment of novelty pencils and other items.

Each building in the village is built high on stilts, so as not to suffer damage from the Amazon’s seasonal flooding.  None have windows or screens, but they did have electricity, the source of which we were unable to determine.  Even a few had satellite dished, pointed straight up, since the satellites orbit directly over the Equator. 

The weather was hot and humid, about 90 degrees with 95 percent humidity.  We quickly sweated through our shirts.

We climbed the steep staircase to the tiny one-room school and delivered some pencils and other supplies to the teachers.   We also visited the tiny church next to the school.  Instead of pews, a number of white, plastic Wal-Mart chairs were set up.

Everyone in the village was used to visitors and tried to earn extra dollars by dressing in native costumes or posing with their pets.  We saw a number of sloths, a beautiful toucan and two caiman (a variety of South American alligator). Although the children were eager for any gifts and money we had, none were pushy or impolite.  Even though we don’t speak Portuguese, we managed to get by with our Spanish.

Apparently the word had got out in the area and a number of children of all ages from other communities also showed up at Boca da Valeria! 

John poses with his two escorts at Boca da Valeria

We stopped at the little canteen in the village and tried to hydrate ourselves with a Coke and a local beer.  John was pleasantly surprised that the restroom was fully equipped with running water!

We returned to our ship for a late lunch and our turn at desk duty before attending Sabbath services at sundown.

We turned in tired after dinner with our wonderful table-mates.  We will miss them when then depart on Monday.

Our first Amazon port of call: Santarem, Brazil

Travel Blog   Thursday -Jan 2, 2014

Our first Amazon port of call: Santarem, Brazil

Today we made our first port of call in Brazil and we were asked to act as tour escorts. We met in the show lounge and helped the excursion crew with getting the guests in their correct ground tours groups.

The tour that we escorted was the city and cultural center tour and included a variety of stops during the three plus hours that we were gone. It was so hot and sticky with the high temperatures and equally high humidity that it seemed like a lot longer tour on the non AC bus. The temps and humidity were both approaching 90 here on the equator.

Our first stops on this tour included the cathedral and the small history museum, neither extremely impressive. We did get to see the meeting/wedding of the waters. The Amazon is a muddy color looking like coffee with cream while the tributary is a clear bluer color. They run side by side and don’t mix at all so it looks like two lanes on a highway running parallel to each other.

The final stop on this excursion was the most interesting. We went to a plantation where we were shown many of the locally grown fruits and had the opportunity to sample them. We also were told about how Brazil nuts are grown and harvested and they demonstrated how poisonous manioc is grown and processed into edible flour and tapioca and how rubber trees are tapped. The Amazon basin was a very important rubber producing region in the past and it was the reason that many of these towns and cities began.

After returning from the tour, we quickly rushed into our state room to take a cold shower but it was rather lukewarm in this area of intense heat but it felt good to wash the sweat off and relax for the rest of the afternoon and evening. We went to bed early, after our late dinner as we were tired from our first day exploring in the Amazon. We had to set our clocks back into Atlantic time so we got an extra hour of sleep.

How Brazilians travel distances on the Amazon

New Years on the Equator

Travel Blog  
Tuesday-Wednesday, December 31, 2013 -Jan 1, 2014

New Years on the Equator

It is traditional to bring in the New Year with chanting, “Out with the old, in with the new!”  The turn of 2013  Tuesday morning brought us the outer waters of the Amazon.  Land could not been seen, but the abrupt change in the color of the water from blue to brown signaled that we were dealing with a flow of fresh water off the land, carrying tons an sediment and silt with it.  We continued up the north branch of the river all day and were pleased when we could finally see land.  The tremendous flow of this, the world’s largest river, is almost incomprehensible.

the Lower Amazon

into 2014 was a perfect example of the truth of this.

Our trusty handheld GPS gave us a good idea of our location and the speed of the ship.  At first we were wondering why the Pacific Princess’ speed had dropped off and after a bit of thought realized that we were bucking the current going upstream and our speed would be reduced, of course.

Our afternoon program, a presentation on Brazil and the ports of the Amazon was packed.  Some members of the audience were forced to stand for the lecture and we received rave reviews from the guests.  This program was televised the next day for those who were not able to catch it the first time.

Our ship anchored in the river two miles south of the Equator, which we had just crossed!  There were no announcements about this in anyplace but our show, since we had the Crossing the Line ceremony on Monday.  We just explained to the audience that King Neptune doesn’t do rivers!

Celebrating New Year's Ever with our tablemates

We both love New Years Eve and have brought in every year together, starting in 1966.  We have celebrated the New Year three times at sea, once on a riverboat in Oregon’s Willamette River and countless times on land.  This would be the first anchored on the Equator!  We had a wonderful formal dinner with our tablemates and went out to the celebration in the Cabaret Club.  We enjoyed the fireworks that the nearby town set off as the year passed from old to new.

Every year in the past, we had watched the ball drop in Times Square to signal the event.  It almost felt as   This year was different.  Due to our time zone, we were able to start the festivities two hours before the Manhattanites.  Take that!  Brazil and Greenland have got you beat! We turned in at about 12:30.
New York, you don't own New year's Eve!

 Wednesday, Jan 1 2014

Typical Delta view

Unlike most revelers, we awoke early on New Years Day.  We threw our laundry into the machines on the way to breakfast on the fantail at about 7:30.  Our breakfast was timed perfectly.  Our washing was just finishing and ready for the dryer when we returned.  Laundry on a 28 day cruise can be problematic. Timing is essential, if one is to beat the crowds.  We picked the perfect time for it!

Our final presentation for the first cruise, Voyage of the HMS Beagle, was scheduled for an early 9:45.  Attendance was better than expected and we had some nice comments.

This was the first afternoon in quite a number of days where we did not have desk duty in the afternoon, so we decided to kick back for the afternoon.  We retired to the Promenade Deck lounges for a number of hours and caught up on our reading.

We have missed a few things on board.  Internet coverage is slow and expensive, but better than any other ship we have been on.  We have had trouble following the Seahawks.  ESPN has continued to ignore their fantastic season.  We have been able to connect with Kari and Jim on Skype and are reading important email every few days.

We do not miss Pacific Northwest weather, but it wasn’t a problem in our winter home of Desert Hot Springs. 

After dinner at the buffet, and drinks with friends, we attended another excellent show by our comic, Tony.  He brought tears to ours eyes from laughing for the second time.  He is a real pro.  We turned in tired, but happy at about 11:00.

What a wonderful day to start a new year!

Tomorrow, Santarem, our first Amazon port of call.