Santarem

Beautiful weather, fantastic scenery and a great boat trip. We had it all today. First thing, Gail and I made a quick trip to downtown Santarem sine we had a shore excursion at 12:00. We walked around a bit; I bought a hat and souvenirs and returned to the ship. We left on out trip up the Tapajos River and Jari canal and it was great from the start. We saw so much wildlife, lush jungle and lots and lots of water. We saw fresh water dolphins, Piranhas, Iguanas and countless birds (herons, buzzards, Macaws, and every color of tropical bird you could imagine). Oops…almost forgot….every imaginable insect… It’s amazing seeing the Amazon basin at the high levels because of rainy season. The people here may have two dwellings, one at elevation for rainy season and one on the river that is high and dry during the “dry” season. Of course, I’m not sure what that means down here where they get over 200 inches of rain a year….now that’s a lot of rain. The day was so nice I even went swimming in the Amazon, hope I didn’t catch anything. The day was great, the sun even better and the scenery…priceless.