Day 14-15, March 7 and 8

 March 7 Boca Da Valeria, Brazil

March 8 Manaus, Brazil

Hey Everybody,

Again trying to get caught up with the blog.  The weather is the same, warm, humid.  Boca Da Valeria, has no excursions, very small area that has a little village with lots of children.  We were here before and did not get off.  

The children greet you as you step ashore from the tender.  They want to show you around their little area and you can give them a tip.  Several children will be holding different animals, like a sloth.  If you take a picture of them, then a tip would be appreciated.  Some of the children will dress in their culture costumes.

We treated this day as a sea day, just relaxing about.

We did go to the Magician show.  He was quite good.  Entertaining.

March 8th Manaus, Brazil.

This is a highlight for Rich and I to be here in Manaus again.  The first time was in 2012.  There were some noticable changes, a few more high rises have been built.  We were anchored so we had to take a tender in, not the ships tender, but a local tender which is much larger.  The one we were on would not meet Coast Guard standards.  There were cracks in the support posts. 

Today we took a tour, Golden Era of Manaus.  Unfortunately it was raining for most of this tour.  We had umbrellas and hats, plastic type of raincovers but we did not wear them.

The bus was somewhat comfortable for the short ride to the Opera House.  We had been there before except this time there were no rehearsals and we just sat in the chairs and checked out the beautiful ceiling which has French flair.  There are many rooms to the Opera House, we saw one dressing room and there are some pictures of that.

Ceiling in large upstairs room

Ceiling in the opera performance room

A section of the ceiling

The lower seats and upper box seats

The dressing room

Next up after touring the outside of the Opera House, we went to a small craft store, not my cup of tea.  

Then we were off to a huge home where we spent time checking it out.  One thing in this home that I did not see was the kitchen or bedrooms.  Much of the wood, especially the railings are made of mahogany. The house was built in the late 1800's during the rubber barron period by a German.

The entry foyer 

Painting at top of stairs

Painting in the foyer

Second floor porch in rear of house

The back garden area from the porch

Next stop was a huge vegetable and craft market with a restaurant.  We browsed around for a bit then headed back to the bus.  They had a wide variety of nuts, cashews, brazil nuts, beaded earrings, necklaces, baskets that were hand woven.

The outside of the market

The Mercardo Public Market

Inside the market

We were glad to get back onboard.  There was a 5:30 show of Night Sounds of the Amazon.  There were 4 people playing different kinds of instruments and one singer.  It was a good show.

After dinner in Compass Rose, we retired for the evening.

Until next time...