Parintins

We arrived about 10:00 AM, October 22. I was surprised to see a pretty town from the ship, as the literature given us by HollandAmerica suggested it was a sleepy little village we could get acquainted with by going on a tricycle pedalled by a local native. The city is situated on an island not far from Manaus and road wise is just as isolated as Manaus. In the harbor were the same two and three deck river boats we have seen everywhere we have gone. Parintins is not a hub like Manaus, so there was not the same level of activity on the dock. The skyline is marked by the steeples of churches.

Which reminds me of a story told me in Manaus. They had pre-fabricated a Catholic Church building somewhere else and were towing it on a barge up to Manaus. As they came over the bar at Macapa, a heavy wave broke loose one of the spires which toppled into the river. They never replaced the missing spire and because it had only one spire, they were not required to send money back to the Vatican in ensuing years.

In Manaus we canceled Ruth's ticket for the boat ride to the meeting of the waters. As it turned out she would really have enjoyed that trip. We had scheduled the tricycle trip in Parintins for both of us, but should have canceled it for both of us. It turned out to be the hottest, most humid day of our trip. We started out on the tricycle, but it became very evident Ruth was not going to survive 90 minutes pedalling around this town. There was a caravan of tricycles - probably 30 or so - that just took us through streets not unlike Tijuana. After about 30 minutes, I had the pedaller turn around and take us back to the ship. We had a HollandAmeroca cloth tote bag which I emptied and poured about a cup of cold water in it to soak the material so Ruth could cool off her head. In addition, I had a bottle of cold water which I poured down her back to cool her. Under normal circumstances she would have been very upset that I would do such a thing, but she was grateful instead. You can see she reall was suffering.

We both were soaked from sweat and took cool showers as soon as we got back on board. After a long nappy, Ruth recovered quite well and is back to normal this evening. We didn't feel like dressing for dinner, so went in casual attire to the Lido Restaurant, which is served cafeteria style. It has exactly the same menu as the dining room and has the advantage that you can see what each item looks like before selecting it. I chose braised lamb shanks and Ruth chose a very tasty chicken breast. Foir desert I got a double scoop of pineapple sherbet for Ruth and I chose a layered cake with cream filling and raspberry syrup. They were both good. We finished our meal much more quickly than we would have in the more formal dining room. It is the first time we have had dinner in the Lido restaurant and we enjoyed the informality of it. Afterwords we went to the aft deck to watch them take up the anchor and get on our way down the river. The ship is cruising at 16 or 17 knots and the current adds another 2 to 4 knots to our speed, so we are going right along. We are scheduled to arrive at Macapa about 7:30 PM on Thursday and will get across the bar and back in the Atlantic in the Norther hemisphere soon after.

Speaking of the river, I think I forgot to mention the Rio Negro is very pure water but acidic. As a consequence, there are fewer species of fish than in the Solimoes River. The Solimoes River has its origin in Peru while the Rio Negro has its source in Columbia. It is only after these two rivers converge downstream from Manaus that it becomes known as the Amazon River. The Amazon is very wide, but also surprisingly deep. I mentioned before we went over the deepest part of the Amazon on our way upstream to Manaus, but the Captain has mentioned several times the depth of the river as over 150 feet.

At Parintins we had to anchor offshore about one-half mile because it became very shallow closer to shore, except for a very narrow channel to a wharf which the local authorities would not give permission for this ship to use. I took some video footage of one of the ship's tenders as it tied up to a platform protruding out from Deck 3. The current was strong enough that it appeared the tender was actually moving upstream even though it was stationary.

Our next port is Bridgetown, Barbados on October 27th. After that we have just five days before we arrive at Tampa. We really have enjoyed this cruise, but will be very glad to get home. As the time draws nearer, I think more often of home and all it means. We just finished the Book of Acts and enjoyed God's care of Paul on the last recorded journey of this special servant of the Lord.