We spent 1 night in a hotel in the port town of Porto Velho. This was our chance to pack a smaller bag and buy a hammock and mossie net for the 900km boat trip down the Maderia river and then up the Amazon river. Pete explained the differences between the hammocks and what made a good one. With everyone having bought a hammock (somehow I actually got my pricing confused and ended up paying more that what the shop was asking) we headed to the port to find our boat. The boat was a triple decker wooden thing with the cargo (so many onions, potatoes, tomatoes, limes, but also wardrobes and a fridge freezer) on the lower deck, us and many others in our hammocks on the middle deck and then the bar on the top deck. Our tickets said that we were to sail 6pm Tuesday. That wasn't the case as we found out that we were to sail 9am Wednesday. No problem as we would sleep on the boat and watch the port life which was mainly 2 type of dolphins, grey and pink swimming in the not so pleasant water.
The truck was going on a special barge which is pushed by a tug. The thing was huge and sat very low in the water with all its deliveries. To be honest it didn't look the most stable of things to be parking the truck on. After much manoevering of the barge in the smallest of spaces it was time to load Ithaca. Sadly there was no nice boat ramp in place and Pete drove onto the barge on the narrowest planks of wood which made a horrendous sound as they cracked under neath 18 tonne of truck.
9am Wednesday came and went and we still haven't moved. It didn't really bother me as I was very much enjoying all the sleeping and book reading in the hammock, however a change of scenery would have been welcome. We were then told that it would leave at 3pm, which then came and went and a new departure time of 6pm was announced. By 6pm most of us were watching the barge getting nudged into position in order to leave. We were hoping to be able to wave Pete off with Ithaca but sadly not as the last we saw of him he was off the barge and standing on the bank! We finally departed at 8pm Wednesday, 26 hours after we should have.
It was great to get moving as the river is very smooth and provided us with great viewing of rain and lightning storms. Life on the river was also suprisingly cool and mossie free due to the nice breeze and I hate to say it, but one day it was actually cold! I went to bed the 1st night a little worried about the food on board after we were given noodle soup and found out that we needed to provide our own bowls etc which we didn't have. The soup was horrible so it was crackers for tea instead. What we thought was breakfast was a 6.30 wake up to a whistle blowing and “cafe” being shouted. After no tea the night before I was starving and was not impressed but thankfully Tony brought me a cheese toastie that was discovered on sale at the bar. A great surprise to have woken up from a nap to and a much needed morale boost. Things were looking up from there on as we got 2 meals a day in a tin tray. The meat, rice and spaghetti were edible but I didn't think much of the potato salad and bean additions. It beat crackers though!
After our 1 night docked we spent 3 night cruising and I really enjoyed myself. The hammock was very comfy, maybe a little too comfy as I spent 35 hours solid asleep one day other that waking for food, shower and the toilet. We docked at 4.30am Saturday morning in the city of Manaus which was 12 hours earlier than expected so we spent a few more hours on the boat so that it could get light before we got taxi's to the hostel which I'm in now.
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