Our breakfast in the Pinnacle Grill was a strange experience this morning. One thing we learned was that if you do not have a menu handed to you, all of the waiters will assume you have ordered your food. There does not seem to be one waiter that deals with us, but a team of them. Sometimes, like today, it doesn't work so well.
We sort of knew that when we were asked if we needed the menu, saying no was a mistake. With the exception of two daily specials, we have the menu memorized. Our yogurt and berries arrived as usual, as did the coffee and the orange juice. Then we waited to place our order. And waited and waited. Finally we had to ask for any waiter to take our order, since they all assumed we had done it already. One of us ordered a simple breakfast of bacon and eggs with an English muffin. Then a skillet breakfast was ordered without bell peppers and no chips. Well when it arrived, it consisted of potatoes and onions, with 2 eggs on top. No ham, no cheese. And served on an appetizer-sized plate. The waiter had dropped the food off, then disappeared. Almost an hour had elapsed since we came into the restaurant at this point. We were not alone since the couple at the table behind us was waiting for tea and pastries for 20 minutes.
We questioned the waiter on the skillet breakfast, and he sent Tina to talk to us. We told her in the nicest way that there was a miscommunication about what was ordered and what was delivered. Tina offered to replace the "appetizer" with a real skillet breakfast, but we declined. She promised to look into why that happened, apologizing for the waiter's mix-up. We recently spent 77 days on the Volendam, where we had the same waiter for breakfast everyday. They did not have the entire staff waiting on each and every customer. Sometimes when things work well, why change it? Not a big deal, we will survive and try to keep our orders as simple as possible from here on out.
So today's port was the small city of Parintins, made famous for their Boi Bumba Festival. It is a well-known music and dance competition that is held here every year in the month of June. There are two competing teams that vie for the best costumes and dances. The theme is surrounded with folklore of a resurrected ox with each side either a blue ox or a red ox. The company Coca-Cola picked up on this and created cans of red or blue for the opposing teams. The soda happens to be the biggest seller in Brazil. When the night time festival happens, it produces half of the town's income in 2 weeks. It is also second to the festival of Carnaval. Flamboyant costumes, dances, singing, and floats are created year round in this community of 100,000 people.
The biggest and most impressive Bumbodromo stadium is located here. It seats 35,000 people and it is where the competition takes place. We have seen it on past stops here and discovered it was built in the shape of a bull's head. Today we hiked to it in the steamy humid heat of the day.
This was a tender port, where we were brought to shore, then transferred to a local wooden ferry to pass through it and onto the floating pier. A long ramp took us up to the main road where the souvenir tents were located. Right out of the terminal building was the Convention Center where later at 2pm, a performance of singers and dancers put on a show for the guest that paid for this shore excursion. The cost was $100 for 90 minutes and it included the local drink of caipirinha. The other option was taking a triciclo ride, similar to a tuk-tuk ride. They hold two people and can be operated with a guide pedaling a bicycle or driving a motorcycle. A group of 20 triciclos passed by us as we hiked to the small church to the left. This tour was also 90 minutes for $45.
Walking through the town, we made our way to the street above the river where we saw some restaurants and the local plaza for concerts. Many small cafes lined this road. Following the map, we made our way up some side streets where we found piles of garbage, some bagged, some not, laying outside the homes and cafes. Much of it had been scattered, and we assumed it was by the roaming dogs. But to our surprise, we discovered it was the vultures that got into it. Looking down the banks of the river, we saw so much garbage floating in the river, it was off-putting to say the least. Much of it was bits and pieces of floating Styrofoam like we saw in Manaus. Locals paid no attention to this because the river takes it all downstream eventually.
The highlight of this town has to be their cathedral, Catedral Nossa Senhora do Carmen, reportedly the largest church in Parintins. It was a modern design and rather simple on the inside. The only stained glass was over the altar. The wooden pews were carved up with names of many local kids we assume. Even with the high vaulted ceiling, it was extremely warm in there. Fans were mounted at each station of the cross, but were not running. Sitting outside to cool off in the slight breeze, we chatted with a group of fellow guests who were trying to find their way to the Bumbodromo. Our maps claimed it was a 1.1 mile walk from the terminal. We think they were off by a mile or more. We all headed the way the map indicated, and finally reached the stadium. Knowing there was not much to see since it was closed, we turned around and and headed back.
Running into Martha and Bob, we all headed back down the ramp to the waiting tender boat. Lined up outside the Convention Center was the group that paid to see the show. This was the perfect time to head back and fill up on something ice cold like Cokes. We agreed that this port might be one we could have skipped, although we are sure some folks will think otherwise. By the way, we did see video of the costumes, singing, and dancing from our buddies that attended the show. It was just as we expected it to be. No more, no less.
Lunch was from the Dive-In with really quick service. We had hot dogs and a cheeseburger, and a shared order of sticky clumps of fries. Of course, we kept busy with photos and reports for the remainder of the afternoon. After a three hour walk in the steamy Amazon heat, we appreciated the coolness of our stateroom. And speaking of staterooms, there was a funny request leading The Daily newsletter today. It said, when going ashore, please remember to carry your stateroom. Oh that's going to be a hard thing to do….LOL. Of course, it meant please carry your stateroom keycard.
The ship turned around in the river around 6 pm and headed back down towards our final stop in Santarem tomorrow. The sun went down shortly after, but not quite as spectacular as last night's display. Captain Frank mentioned that the clocks will go forward one hour tonight. Like it or not, we have to do it.
Dinner was good with smoked chicken as our appetizer along with a nice green salad with green beans and dried cranberries. Balsamic vinaigrette made it even better. Our entrees were the Club Orange special of sliced lamb and white beans. Very tasty. Desserts were one scoop of orange sorbet, and a conservative slice of a chocolate torte. We are pleased that the portions are smaller for dessert. Hot coffee topped off the dinner.
The entertainer was the comedian Sid Davis, but we think that many folks were done-in from today's heat and may have missed the later show. We know we did.
Bill & Mary Ann
