Cooks Tree Boa

Eleven days

Transcending the boundary between the Amazon and Muddy Waters of the Rio Tapajos "clear, blue light in the early morning sky, the Royal Princess docked at the port terminal Docas do Para, Santarem in 0846 with two degrees 24 north latitude and 54 arcmin, the position 44 minutes west longitude in the middle of the multitude of small river boats in front of a due-north heading of zero degrees.

brown water, such as the Amazon, flows over sedimentary rocks and then run large amounts of sediment with them, while so-called "black water, like those of the Rio Tapajos itself flows more crystalline rocks and discharge areas heavily wooded. Because of their different density, temperature and acidity, the mixture is resisted for several miles and is finally induced by turbulence.

Founded in 1661, Santarem, located about half way between the two cities of Belem and Manaus Amazon at the junction of the Amazon River and the 15-mile-wide Rio Tapajos, the metropolis is the third largest in the basin, with a population of 265,000 and serves as a gateway to his deepest heart.

In 1927, Henry Ford had obtained 43.000 square miles of rainforest, cleared 50,000 acres of it, and planted three million rubber trees, the construction of a town called "Fordlandia" to facilitate and provide planting mass, but an interval of 17 years and $ 20 million of expenditure had only resulted in failure and he sold the land in Brazil for the paltry sum of $ 250,000.

Santarem population, echoing the Yukon in the late 1800s, exploded overnight with the discovery in 1958, a vein of gold in Itaituba, 60 road miles on the Rio Tapaja³s, serving as the gate entry for thousands of prospectors who traveled by the two rivers and air.

Eleven years later, in 1969, the completion of a road connecting the city of Cuiaba highways Brazil for the first time, although the river still serves as its main artery. Small boats arrive early morning to sell the freshly caught catfish, piranha, and picaruru, among other types, while river boats serve as floating bus for transportation between cities Amazon all day and night, fueled by the floating gas stations.

Santarem is a leading manufacturer of hammocks that offer many advantages over the mattress, they are cool, cheap and portable, even for riverboat trips at night, while the mattress is warm and easy to mold.

The nearby farm of cassava, located on Route Alter Chao and operated by families of peasants, is a series of thatched huts display native fruits, applications of medicinal plants, extraction of rubber trees, and production of cassava flour.

Coupe in the outer bark of the rubber tree produces a red gash, as if it bleeds, and it coagulates slowly in white, rubber latex, which is then extracted.

cassava flour, a staple of the Amazon basin nutrients are processed by a human-powered saw, which cuts the roots of cassava toxicity. This is then pressed his liquid, coarse flour, and roasted before being loaded into bags for transport to market. The operation is entirely outside, in a crude, thatched roof.

When the sun still in the sky pastel had arced to the west in 1700, living in the Amazon port of Santarem, had begun to relax: the three-decked sternwheeler open on the sides, means of connectivity between pockets of civilization along, had long since left their daily schedule, while a truck backed into a well below the imposing Royal Princess cruise ship, had accepted his shipping. The expanses of greenery leading to the town had taken on the velvet greens highlighted horizontally, while the Tapajos river shone a silver mirror. The river was the comm Amazon.