Rio Madeira exploration

Eventually got off the public ferries up the river and on to our private ferry to explore the area more. Three days of canoe trips, jungle, walking, amd more travel up the river followed. Would love to show you photos of all the dolphins, birds, caiman, and village life we saw or visited but as I said, my camera succumbed to the humidity on the public ferry (or maybe it was all the Brazilian calypso music). Good news is that the camera started working again once we reached dry land at Porto Velho, so hopefully when I report from the Pantanal, some photos will be included. Since getting off the ferry, we spent a couple of anxious days waiting for the truck ferry to arrive with Darryl and Cameron on board. They were supposed to arrive on Saturday, a day before us, but finally arrived Tuesday morning. Gave us a bit of time to explore Porto Velho and had a couple of meals out. First night was a disaster. Went to an all-you-can eat pizzeria. Would have been tricky for a vegetarian at the speed of service. Think I only managed to get two slices of pizza in the 1st hour. The 3 vegetarians in our group then decided to order a separate pizza, only for it to have tuna on it when it arrived. So that went back and a cheese pizza arrived. This was ok but was a long way from the best pizza I´ve ever tasted. The rest of our group were ready to leave the restaurant before we´d really started eating. Night 2 was better though. 5 of us went to small restaurant close to the hotel, and were fed with large omelettes, accompanied by rice and a side order of fries that we all went for because we didn´t know rice was part of the meal. The photo shows some of the mountain of food that was left after we finished eating.

Since then we´ve spent two longs days on the truck travelling south towards the Pantanal. Reached the town of Pocone this afternoon for a quick break, laundry, internet, and a night to catch up on the sleep we´ve missed due to having 5am starts the last two days.