Sunday, August 26th

Today we had reserved for Alter de Chão. At least we were hoping to go if we didn't have anything urgent to get done. And we got to go - woo hoo! It turned out to be a fantastic activity for my last day in Santarém. We took the bus from town, which was very cheap. When you get there you walk down the hill through a little town to the beach, where you find lots of vendors who want to sell you things. I had expected their prices to be jacked up, since we were in a touristy area, but they really weren't bad. I bought a beachy dress as well as some yummy snacks to take on my long trip back home.

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Sunday, August 26th

Today we had reserved for Alter de Chão. At least we were hoping to go if we didn't have anything urgent to get done. And we got to go - woo hoo! It turned out to be a fantastic activity for my last day in Santarém. We took the bus from town, which was very cheap. When you get there you walk down the hill through a little town to the beach, where you find lots of vendors who want to sell you things. I had expected their prices to be jacked up, since we were in a touristy area, but they really weren't bad. I bought a beachy dress as well as some yummy snacks to take on my long trip back home.

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Saturday, August 25th

Today we attempted to get a hold of several people back in Santarém, but didn't have a ton of luck. We ended up not being very productive but having some fun instead! First of all, we got up at 2:30 in the morning and got our bus around 3:30am (okay, so not very fun). The bus was a little late. By the time we arrived in Santarém it was around 6 am. This is just the way the schedule is all the time, which must suck for people like Arimar who seem to take the bus multiple times per week. We went out for breakfast at a random little place across town where our taxi driver took us. (We have our own personal taxi driver now - he gave Angela his number when she took a taxi to go meet the Magnolio from PSA the other night, (with whom she had an appointment but never showed or called to apologize). Pretty much anytime we call he comes and gets us in just a few minutes. It is nice if you don't happen to be on a busy street where you can hail a cab. By the way, taxis are pretty cheap here compared to the US. I would avoid taking one for longer distances, but in town it is not a bad way to go if you are in a hurry or don't know how to get where you are going.

Even though we were really tired after breakfast, we couldn't go back to our hotel because check in wasn't until noon. So we did some shopping for a couple hours. When it was finally noon we went back to our hotel for a nice nap.

In the evening we went to a restaurant out by the water where I had a couple of traditional Brazilian things. One was a really strong drink made from sugar cane, and for food we had some sort of fish thing.

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Saturday, August 25th

Today we attempted to get a hold of several people back in Santarém, but didn't have a ton of luck. We ended up not being very productive but having some fun instead! First of all, we got up at 2:30 in the morning and got our bus around 3:30am (okay, so not very fun). The bus was a little late. By the time we arrived in Santarém it was around 6 am. This is just the way the schedule is all the time, which must suck for people like Arimar who seem to take the bus multiple times per week. We went out for breakfast at a random little place across town where our taxi driver took us. (We have our own personal taxi driver now - he gave Angela his number when she took a taxi to go meet the Magnolio from PSA the other night, (with whom she had an appointment but never showed or called to apologize). Pretty much anytime we call he comes and gets us in just a few minutes. It is nice if you don't happen to be on a busy street where you can hail a cab. By the way, taxis are pretty cheap here compared to the US. I would avoid taking one for longer distances, but in town it is not a bad way to go if you are in a hurry or don't know how to get where you are going.

Even though we were really tired after breakfast, we couldn't go back to our hotel because check in wasn't until noon. So we did some shopping for a couple hours. When it was finally noon we went back to our hotel for a nice nap.

In the evening we went to a restaurant out by the water where I had a couple of traditional Brazilian things. One was a really strong drink made from sugar cane, and for food we had some sort of fish thing.

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Friday, August 24th

This morning we went to Ibama, the Brazilian Ministry of the Environment, to purchase our permits to enter the nature reserve in which Maguary is located. We were running rather late, and by the time we got there I realized that I was supposed to have brought my passport and didn't. But they gave me the permit anyways, phew! We caught the bus from the other side of town. When the bus stopped for a break, we realized that Arimar, the Manager of Couro Ecológica, whom we were going to Maguary to meet, was in fact on the bus. He spotted us and came to introduce himself. The bus took a couple of hours.

When we got to Maguary, I realized how different it was from Suruacá. First of all, Arimar got off the bus before we did - he is in the same community but lives way down the road from other people in the community. Thus Maguary is a lot more spread out. It doesn't have that same tightly-knit community feel that Suruacá did.

We got off at the stop for Dona Idu's house, the woman that we would be staying with. We are only here for one night, which is a bit odd, but due to the bus schedule and the timing of my flight back to Rio, that is the only way we could work it. I think Angela will be coming back, though.

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