«	2001 September	»
«	29th	»
	Saturday

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Saturday September 29th, 2001

It’s Sunday onboard Seamaster - a day off for many of the crew - a day to attend to personal items, sleep late, visit the market, read a book, swim in the yacht club pool - or do nothing much.

But the generators still needed their oil and filters changed in preparation for the hot days ahead - so Alistair and Rob have been sweating it out in the engine room, making sure that everything is in order.

As I write this, Paulo is in the galley preparing lunch (the main meal of the day) and some of us have just returned from a morning with Miguel (our guide) to the market.

The best time for this was to start early - so at 0800 we were ashore and standing at the entrance to the yacht club while we waited for our taxi. A pile of horse dung was heaped in the middle of the pavement - while the animal itself (someone referred to it as a “bag of bones”) wandered slowly along the curb nibbling grass from small clumps growing at the side of the road. It occasionally strayed into the middle of the road - but the buses and cars just drove around it and no-one paid it any attention.

The roads were nearly empty - being a Sunday morning - and we were soon passing through the centre of the city - with some very pretty architecture of Portuguese influence of more than a century and a half ago - much wrought iron work, and tree lined squares.

It was only about 15 minutes to the edge of the market - which sprawled through several streets but with much of the focus being around the fishing boats jammed together at the dock - and the large under-cover fish market.

We saw fish we have never seen before; some very small, some huge; some, like the piranha, with very sharp teeth and legendary biting power. Some eat only fruit, while some are far more voracious.

Many of the small fishing boats were deeply laden, with their crews getting the on-deck charcoal barbecues going for lunch. Most were wooden, perhaps no more than 10 metres long, with very little freeboard showing above the river. Some were brightly painted; some had obviously seen little, if any, paint in many years.

Most of the spindly masts were held up by cords tensioned by old-fashioned deadeyes - disks made from wood with holes that the tensioning line is passed through.

We understood why these craft give a very poor echo on our radar screen - because there is almost no metal to reflect the radar beams.

We will have to be extra careful when we head up river, as these boats often don’t carry any lights at night. The river is their highway - with vast amounts of traffic as far as Manaus, 1000 miles away - so our watches will need to be carried out with a lot of care - and the extensive use of the searchlight during the dark hours.

But back to the market:

The fish looked as though they had all been caught this morning - shining fresh in very orderly piles. Some were covered in sharp spikes, some had thick armour-plated scales, some looked very prehistoric, most were obviously highly adapted to the conditions in the river and the jungle. There were also large bins full of mud crabs - 5 for 1 Real - all waving their pinchers in the air.

The undercover fish market was buzzing with activity - there were many stalls around the perimeter of the building, the top of which was fully vented to provide a good airflow. The concrete stalls catered for fish that ranged from diminutive shrimps to the largest Pirarucu - that can reach 3 metres in length. There were enormous thick white fillets of this enormous Amazon River fish on sale - alongside the considerably smaller but still large fruit eating Tambaqui.

Prices seemed very cheap to us, ranging from approx US40 cents to US$1.60 per kilo for the overall range of fish.

We wandered outside through the many varied fruit and vegetables stalls - made from rough timber, sacks, cardboard, plastic and tin - with Miguel getting us to try things we have never tasted before. We bit into the tiny yellow flowers of the small green Jambu’ plant - and found that our mouths were tingling and almost fizzing from the effect for the next half hour or so. We sampled strange fruits that were very refreshing, and scrapped the brown “powder” from around the outside of the nut that was enclosed inside the very hard outer husk of the Jatoba’ fruit - that took a hammer to break in the first place. The “powder” tasted strong and sweet, but I’m not sure if I will put it on my favourite’s list.

There were racks of spices, cheeses, vegetables, fruit, nuts, clothing, meat (cooked, raw, salted - of rather strange hues), the Belem equivalent of “fast food” stalls, and a woman who offered us the magnificent pale grey and silver skin of a boa constrictor complete with head and a full set of very sharp teeth - for 60 Reals (about US$24) - or a smaller skin without a head for 20.

Stores stocked cast-iron charcoal-fired clothing irons, huge spun aluminium pots, a mangle, gas stoves, shoes, boots, jungle medicines, 33rpm long playing records of way-before-my-time, and hats, bags, and so on.

People in the market recognised us from a local television programme last night - the TV crew had a good look onboard Seamaster. But some also knew - from the same programme, that we were interested in buying more hammocks.

We eventually arrived at a good deal and 7 were carried away to be placed in the boot of the car - while Miguel went in search of an extra bag of oranges, some small but very special fish, and some tropical herbs of distinctive flavour.

We came back to Seamaster loaded with many items.

The deck now has a lot more hammocks strung up than this morning - in the cool of the breeze but out of the sun under the big awning they are proving their worth. The sun passes just about directly overhead at noon each day - our individual shadows are almost non-existent.

All of the big extract fans are keeping the airflow going through the interior of our vessel - I have a cool breeze passing over me from the hatch in the deck just in front of the computer - but all of our hatches also have insect screens on them for when the insects start getting interested in us. For now we haven’t been worried by them at all - the continuous breeze has been keeping them away, and by being well out in the river means there is less chance of trouble. But we know that the problems with insects will increase as we head west. So we are getting prepared.

I was sitting on deck under the awning before lunch - putting my thoughts for today’s Log down on paper - and looking away from the city - looking south across the Rio Para at the far shore about 2/3rd of a mile away. It’s a shore with the dark green of the jungle right down to the water’s edge.

This afternoon it is very warm and sticky - but each afternoon has been much the same.

To try and work after lunch doesn’t make much sense and only produces an enormous amount of sweat and a big thirst. So from tomorrow we plan to get more in rhythm with our surroundings and rise with the sun at 6am - to get most jobs completed before the heat and humidity take over.

The evenings are a delicious temperature - with a few degrees drop to around 30 deg C making life onboard very pleasant indeed. Last night the outside fell to around 25 deg C - and it felt cold - even in the cabins. Some in the hammocks on deck took to wearing their polar jackets.

Rodger, Janot and Rob have now installed the new water purification system developed for us by a New Zealand company - to allow us to pump the river water directly into our tank but removing all the silt and “bugs” and treating it on the way through with an ultra-violet sterilizer.

Our foredeck awning has been built to become a water catchment device - and has a pipe in the centre that leads through a valve and filters and the sterilizer down to the tank. We haven’t tried it yet but I am sure that when the rain does come, it will be very heavy and help to top the tank in a very short time.

But there has been little rain so far - quite unexpected. We thought we would be in for definite solid downpours every afternoon - but so far nothing more than a few bursts.

Lunch is now over - a Brazilian meat stew with rice and manioc and many other ingredients that we are not used to - but that were delicious.

Followed up by a local type of crème caramel (also by Paulo) we are now replete.

Seamaster has become quiet again - a nice change.

The hammocks are full. Some crew are catching up on sleep lost during watches that we run all night - every night - even at anchor. We need to continue to be very vigilant and are making sure we keep fully aware of the dangers that do exist for the unwary in this part of the world.

We have yacht club members coming this evening at 7pm, so a few winks now will help later for when temperatures cool and our visitors arrive. Yachtsmen from here in Belem will get to visit Antarctica for the first time - through our onboard video footage taken those seemingly many months ago.

Now is a very different time altogether.

Until the next Log,

All the best,

Peter.

7pm: It’s suddenly started to rain VERY hard - the boys are up on deck whooping with joy as the water cascades off the awnings. The forward collection device is getting a try-out. Lightning is flashing all around us.

PS: PLEASE NOTE: This Log follows Log Number 109. We are still learning about the new system, so please bear with us.

Sir Peter Blake

"Having vision is not enough. Change comes through realising the vision and turning it into a reality. It is easy to espouse worthy goals, values and policies; the hard part is implementation."

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