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Composed of 2,999 unique reefs, and 900 islands spread over 2,600 Kilometers, a countless amount of wildlife call the reef home.

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Logs & Blogs

'A decade later, the journey continues'

Dec 18, 2011

Janot, Rio Negro

It was ten years ago now that I first arrived in Manaus aboard Blakexpeditions’ Seamaster. We stopped here for a couple of days, after motoring up the Amazon from Belem.

We had to get more food, fuel and equipment along with the rest of the team before starting our trip up the Rio Negro. The 3600 meter long bridge crossing the river did not exist at that time. It only opened to the public a few months ago.

We visited all the markets, including the fish market to get our supplies, and I remember being amazed by the size of the different fish we saw there. Tambaki, Pirarucu and Tucunare were huge and looked both impressive and awesome. Tambaki, a huge fruit eater fish, is still of respectable size on the plinth, but both Pirarucu (the biggest fish in the Amazon, able to reach 3 meters and over and 250 Kilograms), and Tucunare (Peacock-Bass) along with all the different catfish, are drastically downsizing. I had the frightening feeling that it certainly shows the effects of industrial fishing in these waters. As for the Tambaki, fish farming has been a success in the region, but with this industry comes huge downsides, such as drainage and pollution of the many creeks that provide water to the Caboclos (mix-race inhabitants of the Amazon) and their crops.

With Blakexpeditions, we discovered Novo Airao, where our guide Miguel Rocha has his foundation. It was a small, peaceful village, mainly dependent upon boat-building. Today, this activity is slowly dying.

Since the bridge on the river was built, Novo Airao has become more tourism oriented, and the people from Manaus come here over the week-ends to enjoy the beach and the river as it is only three hours away from the big city. Although this increased activity has provided locals with bigger incomes, new shops and thriving "pousadas" (local equivalent to a Bed&Breakfast), it brings many side-problems like drug consumption and prostitution.

This year’s expedition took us to Santa Helena where we also had a stop ten years ago. A decade ago, it was a nice little town with a small church and a school. There now remains a few families, but no more church. Luckily, one of the youngsters came back from Manaus where she had studied, and now teaches the one dozen kids left in the village, who themselves dream of escaping to the big city.

I think the main reasons for that desertion is firstly, that the river can no longer provide the families with the fish they need to survive, nor can they sell fish to acquire the extra money they need to buy fuel for their engines and the village generator. This is primarily due to the industrial overfishing taking place in the entire region. Secondly, there is television, which entered all the households, bringing along with it false pictures and advertising, enticing the children to dream about a better life in a bigger place.

Sadly, the reality is that most of them will find unemployment, misery, drugs and prostitution in bigger city centers.

Barcelos was also a place we visited in 2001. The main income there was coming from the trade of aquarium fish, which were exported by the millions.

This trade still exists and does well; however a new activity has developed, Game-Fishing charters for the infamous "Tucunare", the Amazonian "peacock-bass". I saw up to a dozen big boats along with some huge river-resorts offering their services at different levels of quality and price. Let's hope that they respect the advertising rule they gave themselves, ”strict catch and release sport fishing”.

From Barcelos, Seamaster had traveled up to Santa Isabel, and we ventured there again on this trip. Ten years ago it was a very small town, with inhabitants living on the “Piaçaba”, a fiber collected from a palm-tree and used to make brooms and ropes. Back then, the town had an almost ghostly feeling with its empty streets at the hottest hours of the day. I was pleased to discover that it is now a nice little place with very clean streets and a brand new commercial wharf. Shops are everywhere and very colourful, there are public rubbish-bins every hundred meters or so (which is seldom seen in Brazil), and the people look very busy and happy there, having added to their traditional trade the aquarium fish and game fishing charter industries.

Sao Gabriel de Cachoeira was this time the furthest we went on the river. This is a medium-sized city, very busy with a huge military garrison, whose role is to control and survey the borders of Venezuela and Colombia a hundred kilometers north. This is an area currently used by the drug Cartels to try and smuggle their products out of Colombia.

Sao Gabriel is also the gate for tourism up to the “Pico da Neblina”, the highest mountain in Brazil at 3014 meters.

I did not notice a lot of changes after all these years, with its busy town center and a nice but somewhat decayed waterfront area, where people gather on the beach and at night in the bars, on week-ends, espcially during the low-water season.

I am now comfortably installed for a few days at the Pousada "Chez Les Rois” in Manaus, trying to understand all the information and feelings I did gather during my return to the fantastic Rio Negro region, in the State of the Amazonas, Brazil.

I spoke a lot with Miguel our guide, who at around seventy years old has spent about forty years guiding people on the Amazon, Rio Negro and Solimoes, along with many of their thousands of tributaries. This includes Jacques-Yves Cousteau, Sir Peter Blake and a number of film crews from the BBC, National Geographic and other well-known production companies. He helps me in my task with his knowledge and wisdom.

He tells me about the changes himself noticed through the times. He says that the sudden storms we encountered in a couple of occasions, able to sink a boat, are more and more common and more and more violent. He thinks, as do I, that is related to global warming. We both can only deplore deforestation and its side effects, such as the destruction of the soils and washing away of the lands by the heavy rains. He is trying to fight it, with his foundation, by planting trees and teaching the children the ways to protect the forest and grow crops in a sustainable way.

We talk of the over-fishing of these waters by huge companies, which are making enormous profits by emptying the numerous lakes and lagoons of the region. They use thousands of kilometers of nets, depriving the locals of their main food and income supply, forcing them towards the cities.

He says that the laws protecting this area are already existing, but can only notice there is just too little or no people to control and enforce them and certainly not enough political will to do so.