The Insider’s Guide to Manaus for the Adventurous Budget Traveler
Written: Jan 06 '03
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Rich local culture: music, food, native fruits, fish, river beaches
Cons: Hot and humid climate, slower pace of life (if that doesn't suit you!)
The Bottom Line: This review should help you find and understand more of the interesting local color in Manaus than you would from a tourist package, from local beaches to native fruits....
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| ilselieve's Full Review: The Amazon |
I was a resident in Manaus from 1999 to 2002 and noticed that most tourists miss a lot of Manaus’s local character by staying outside town in the Tropical Hotel and shuttling upriver directly to Ariaú Towers. I’ve put together a guide that will hopefully provide pointers for those who can’t afford Ariau’s and the Tropical’s prices, or who simply want to see more of what Manaus is about….
PLACES TO GO
Praia da Lua, Praia do Tupé
Rent a motorboat from the end of the Ponta Negra to get to these destinations. When the river is down, these white sand beaches are beautiful. The river water is warm and the color of black tea. Weekdays the beaches are less noisy.
Encontro das Aguas (Meeting of the Waters)
If you’re lucky enough, you may have seen this from the plane into Manaus, the spot where the Rio Solimões (as the Amazon is called upstream from Manaus) meets the Rio Negro. Different water densities, velocities, and temperatures mean that the waters don’t mix for a distance. You see a defined border between the chocolate milk of the Solimoes and the black tea color of the Rio Negro. To see this from a boat, you can take $200 a day excursions from the Tropical Hotel, or else take a taxi or bus to CEASA, the departure point for boats to cross the river to the road connection to Porto Velho (no longer passable). From there you can negotiate a cheap price to take a river boat to the nearby Meeting of the Waters (only 30 minutes).
CIGS Zoo (Center for Instruction in Jungle Warfare)
This zoo is located near the Ponta Negra and has the largest collection of animals, including many jaguars. Their facilities are improving and expanding, but some jaguars are still kept in inadequate conditions.
Ponta Negra
The Ponta Negra is a tourist and recreation area on the shores of the Rio Negro a bit distant from the city center. There is a beach for swimming when the river is low. There are lots of cultural offerings in the amphitheater, and many small restaurants and bars. At 6 p.m. on Sundays, capoeira is played, a beautiful acrobatic game that originated with African descendants in Brazil. It is compared to some eastern martial arts, but has the distinction of having rhythm, musical accompaniment, and singing.
Beside the capoeira ring, the Barraca da Baiana serves traditional food from the northeast of Brazil. An array of savory foods and desserts are available. Especially recommended: the peppery “come-quem-pode” from Bahia!
Parque do Mindu
This park was conserved by a local resident and activist when one of the last remaining patches of forest in the city was going to be developed. The entrance fee is only a few reais, and there is a network of trails, an orchid garden, and a small library to enjoy. You may see sloths, monkeys, caimans, and macaws on your walk. Many of the tree species are identified, with interesting information on their use.
Buses from the Center of town to Mindu: 422, 427, 315, 317, or 423
Bosque da Ciência
This natural history park contains some interesting animals may you not see elsewhere – river otters and manatees. The first river manatee born in captivity was born here. There are interpretive signs and also pequeno guias available, “little guides”, who are school children who participate in an environmental education program. They can lead groups on an interpretive walk. A small museum hosts the largest leaf, an enormous alligator head, and other curiosities….
Any bus to the Bola do Coroado will get you within close walking distance.
Natural History Museum
This museum was founded by Japanese-Brazilians on the eastern side of town. The fish and insect collections are stunning and beautifully preserved. They also sell beautiful orchids.
To get within walking distance of the museum, take bus number 519. A taxi from the Bola do Coroado is another option.
Centro Cultural Palacio Rio Negro
This beautifully restored private residence hosts poorly-attended but excellent offerings in theater, dance, art. Often entrance is free or nearly free. During the day on weekdays you can see demonstrations of traditional methods, such as guaraná making or Brazil nut shelling.
Located downtown.
Opera House
This is the most well known landmark in Manaus. A beautiful ornate theater built during the rubber boom. It has been restored and hosts lots of big acts here. Reserve tickets ahead if you want to assure a good seat. The best views are from the ground floor and from the seats in the back on the other floors. Be prepared for cold temperatures if you’re seated on the bottom floor, and warm if you’re above….
Flutuante do Adão (Adam’s Floating Bar)
This is a spot a tourist would never happen upon…. It’s a small floating bar and 4-room hotel on the other side of the river from the boat port of the Santo Antonio neighborhood of Manaus. There you can order fish to eat, drinks, sunbathe, swim, or borrow Adão’s canoes and kayaks to explore the area. Rooms have private baths and a bed in front of an enormous screened window that looks out on the birds and floating plants. Rooms are reasonably priced at around $R20 a night.
Take the ferry from Santo Antônio (pedestrians go free) to Cacau Pireira, and from there rent a boat to take you to wherever Adão is floating….
Sunday Fair
As part of a plan to revitalize downtown, Sunday mornings a successful cultural fair is hosted downtown. There are places for children to play, theater, food booths, craft booths, and displays of capoeira.
SHOPPING
Amazonas Shopping
“Amazonas Shopping” is a large mall extremely popular on weekends. This is where you would get Brazilian fashion, appliances from the local manufacturing industry, and imported food. There is a shop selling local artisan crafts, books, etc., called Eco-Shop, and it is a convenient and safe place to shop, however you can find most of the items at the downtown market (mercadão) for a fraction of the price.
Zona Franca
Zona Franca is a section of downtown that sells merchandise manufactured in Manaus. The prices are cheap compared to the rest of Brazil, but are not likely cheaper than in the U.S. The exception to this is the CD’s. There are several CD stores downtown (Disco Laser) with low-priced Brazilian music mixed in with lightly-used CD’s of American music in an incredibly eclectic mix. Prices here range from 2 to 12 reais – 1 to 6 dollars.
Bate-palmas
Clothing is the other cheaply-priced merchandise downtown. The stores to visit are the “bate-palmas” where someone is stationed at the open storefront giving a spiel or clapping their hands (hence the name) to draw you in to the store. Especially low-priced are the fashions for colder climates, that somehow still find their way to Manaus, but don’t sell very well! I got a number of hooded wool sweaters here for $R3 apiece (US$1.50).
Mercadão
The downtown market is an extremely colorful covered market near the waterfront. Go early to see the fish catches: matrinxã, tambaquí, pirarucú, surubim. Here you can find all kinds of trinkets, foods, and natural medicine: shellacked piranhas, love potions, seed jewelry, bows and arrows, Brazil nut cases with Brazil nuts inside, smoked guaraná logs, pirarucú tongues and scales, açaí by the liter, bead curtains, medicinal andiroba and copaiba oils, and different kinds of farinha (manioc meal).
SERVICE
Don’t be offended if service doesn’t live up to North American expectations. Often it’s expected that it’s the patron’s job to get the attention of the waiter or salesperson. (Hissing is a common technique!)
Efficiency is a cultural value; time is something that is shared generously in Manaus.
There is a bewildering bureaucracy in many of the stores downtown: (1) Choose your item with the help of a salesperson, (2) Take ticket to cashier’s booth, pay, (3) Receive recept, (4) Take receipt to wrapping booth, (5) Show your receipt and retrieve item.
PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION
Taxis
I’ve never had a taxi driver try to cheat on the fare or route. One can pre-set the fare before getting in by negotiating a set price. You could ask, for example, “How much would you charge to take me to the downtown market?” If the response was $R12, for example, you could ask if he would settle for $R10. Or you could ask for a discount. Depending on the current regulations, you might get 10% off any fare above $R7. The radio taxis are usually more reliable in terms of car maintenance, seat belt availability, and a/c. Get a card from a taxi driver you like with a cell phone and call him when you need him. Or a toll-free radio taxi number. You can expect from between town and the airport to pay $R35 (2002).
Buses
The bus system beats the bus system in most American cities of this size. The fare is R$1.20 and you can get most anywhere you want to go…. Ask someone at the bus stop how to get where you’re going. I’ve never laid my eyes on a bus route map or printed information. Board at the back of the bus, give your fare to the fare collector, go through the turnstile. Get off at the front of the bus. If you don’t know where to get off, you can ask the fare collector or the bus driver, or another passenger, to let you know.
Driving
Be very wary of other drivers, the city did not grow up with cars, and the drivers take high risks.
FOOD
Main dishes in Manaus have little variety to a North American palate, typically beans, rice, potato salad, and manioc flour with either beef, chicken, or fish. The food to explore in Manaus, however, is from the street vendors and marketplace. It comes from rich local and northeastern traditions.
Examples:
Tapioquinha – glutinous pancakes made from manioc starch; usually buttered and filled with tucumã palm fruit and farmer’s cheese (personal favorite!)
Tacacá – a soup local to the Amazon region: a tangy broth made from the juice extracted from manioc processing, a gum in the bottom of the dish from manioc starch, leaves from jambú, a slightly narcotic leaf that makes your tongue buzz, and salty dried shrimp floating on top.
Pamonha – green corn and coconut milk boiled in corn husks (can choose savory or sweet)
Bolo de macaxeira – a glutinous translucent oily cake made from manioc; tasty but heavy
Caldo de cana - juice pressed on the spot from sugar cane, muddy green-looking and sweet; usually accompanied with something deep-fried....
The region produces an awesome array of forest fruits (highly seasonal). Iron-rich açaí, cupuaçu—an aromatic relative of cacao, ingá the ice cream bean, sticky abiu.
Cupuaçú – creamy white with a flowery medicinal flavor
Pupunha – a buttery, corn-flavored palm fruit
Sorva – snotty texture, sweet
Mapatí – resemble bronzed grapes;
Good places for regional-type foods are
Açaí e Companhia (nice atmosphere and music)
Casa da Sopa (soup buffet; HIGHLY RECOMMENDED)
Canto da Peixada (variety of local fish dishes)
For international food, the Miako and Suzuran offer Japanese food; there’s a Korean restaurant on the “Boulevard”, superb Italian food at Gianni's, and there is a home that serves Peruvian food downtown near Cortez Casa de Câmbio.
CULTURAL EVENTS
Festivals
Festivals are usually held in the Sambódromo, a huge stadium on Rua Constantino Nery. Carnaval is held here, and many other festivals, including Manaus’s popular boi.
Dancing
Upscale: the Tropical Hotel’s dance floor
Middle class: Tukannu’s, Coração Blue near the Ponta Negra
General public: Deus Me Livre, Municipal, Meu Dengo, Kitabom
Most adventurous: the Casa do Terror, a cobwebbed hole-in-the-wall near the Bola da SUFRAMA where a shirtless Cearense in a cowboy hat spins old LP’s of boleros and bregas.
WHAT TO WEAR
The climate is very hot and humid. Packing thin, light-colored clothing will help you suffer the least during the day. There is little cotton or natural fiber clothing available in Manaus, so don’t count on being able to pick up something on short notice. People seem to prefer synthetic materials, which have the advantage of drying easily without molding….
SAFETY
I haven’t heard of violent crimes against tourists in Manaus. However, avoid robbery by avoiding crowded (or deserted) places. From 5-7 p.m. and 7-8 a.m., the buses are packed with people going to and from work, so try to avoid needing public transportation during this time. In a year of using buses daily, I was pickpocketed twice, once by a well-dressed teenager on a crowded bus, another time by 2 middle-aged women pretending to look at wooden spoons in the market.
WHERE TO GO FROM MANAUS
Presidente Figueiredo – town of beautiful waterfalls 100 km north of Manaus
Praia do Tupé – nearby white sand beach
Manacapurú – Paraiso d’Angelo chalets on black water
Parintins – boi festival in June
Maués –guaraná festival
Venezuela by bus, 16 hours
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Students
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Epinions.com ID:
ilselieve
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Member: ilse ackerman
Location: Harrisonburg, Virginia
Reviews written: 7
Trusted by: 0 members
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