I’ll be backpacking through Brazil next week and i’d like to stop by Manaus for a couple days and take a guided trip up the river and through the jungle. I have all of the vaccinations/gear thats needed for the trip, now i’m running into problems with flying in and out and finding a reputable tour operator. Heres what i have to work with so far: I’ll most likely be flying into the Manaus (MAO) airport from Rio (GIG), i’d like to land very early in the morning so i can catch a 7am tour departure. Two days and one night is about all the time i’ll have so i won’t be there for long.
Here are my current problems: Flying in and out of Manaus on TAM airlines is about $370 USD online and $900 USD over the phone. Problem is TAM only accepts Brazilian issued credit cards online and cost is somewhat of an issue. Or i can by an airpass over the phone for $700 USD good for 4 stops. Next problem is finding a reputable tour operator, most of the travel/backpacking forums are full of nothing but spam posts from the tour operators saying how great their tour is or how they got robbed on some other tour.
Anyone have any advice/experience on what airline to take, how/where to book and what tours to go on so i don’t have to cut out this part of the trip?
How much time do you have? I took a bus from Venezuela to Manaus, so I can’t help you on how to fly in there. Manaus is a very cool town. Take a tour of the opera house. You can take a ferry across the convergence of the Rio Negro and the Amazon and watch the surreal border between the cafe au lait muddy waters of the Amazon and the clear but tannin colored waters of the Rio Negro. It takes several miles for the waters to finally mix together.
I took a cargo ship from Manaus about halfway to Peru, stopping at a town with a major wildlife refuge. It was about a 5 day trip and cost next to nothing. You buy a hammock and hang it on the open air passenger deck. It’s sweltering hot and gets boring in a hurry. You’ll see some cool birds and probably both grey and pink river dolphins.
The jungle lodge in the wildlife refuge was completely booked so rather than suffer another 5 or 6 days on a cargo boat, I flew on some jungle puddle jumper up to Iquitos, which is a completely awesome jungle town that is surprisingly cosmopolitan. I think they allowed me to pay for the plane fare with an American Visa card. This was 2002. If it’s still open, go to “The Yellow Rose of Texas”, a bar owned by a super friendly Texan. The cocktail waitresses are “very friendly”. There’s a cool iron building built by Eifel.
I took a speedboat or two up to Tabatinga/Leticia and then stayed at some wildlife jungle lodge in Peru for about 5 days. I didn’t see much there, mostly some monkeys and tons of caimans, which we went hunting for at night. You shine a light on them and then grab them around the neck with your hands. Very fun. I went fishing for pirahna (the easiest fish in the world to catch) and electrical eels, which we didn’t catch any. Supposedly, there are lots of birds, but the day I went for the bird hike, it was raining and so I didn’t see hardly any at all.
I ended up flying to Quito from there.
I doubt that this helps you at all, but have fun.
OK, this is the wildlife refuge I was talking about. This is the one that was fully booked and I did not get to go to. I was told that it was one of the best ones there was. The town is Tefé.