Sailing along the Marañon river

December 19, 2008.

After we left Nauta, the ferry headed to the Marañon river, another tributary of the Amazonas river. The travel was slow, and peaceful, in moments it can be bored, because the only things you see are trees, and forest… so you kill the time chatting with another passengers or just lay down in you hammock, although I should say it’s hard to keep in your hammock when it’s very hot….

These days were stressful because most of the passengers wanted to be in Yurimaguas really soon, passengers said the sooner the better! Christmas day was very close, so they were asking about what could be the options to take a bus or car to get to Tarapoto. Yurimaguas is located in Loreto department, so we can see it’s still low forest… There’s a road that takes you to Tarapoto and Moyobamba, both cities in San Martin department, and it’s in the high forest. Some passengers in the ferry were talking about the bad conditions along the road to Tarapoto, and the fixings in the road the IIRSA NORTE project was doing. Even they were talking about a limit time to cross the fixing points… just 5 hours during a day… that kind of news made the passengers more stressed, and really anxious to get to Yurimaguas, and buy a ticket to different cities.

The travel from Iquitos to Yurimaguas lasts around 3 nights, 4 days by ferry. During the travel, and included in your ticket, you get 3 meals… a breakfast, lunch, and dinner… but really it’s 100% better if you take your own food, and bottled water… because for every meal, we had to make a line, and have our own plate (or bowl), and spoon… It was very uncomfortable for me to make a line, and get the meal that way, but.. I decided to take it easy, and just follow the flow…

We did some stops in between, but the principal one was when we got to San Regis community. It is a small community, basically farmers, but they are aware of every ferry that touch the port because it’s the opportunity to get an extra income… so when they know they day a ferry is getting, lot of communards are waiting with lot of things to sell…

By the time we were in San Regis, around noon, passengers were hungry, so when the ferry was at the port you can see a fast running to the ferry… kids, women, men… all running to get a client, and passenger trying to find something to eat. One thing about it, it’s that you have to be used to this kind of food because it’s prepared in poor healthy conditions, you don’t know if they boiled the water, or if they cooked in a clean pot or things like that… so It’s my advice for new travelers not to try that kind of food, it could send you to the toilet at once!

These pictures show how the communards were expecting the ferry, and the rush to get a client.

San Regis community

 

Running to get clients

 

different kind of things

 

closer view of the vendors

 

leaving San Regis

 

Leaving San Regis

 

The ferry was in the community around 40 minutes or more, accepting more passengers, uploading, and downloading things, or products. When everything was ready, we left San Regis heading to another community.

My plans to be in Lima before Christmas were changing due to the time I was taking to complete the tour, and because I was discovering new places, and knowing new people, making new friends, and having fun… I was calculating just some hours in Yurimaguas, then a few more hours to get to Tarapoto, take a bus to Chiclayo, and then heading to Lima so I could be by Christmas at home…. Well, that was my plan…

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