Princess Cruise to Amazon?

[cruiseapril]

Anyone here ever taken a Princess cruise to the Amazon?

[Druke I]

We did the Amazon, on the Pacific Princess (old), Dec 91, Manaus, Brazil to Fort Lauderdale, Fl., and enjoyed it very much.

 

Hot and humid that part of the world, but the river is amazing, particularly the "wedding of the waters", where two rivers, of different colors/salinity/clarity, flow side- by-side for some distance in the same banks.

 

Brazil is extremely fussy about visas, so don't slip up on that part. When we went, we also had to have innoculations for yellow fever, I think typhoid fever, and some anti-malarial pills were prescribed. Required medicines/shots change from time to time, check with health dept or MD shortly before trip.

 

Flight to Manaus was a charter out of Miami, took a load of us down, and returned with a load of disembarking passengers.

 

Interesting & enjoyable trip, but not sure that I would repeat it.

[Pam in CA]

We recently did the Royal Princess from Manaus to Rome. It's a very interesting cruise and something that is a bit out of the ordinary.

 

I've done the Amazon twice at different times of the year with enough of a difference between January and April to make it interesting. The start of rainy season is late December/early January so that there is a difference of feet in the depth of the water in the jungle. You'll undoubtedly take tours on small boats through the jungle.

 

As Michael said, the Meeting of the Waters is awesome. The Rio Negro and the Amazon are totally different and don't mix for hundreds of miles downstream so that you literally have two rivers running side-by-side, one black and clear, the other muddy and sluggish. Manaus is on the Rio Negro and because of the acidity of the water, there are very few bugs. Just a few miles downstream, the Amazon meets the Rio Negro. The Amazon is teeming with life, and bugs.

 

I would recommend a cruise starting in Manaus rather than disembarking Manaus since the charter flights returning to FLL have to wait for the people flying in from FLL before departing. Even if you're on the 1st charter, you will get back to FLL very late and if you're on the 2nd charter, it'll be early the next day before you arrive in FLL.

[shellbeachjim]

We were on the same cruise with Pam and agree the Amazon certainly is different from anywhere else I've been. Yes the rainy season does raise the water level "a bit". When we were there in April, the water was up 45 feet. :eek: If you go, consider taking an excursion on one of the motorized canoes. They hold about 10 people and will give you an appreciation of how large the river is.

 

Here are a couple of links which may be helpful. First one from the South America board. This was someone who went in April 2004.

 

Review of Amazon Ports: Manaus, Boca de Valeria & Recife

 

Here's the roll call for the cruise Pam and I were on. Yes it's in the past, but there's some good information here.

 

Royal Princess April 21, 2005 Manaus to Rome

 

Here's a roll call for next year on the Regal, Ft. Lauderdale to Manaus. I'm with Pam, it's better to start in Manaus than to return from there:

 

REGAL PRINCESS APRIL 7, 2006 Ft. Lauderdale to Manaus

 

Finally, you'll need a Brazilian Visa. There have been a couple of discussions on this recently.

 

Do you need a Brazilian Visa

Visas

 

I feel like Derf!

 

Jim