Manaus

[Mapu]

We will be in Manaus on January 5 and January 6. On 1/5 we will be overnighting on the ship and disembarking the morning of the 6th. Our flight is not until shortly after midnight on the 6th 12:50 AM 1/7). We are interested in private tours for both days recognizing our luggage as an issue on our second day. Any suggestions?

Edited May 3, 2013 by Mapu

[ednotmilkman]

Hi Mapu,

 

I have no idea. i'm just looking for preliminary info on possible Amazon River cruises. I'm thinking more toward smaller boats upriver than the big ocean cruise ships. Where have you gotten your information. Is there a Lonely Planet, or similar book about Amazon travels?

[dfb]

We used the Amazon Explorers, whose office was in the Cruise Passengers Terminal building. We booked with the one day for the next day. You may be able to get in touch with them in advance though to make your plans with the luggage. Good luck.

[Mapu]

We have booked with Amazon Riders after communicating with Rafael and set up tours for Jan5 (all day) and a half day city tour on January 6 ending at the Hilton before our flight back to Miami. We decided to relax in the afternoon and having a room to be able to relax and freshen up seemed a good alternative.

[LittleRedJohn]

We cruised the Amazon a couple years ago with Oceania; they had scheduling problems but still we had a fine trip. You might consult TripAdvisor for some side trip recommendations. Do a lot of research and you'll be fine. We were in Manaus for two days, which is a bare minimum of the time you need in my opinion. We used Anavilhanas Eco Turismo. Daniel Barretto was one of our guides. They were great. One day they took us in a motor boat up the river to several villages. Great experience. The next day we had a personal auto tour of Manaus, and the guide was very willing to do what we wanted to do. Also a good experience. In Santarem we used Gil Serique. He's fabulous, you must use him. If the town is small, and we were in a couple of those, you don't need guides. We found people pretty helpful. Some of our fellow passengers who took ship-sponsored side trips told us later they wish they had done early research and signed on with private guides as we did. If you get a couple of other people to go with you, the cost is reasonable.John.

[Mapu]

We cruised the Amazon a couple years ago with Oceania; they had scheduling problems but still we had a fine trip. You might consult TripAdvisor for some side trip recommendations. Do a lot of research and you'll be fine. We were in Manaus for two days, which is a bare minimum of the time you need in my opinion. We used Anavilhanas Eco Turismo. Daniel Barretto was one of our guides. They were great. One day they took us in a motor boat up the river to several villages. Great experience. The next day we had a personal auto tour of Manaus, and the guide was very willing to do what we wanted to do. Also a good experience. In Santarem we used Gil Serique. He's fabulous, you must use him. If the town is small, and we were in a couple of those, you don't need guides. We found people pretty helpful. Some of our fellow passengers who took ship-sponsored side trips told us later they wish they had done early research and signed on with private guides as we did. If you get a couple of other people to go with you, the cost is reasonable.John.

We had fantastic experiences with Gil Serique in Santarem and Rafael's team from Amazon Riders in Manaus. I highly recommend both private tours.