Journey with Christina

Presidente Figueiredo is a sleepy village two hours north of Manaus and sits in the center of an area with more than 150 waterfalls, of which we only saw five. The area is popular with people from the city to get away and cool off on the weekends. We decided to act like the locals and join them for the weekend, dragging Marion who is not comfortable around water, with us.

We arrived to the bus station and grabbed a cab to our hostel, which was actually only a 5-minute walk. After settling in and somehow communicating that we wanted to set up a tour to visit the waterfalls the next day we smartly huffed it back to the bus station to get a taxi to one of the closer waterfalls for the afternoon. The drivers all looked excited when we came back and asked to be taken to Urubui which again was only a 5-minute walk from the bus station, quickly eliminating our short-lived smartness.

This waterfall was set up like a beach and had a natural “water-slide” using the flow from the river. Of course it started raining as soon as we arrived but that did not stop Jon and I from trying it out while Marion watched over.

Natural water slide at Urubui.

The next day we set out early for our tour of a few of the falls that was arranged with the owner of the hostel who actually grew up in town. It was fascinating to learn that the town was only created 20 or so years ago in order to build a dam and an electrical plant. Her family moved to the are from southern Brazil, her mother was a nurse for the local town and her father owned the only restaurant on the lake created by the flooding of the area near the dam. At the time of construction, the town was booming with many jobs. Upon completion of the project many employees lost their jobs and the town fell into disrepair. A revival and cleanup of the area is taking place for the wave of tourists and locals that come to enjoy the waterfalls.

View of lake created by dam from restaurant. Yummy buffet lunch for R$10.

Our first waterfall of the day was Cachoeira Sussuarana, a remote waterfall an hour’s drive away and then a 4 kilometer hike into the woods. As we proceeded into the woods we felt like we were being taken into a secret place. As our luck would have it, and to our guides dismay, Marion fell twice, a branch from a tree high above broke off and nearly missed Jon, and we encountered a snake in the path that refused to move so we had to cut a path in the surrounding woods. No worries though, the owner inquired to a local friend what to do in the future and was told that she needed to carry a stone from the head of a particular fish when she was hiking to ward of snakes.

Snake cutting off the path.

After making it in one piece and not “dying” (Marion almost “died” at least every other day for the duration of our time with her) to the waterfall we were rewarded with a hidden waterfall we had all to ourselves.

Drop after the pool, falls into a natural swimming pool, and Jon and I sitting in what happened to be a large dragon fly worm next. After we were covered with little teeny wiggly worms. From the look on Jon’s face one might have gone where the sun does not shine.

Can’ remember the name of this one.

The next day we went to another gorgeous but popular waterfall. The path to the waterfall had tons of cool caves. At the waterfall you could walk right over to it never even knee deep. I enjoyed the sunshine and the falls while Jon and Marion looked on in the shade bored out of their mind.

Iracema waterfall

Where we stayed, Hostel Presidente Figueiredo, which had a cool hippy vibe, a washing machine for guest use and Netflix. Jon was in heaven and spent several hours sitting watching movies becoming upset when he had to give the room up to some teenagers so he could come have the delicious pizza the owner made us for dinner. We had a private air-conditioned room with a bathroom for about $27 a night without breakfast. The staff were warm and welcoming and the owner spoke English.

Jon and Marion outside the hostel looking slightly happier than they did at the waterfall and the inside hall of the hostel, which used to be a driveway.