Jericoacora and Beyond

Well once Mitch and I were all rested up and recovered from our week of partying and consequential colds, we set out to explore the glories of Jericoacora. Turns out Jeri, being the isolated and touristy town that it is, is quite able to charge absolutely rediculous prices for most tourist attractions, so we (or rather our wallets) decided that we didn´t really need to rent quads or dune buggies or surf boards and that we could find plenty of entertainment without such things. We were quite right. After our first hike of the rolling grass hills that were rather reminiscent of Scotland, we decided to hike the wind-blown-smooth sand dunes adjacent to Jeri. Our first day turned out to be much more of a mission than we expected as the dunes were not large nor far apart but were however separated by very warm, stagnant waters and dense shrubbery. Not so ideal for flip-flops, but we trecked on with the top of our chosen sand dune set firmly in our minds and were very pleased we did. Our dune turned out to have a steep slope on its far side that was just begging to be leaped off, a request we couldn´t help to oblige to. After numerous jumps we sweatily battled out way through yet a thicker bog that did not look nearly as treacherous from the top of the dune and eventually made it to the glorious ocean that we thankfully and immediately jumped in to both clean and cool off.
Our next adventure involved renting horses from a group of horse handlers we had passed many times on our way to the beach. Being the second cheapest tourist experience aside from the free hiking we smugly rode off on our tiny mares with our thick and thrifty wallets and set off for the beach. Well neither Mitch nor I had been on a horse in years and it appeared the horses could sense this as they mostly did as they pleased. Each time I would try to get my cream-coloured mare to do more than a snail´s pace she would veere off to the left or just stubbornly continue at her snails pace. Mitches grey-spotted mare would give him a small run but his saddle could not stay on her sadly malnourished back, so it appeared we were to stick with walking and mostly to where the horses wanted to go. A little bewildered at the complicated nature of our horses and their inability to walk much faster than we could ourselves, we were still pleased with the great bargain we had found; that was until we saw a group of other riders heading the opposite direction. Their horses we magnificent and large and strong and fed and, best of all, running! Oh what fun they must have been having! We thought, perhaps our horses didn´t want to head away from the stall where we rented them, so back we head. I was indeed able to get some runs out of my horse and began to feel like quite the cowbow. She even went where I wanted! Mitch however could not stay on due to the wobbly saddle and we head back to trade in his horse so we could set off on a wild running horse adventure. He did manage another horse but the second saddle was also not quite up to par and our legs we beginning to feel the rubbing a little too much so after one run we went back to take a sabbatical from our cowboy careers after one hour.
The remainder of our days involved more sand dune jumping off of a far closer and bog-free dune, poker and partying with yet more Isrealie friends and beautiful ocean sun sets. To stay in shape Mitch continued the daily push-up and sit-up routine and added in some morning runs which apparently could not be early enough as he would come back quite overheated each day and in desperate need of a cold shower each time. Being the gym man I am myself, I opted to hit the gym for another fantastic four hour gym session. I had a great time representing Canada´s strength and thoroughly enjoyed teaching all my fellow gym mates how to properly do the exercises I was doing which had them all enthralled. I even had one 51 year old man who spoke English quite well ask if I was from Cirque du Soleil! A truly great time and I was sad to say goodbye to them all as we were leaving the next day.
6:00 we are half an hour early at our pick up destination. Well time passed and passed and no truck was in sight. Mitch opted to check the next block over just incase we had the pick up spot wrong but to no avail. Around 6:30 we caught the tail end of a truck leaving nearly full of passengers and thought the worst. We thought we had missed it and were fuming. We sat for an hour and a half in front for the company office where we bought the ticked just running through all the things we were to say. So very very angry. We were set that we were not to pay another penny and that they were going to pay for our next night to stay and so on and so forth because we were wronged! Luckily, before any store property has been set aflame, an emplyee arrived and explained the truck was delayed due to high tide. Turns out a 4x4 ride out of town can´t always be on time due to the changine tides. We were a little less disgruntled, but were not totally relieved until we were on the truck and on our way. The ride was beautiful and we were very glad we had not paid outrageous amounts for a dune buggy ride for the same seeing as how we got the identical experience through everyday transport. After two more two hour waits to transfer buses we arrived in Belem at 3:00 PM.
Our next mission is to find our way to Manaus. Boating up the river seems long and over crowded so we very well may fly. We´ll keep you posted!

Photos: Close up of Pedra Furada; Matt dune jumping; Blonde Zohan on a horse; Our road travelled from Jeri