Amazon & Carnival Explorer Cruise - Day 34: Fortaleza, Brazil

Saturday, March 9

Today we are in Fortaleza which is our last Brazilian coastal city before we start up the Amazon.  Fortaleza is another large city with a population of nearly three million.  Like most of the East Coast Brazilian cities we have visited, Fortaleza is known for its beautiful beaches.

The port where we are docked is in the upper right corner of the map, you can see two breakwaters and we were right near the upper one. 

I wanted to get up earlier today and woke up at at 8:00, but decided to sleep a little longer and the next thing I knew, it was almost 10:00.  I got up feeling no better or worse than yesterday so we decided to get ready and head into the city.  We are docked quite a ways from the city center so the ship was providing shuttles.  When we got up it was raining, but it seemed to be letting up.

Once we were ready, we got off the ship and caught the shuttle and took the 30 minute ride into the city.  We were dropped off at a tourist information center, which was more like a market as there were numerous stalls with people selling their wares.  We spent some time wandering through the shops, but curtailed our plans to walk to some of the nearby spots as they appeared to be much further away than indicated on the map we had gotten on the ship.  Although, a lot of people were walking, the area did look a little sketchy and Fortaleza doesn’t have the best reputation for safety.

We walked around the immediate area for a bit, but I was fading and we decided to catch the shuttle and head back to the ship.

On the bus ride back, Val talked to someone who’s friend had his cell phone stolen while walking around so maybe we were wise to not chance it.  We were back on board a little before 2:00 and headed straight to lunch.

Before getting back on the ship, I took some pictures around the terminal area.

 

After lunch, Val was off to trivia and after resting for a while, I caught up with the blog.  After that, I laid down again and tried to take a nap, but that didn’t work so I just read.  We spent most of the afternoon doing not very much as I didn’t have much energy.  I did go up on deck to take some pictures for our sail away, but that was about all I did.

We did do our usual evening routine, but Roy was still missing from trivia so he must be pretty sick.  After dinner, it was off to the casino and I did terrible, but didn’t care as all I wanted to do was get back to the room and sleep.  Val on the other hand, had another good night and stayed a lot longer than I did.

Tomorrow is the start of three sea / river days in a row until our first port on the Amazon River.  I’m hoping I can shake this cold during the sea days and feel good again for our ports.