![Here\'s our speedboat or \"voadeira\" in portuguese, the Lucas Huber - named after Ruth\'s uncle and founder of Project Amazon. This little boat was our home for 30 hours. No padding on the seats and some very rough sections of water makes for a long ride! The advantage is that you can cover at least 3 times more water than a normal barge or boat. It\'s a great way for river workers, pastors and supervisors to get around.](http://www.reutterfamily.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/arapiuns08_01.jpg "Here\'s our speedboat or \\"voadeira\\" in portuguese, the Lucas Huber - named after Ruth\'s uncle and founder of Project Amazon. This little boat was our home for 30 hours. No padding on the seats and some very rough sections of water makes for a long ride! The advantage is that you can cover at least 3 times more water than a normal barge or boat. It\'s a great way for river workers, pastors and supervisors to get around.")
Come along with me on a trip up a tributary of the Amazon River as we visit a recently planted church! Make sure to bring plenty of sunblock 
Enjoy!
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- Along the banks of the Amazon River in Santarém is where this trip begins. You can see it’s a very brown river- much like chocolate milk, although not nearly as tasty or healthy.
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- Here’s our speedboat or “voadeira” in portuguese, the Lucas Huber – named after Ruth’s uncle and founder of Project Amazon. This little boat was our home for 30 hours. No padding on the seats and some very rough sections of water makes for a long ride! The advantage is that you can cover at least 3 times more water than a normal barge or boat. It’s a great way for river workers, pastors and supervisors to get around.
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- Joaquim (roughly pronounced “joking”) is quite an amazing person – our church construction supervisor, a jack of all trades and a great motivator, he’s one of the many people that make Project AmaZon the amazing church planting force that it is. I get to ride along with him to visit several churches that our currently in process of being built.
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- Joaquim’s wife and daughter accompany us on our trip. Ruth wanted to go, but with just having the c-section we decided it would be best not for her to go.
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- We left the Amazon River, crossed the immense Tapajós River and headed into the Arapiuns river, a beautiful river with white sand beaches and poor living conditions. I took about 30 pictures like this – each one great.
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- We met up with the PAZ medical team who were aboard the boat the Portador da Luz and picked up Pastor Renaldo to visit one of the church plants along the Arapiuns river. One of the things you can’t really tell from photos is just how bright it is out on the river, or how much hotter the sun is on the equator. Lots and lots of sunblock, friends.
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- When one shows up in a river community with a camera and video camera, you have nothing but curious little kids all over the place, just wanting to get into the photos. I had them sit down on the bench for this nice little shot.
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- We have hundreds of photos like this, because we’ve planted over 500 churches a lot like this one. Joaquim is overseeing the final phase of construction with the doors and windows.
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- Some desperate last attempts to get into a photo before we leave! It worked.
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- One of my favorite parts of being out on the river: the sunsets and sunrises. Hard to beat.
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- Pastor Renaldo, the river supervisor of the many river churches on this river.
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- Me! Yep, I was here to, and thanks to Pastor Renaldo, you all know it! This is how we travel :)
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- We caught back up with the Portador just in time for this nice sunset shot. I also shot some great video footage. I was actually shooting video the whole time as well preparing for some upcoming videos I’m making for Project Amazon.
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- Adriano and his wife Carla are Brazilian missionaries with Project AmaZon and work specifically in the area of our health ministries. Adriano is such a servant and a most useful person to have around. Oh, did I mention he likes to joke? Too bad I don’t ever joke around.
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- A photo that you didn’t see was the amazing night sky. There was no moon out and the stars were so bright we could see their reflections in the river water! I have never seen anything like it. My little Canon Powershot just couldn’t pick it up (but my new Nikon DSLR just might be able to! We’ll see in the future!). Back to this picture: we got up at 5 AM and took off super early because we had lots and lots of river to cover in a little bit of time.
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- After thirty minutes on the Arapiuns, we entered the Maró river. Each new river gets tighter with thicker vegetation on each side. The current gets stronger and the river winds around like a snake in the jungle. At this point, we are over 10 hours away from Santarém by any normal boat. The villages are few and far between. There is little if no local infrastructure. No electricity, no roads. Just generators and very simple living.
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- When you first see the new PAZ church on the Maró River it takes your breath away, partly because you’ve been traveling for hours with seeing very few signs of human habitation. Yet here at the end of the earth live people very close to the heart of the God – people who need to here of God’s great love. The PAZ church stands as a beacon of hope to the four corners of the Maró River.
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- Joaquim inspects the work recently done to the church. It’s time to take the scaffolding down! The new windows and doors have been put in.
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- Almost done. I made sure to keep a camera in my hand and take lots of pictures as to not get in their way as they worked in the intense and hot Brazilian sun! Ha!
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- Inside there’s not much left to do: tile the floor and finish the walls. I experienced for myself one of the things that makes Joaquim so well suited to this work: he is able to motivate the local residents to come together and finish this project and let God’s story shine in Prainha of Maró through their brand new church building. It may not look like much, but trust me, this is the nicest building for many, many hours.
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- Some of the local believers and workers in front of the nearly completed church in Prainha.
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- On our way, we had to cross some fairly intense rapids. We had a local guide with us to tell us where to take the boat. I admit, my prayer life went up a few notches. Last March we went to Prainha with a large Canadian work team. The water was several meters higher and we were able to reach Prainha in the Portador. This time of year, when the waters low, only boats small enough to navigate the tricky rapids can go far enough upstream.
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- A little scenic stop – more waterfalls of the Arapiuns River. We heard about these falls and on the way back decided to go a little further up the Arapiuns to see them. Well worth the little sidetrip!
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- Joaquim and his family enjoy the quick break.
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- After 11 hours of travel (on our return to Santarém) we reached Ponto Grande, a huge finger of beach that sticks kilometers out into the Arapiuns River. Just beautiful. After this point we soon crossed the Tapajós River and I experienced some of the roughest water I have ever experienced in a canoe! Pain.
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- One of our last refueling stops along the way on the Tapajós River. There are no gas stations out here, only the 60 liters of gasoline we brought along. So don’t run out of gas! Bad idea, very bad.
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- Sunset on the Tapajós
great pictures Nate. I’m sure the Cranbrook team will enjoy these.
This was great! It’s hard to comprehend the remoteness of the areas where you’re going, but it’s a little easier to understand after reading this.
Those pictures are breathtaking. I can’t imagine how it must feel to be out there.
It’s hot and uncomfortable but great all at the same time!
Blessed Nate by your travel log and the beauty of His handiwork.
hey nate wow that church looks fine,God Bless U and Ruth and the paz team. from 1 of the march canadians.