Guarana of Maues

Guarana is a climbing plant of the Amazon whose seeds carry several times the caffeine of coffee by weight, and it was domesticated by the Satere-Mawe people of the Maues and Andira rivers, who hold it as a founding plant in their origin narrative and still cultivate a distinctive form of it. The traditional processing is specific: seeds are roasted, pounded, mixed with water into a paste, rolled into hard cylindrical bars and smoked for weeks over wood. The bar is then grated against the rough tongue bone of the pirarucu fish into water and drunk. Maues calls itself the land of guarana and holds a harvest festival, and the industrial trade that turns the same seed into Brazil's national soft drink runs from here as well.

What you actually see

• A plant domesticated by the Satere-Mawe - cultivated on the Maues and Andira.
• Smoked guarana bars - paste rolled into cylinders and cured over wood for weeks.
• Grating on a fish bone - the pirarucu tongue used to shave the bar into water.
• A harvest festival - the town's event at the end of the year.

When to go

October to December for the harvest. Two days.

Honest expectations

Reaching Maues means a long riverboat or a small plane, and neither is comfortable. Visits to Satere-Mawe communities need arrangement and permission and are not casual. The town has limited accommodation. Heat and humidity are constant.

Nearby

Manaus is upriver; Parintins is downstream on the Amazon.