23 Photos Of The World Cup Host City That's In The Middle Of The Jungle

Manaus is 900 miles up the Amazon, and surrounded by rain forests.

It's an important shipping outpost for trading along the Amazon River.

It's also a hub for ecotourism. Here's a dock for tourist boat excursions along the Rio Negro.

Ponta Negra beach.

The Manaus harbor.

The Sauim Castanheira Wildlife Refuge runs right up to the edge of town.

The Arena Amazonia is the most controversial venue of the 2014 World Cup.

The pitch looks great from above ...

But the field is in admittedly "bad shape" going into the World Cup, with dirt patches everywhere.

It also cost $290 million to build, and with no pro team in Manaus it could become a white elephant.

Source: SI

The Colina Training Center looked like this in January. Many World Cup venues were behind schedule last winter.

The finished training center in June, where the teams will practice before matches.

The Ariau hotel in the jungle outside Manaus is a center of ecotourism.

Manaus is remote, closer to Venezuela than Rio.

Swimmers walk along the beach.

The sun sets on the Rio Negro.

It's the only World Cup host city in Northern Brazil.

In 2013, police evicted 5,000 Amazon Indians from an area of rainforest near the city, drawing protests.

Manaus from above. It's a heavily populated city of more than 2 million people.

A neighborhood decorated for the World Cup.

The Rio Negro, one of the Amazon's many large tributaries.

A pick-up field flooded by the river.

Downtown is centered around renaissance-style Amazon Theatre.

Manaus on a map. It's hundreds of miles from the other host cities.

Get to know the other host cities

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