Monday, May 20, 2024

I wake up by a sound near my hammock. I open my eyes and close by sits a yellow headed vulture. It must have detected the stingray carcass. After a minute it flies closer to its breakfast. 

I whisper to Didi, who changes within a second from lazy bum to attack mode. 

Noiselessly like a snake he slides out of his hammock, takes the camera and starts photographing the big bird. 

Sam is getting up too, and soon our little camp is going through its morning rituals. We wash ourselves in the dark water around the boat. Somehow I love moving in the shade and between the stems of the flooded forest. 

I make clean drinking water. That has become a little more time consuming: the water filter was apparently not made for Amazon water. One filter was supposed to last our whole trip easily, but it’s already clogged and the water coming out is no longer completely clear.

I filter the water first through Didi’s t-shirt, eight layers thick. Then I use the UV steri-pen to kill the bacteria. We’ve been using it for several days and are still healthy (although my feet are swelling up a bit, but I don’t think that’s related).

After a breakfast of tapioca and powdered milk Sam and Didi start to work on the new table whilst I’m writing this diary in my hammock.

Yesterday night after ten we went into the jungle. Quite dark but the moon is almost full, so not ideal for wildlife watching.

There were definitely more than enough insects who tried to bite or sting us or crawl into my ears.

A couple of days ago we had already made a small trail, and for Sam it is as easy follow as a highway. 

‘After how many days would you no longer be able to find the trail back? ‘

‘Two weeks.’ Then the fallen leaves would have changed color to dead leaves.

At some point he asks us to turn off our lights. The darkness under the very dense trees is almost complete. But while the mosquitoes are buzzing around my ears a tiny bit of light seems to appear on the ground. It’s Sam holding a piece of moss. It’s luminous!

Later he points his flashlight at a dead bush. In the dead branches is a snake, rolled up. You’d think those thin dead branches are not very comfortable but he has draped himself on them and seems to be sleeping. It’s a beautiful green and dark color and reflects the light of our flashlight.

We see a spider in a hole in a dead trees trunk and later a very large fish spider walking on the water of a small pool. When Sam throws a cockroach it jumps forward to consume it.

Sam really has a good flashlight- very focused and bright. Searching the bottom of the pond he detects two snakes on the bottom of dead leaves. One is poisonous.

We see many small insects and moths, but Sam is a bit surprised there is not more to see. Maybe the moon is to blame. 

I was hoping for jaguar, of which Sam has seen tracks, but alas, nothing tonight.

Sweaty and full of mosquito bites I very much enjoy the cold black water in the flooded forest.

It’s not easy to survive in the jungle. The odds are very much against you if you don’t know it. Reminds me of a story of Sam. One day he was driving his boat through a remote jungle area. Suddenly on the shore he hears shouting and sees people gesturing to him. He boats over and finds three girls, crying and in very bad shape. Their guide has dropped them off and left them. That’s almost equivalent to attempted murder.

Strange things happen here and many westerners are rather naive. A white girl insisted to canoe by herself from Colombia through the Amazon. She was captured by pirates and killed.

Also two Italian well trained soldiers thought they could handle the jungle. They insisted that Sam drop them off and leave. They could handled it. They were tough. Sam charged them $300 for the boat rental and fuel. And he left them a satellite phone with the remark: leave it here, I will pick it up in two weeks. But if you touch it, I will charge you $1000. 

The soldiers assured him that they didn’t need anything, so Sam took the boat and left. Two days later at 02:00 in the morning his phone rang. A shaking voice begging to pick them up. Sam got up, got a friend with a boat and together they drove for several hours to a launch place. When they reached the italians, they were shaking uncontrollably. It had been raining nonstop, they had not been able to start a fire and they could not walk because their knees were somehow locked because of the wetness, wind and cold.

Fortunately they completely recovered after he had taken them home and fed them warm food.

Many many interesting stories.

Still in my hammock. An unbelievable downpour just started. I can’t help but love to watch such an amazing amount of water fall down just an arms length away with only a mosquito net in between.

It reminds me of my high school days; sitting in my room at home doing my homework next to the open window. Outside was a forest and I loved it when it rained in the summer. The smell of wet earth.

Also sometimes in the winter I had the window open despite the cold, because a robin used to sit on the window sill outside and I used to feed it. It came very close but never entered my room. But it would sit  almost next to my elbow.

Those were the days that my boyhood dreams developed. And now, as an old man, they are coming true. What a wonderful life.

The smell of food drifts through the camp. It is still raining steadily, but without the intensity of this afternoon. Our table has a new palm matting on top, so our silver doesn’t slide through the cracks. We also have a second table with a nice top.

“Silver” reminds me that there is a considerable amount of gold and precious stones in the Amazon basin. And many of the people who know where to find it have no concept of the value. 

Sam was at a little restaurant in the bush where he met an old Indian who was carrying two heavy bins on a strap around his neck. As Sam speaks the local language, he talked to the man, who told him he was waiting for the delivery of three brand new boats. Good for transport over the river for his tribe. ‘How much does it cost?’ In reply the man opened one of the bins. It was full of gold. ‘Twenty kilo (45 lbs) of gold.’

Sam was tempted to tell the old Indian that he was being ripped off. But people have been killed for less.

Later huge trucks appeared and three boats were placed in the water. And two bins of gold changed hands…

Good night my friend.