31 August 2001

Bom dia, todos! Hello, everyone!

I awoke this morning to silence at about four. At first I was concerned, but it was so calm and serene that I decided just to let myself wake up slowly, but by 5:00 a.m. I was too curious. We had stopped in the very early morning, around three at the mouth of the Jurua river, and the crew decided to tie up the boat and wait for daylight before continuing up river. They were concerned about the depth of the waters, since the river is dropping, and were not sure what we would encounter here at the mouth.

I also found Manuel walking the deck unaware that we had stopped. But, this is a good indication of why we put our trust in the Amazonian crew.

This morning, the captain told me that he is relieved to be in the Jurua now, because its underwater banks are predictable, and the middle is always deep. On the Solimoes, we had to stop many times, backtrack, and try another route when we saw we only had two meters underneath the keel.

Typically at the places where the smaller rivers dump into the bigger ones, we see many dolphins, and this morning was no exception. Many pink dolphins, or boto, greeted us as we started our new route that is much more southern now. I have begun following the custom of the southern Brazilians by drinking Chimarrao, or Mate each morning, and now I have Kon Tau from China and Petros from Greece joining me in the morning ritual.

We all have different rates of waking up, and this morning we were all up and watching the new river go by at seven.

Ribamar, Agnaldo, and Sebastiao tried a quick fishing trip and we watched as they caught only small fish with a circular net called a 'tarrafa'. Eventually, we will be very happy to see fresh bacu, sardia, and aracu for lunch.

This afternoon, Ribamar, our local all purpose 'ribeiro' (people of the river) is going to give a small demonstration on fishing for Piranhas. We all have a survival kit that contains fishing line and steel hooks.

Ribamar showing the volunteers how to fish for Pirhanas

Our special Piranha kit has a short section of steel line that doesn't allow the Piranha to chew through the line. I just hope they taste good!

Yesterday, the doctors gave us an orientation of our first-aid survival kits. The talk eventually revolved around snakes and spiders. Now, we all have had our fill of what to do if we get bitten by a snake. We have medicine mostly to alleviate discomfort in the field, aspirins, anti-allergy medicine, pain medicine that we can use ourselves.

Our doctors are Paula from Spain, Marcio from Rio de Janeiro, and Ian from the United Kingdom. We are expecting another from the UK in a few days, to make a total of four.

Marcio explaining the dangers of the area.

All of them have worked in the area of tropical diseases, so we all feel like we have enough experience to recognise and act on any problem we might have fairly quickly.

Last evening, we were introduced to an Amazonian electrical storm. We were sure it would rain, but instead there was only lightning racing across the sky for half an hour. Long, complicated bolts of lightning as well as bright clouds of heat lightning escorted us into the early evening. At this second, I am sitting next to our radio operator, Tim, from Holland, who just showed me our first electrical casualty from the storm. We burnt one of our transformers that runs our computers. During the storm, all our readings were erratic and unpredictable. It is best at those times to turn everything off and wait for the storm to finish.

This was our first lesson that the dangers in the Amazon are not only in the water or on the land. We are relying on our ability to use GPS, high frequency radios, solar panels, batteries, as well as satellite telephones to spread the news of our journeys. At the same time, we are trying to respect the fact that we are in the wildest of the wild, and this electrical storm was an innocent reminder, I think.

This morning, we also took a short cooking course from Mara, one of our cooks. She showed us the basics of cooking beans, rice, and pasta out in the forest.

Each one of our teams will have 15 people on it, we will be cooking, setting up camp, cutting the trail, and watching out for each other.

This afternoon, we have a short compass-reading course to attend as well. Basically, what we will be saying if you get lost is DON'T MOVE! Although we would all love to wander 10 miles through the jungle alone, we are hoping to stay together, and make this a team effort. And, it is easier to identify a snake if one person is holding it and the other can take its picture.

Bryan teaches everyone how to use a compass.

We have been told this morning who is on which team, so now we are thinking of all these logistical things, so a sense of humour and flexibility come into play now.

As I sit here, I see Ian from the UK and Steve from Sweden leaning against the railing, one with a camera, the other gulping down watermelon. Jan from Germany just walked by and told me not to look so serious. The characters out here are a lot of fun to watch, as well as watching myself.

Steve is determined to snap a photo of a jumping pink dolphin, so he stands ready all the time. Tim will be working to replace our transformer with a string of batteries. Others are writing updates, studying the GPS manual, or trying to memorise the short dictionary we received this morning with words in
English, Portuguese, Spanish and native Deni.

Next to me is a pile of pans destined for the project, and above my head is a sign that says, "Piranha Internet Cafe", our location for writing these updates.

The steady purr of the engine still is not enough to drown out the loud sounds of the jungle on both sides of us. Chirping birds, snapping branches are the sounds that come from the green blanket around us. I think we all have a different idea of what is inside there...and the amazing thing is that we will soon find out.

I will leave you now with the quote I heard this morning from the captain Flavio. He said, "Quem viver vivera" and, "Nos vamos consequir".

He was looking at our German lookout, who appeared a bit worried staring out at the water ahead of the boat this morning. I think all of us "estrangeiros", or foreigners, have this look a few times per day. Often, it is just that we are thinking of the 10 new things that were just introduced to us, or considering our families, or reflecting on the pile of beans we just had for lunch. But, for Flavio, we just look worried, and he does not speak English. His words meant "He who lives, will live" and "We will succeed."

1 September 2001

Good Evening, All!

This has been quite a busy day for a slow boat. My team and I, consisting of Merel from Holland, Kon Tau from Hong Kong and myself, took the aluminium river boat out this morning to practice working with the GPS, our hand held Global Positioning System that we will use to help us pinpoint our positions as we hike through the forest.

We expect these units to be especially helpful after a week or so into the project, when we will be travelling back and forth between our campsites and the Commandante Savio.

It was a great way to start the morning, the three of us alone, about two miles ahead of the Savio, Merel driving, Kon Tau and myself trying to figure out the intricacies of this little unit that can tell us exactly where we are on the planet within 10 meters or so. We found a muddy spot to land (the river is quite low here, almost the lowest point of the year), we constructed a little figure made of sticks to spot later from the Savio, then we motored back to the mother ship.

By the time we figured out how the whole system worked, we were past our point, but at least the exercise was helpful!

We spent the rest of the day doing a preparation drill to see how exactly we are going to carry solar panels, radios, batteries, computers, satellite phones, pots, pans, hammocks, beans, rice, pasta, snacks, water, extra clothes, safety pack, and other things as we move our camps along.

We had all the material spread across the deck of the ship, all of us throwing in our ideas, and marvelling at how much we have here. I am still dressed in all my hiking gear, I don't feel like taking it all off, yet. I've got the hiking-in-the-jungle fever. Hopefully, that's the only fever I get.

Last night, as we just laid down to sleep, Ribamar surprised us by bringing on board a small Jacare, the local alligators. In the evenings, they are easy to spot, bright orange eyes reflecting in our spotlight, hundreds of them lining the shore. They are beautiful creatures up close, strong, with intense eyes. We all got a chance to get a close look at this little one, about four feet long including the tail. We let him go soon after to return to the shore with his friends.

This morning, we woke to find ourselves beached right at a sharp turn in the river. It turns out it was a great location for fishing, because there were at least ten dolphins, the pink botos, and the small grey ones, having a feast for breakfast right next to the Savio. We all awoke slowly, watched them eat, and took some pictures. We went into the local town to pick up a local river guide, boarded the boat again and were on our way.

This is a quick update. We are supposed to arrive in Caruari sometime tomorrow, dropping off more fuel barrels, and getting a quick chance to walk on dry land again.

Tchau,
Bryan

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