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The Brazilian Amazon
April, 2008
Back on the main river the Discovery had decided to fly a kite off the back of the boat. If you look closely you can also see the hammocks that have been hung in preparation for evening.
The plan is to drive through the night to arrive at Anama sometime in the early morning. Our captain is catching some z's to get ready for the long haul.
It was much harder to see wildlife back on the main river, but when we stuck close to shore the scenery was still beautiful.
A house on stilts with jute drying in the sun. Jute is a plant fiber that is grown around the world and used to make rope, cloth, inexpensive cloathing and even paper.
Another one of these unknown birds - kiskadee vs flycatcher??
Another Savanna Hawk Heterospizias meridionalis??
Many of the canoes we saw actually had motors on the back...
And every village we passed had a futbol field, and almost always it was occupied.
Black Vultures Coragyps atratus were very common.
And with agriculture comes signs of civilization and technology. I wonder what pesticide/herbicide this contained?
Night started to fall and the sky lit up with color. It was one of the best sunsets of the trip.
A giant kapok towering above the rest of the forest.
When darkness fell I occupied myself for hours spot lighting off the boat. Eventually we passed by the lights of Manacapuru in the middle of the night. Sleep did not come quickly or and it was very interupted for me that night. There was still some adjusting of positions and adapting to the curvature of the hammock to be done. That morning we awoke early to a wonderous scene. The light was soft and the river was picturesque. We had arrived very early in the morning and we were docked a little ways from the town of Anama. We enjoyed breakfast admist the sounds of the jungle before heading to the town. There was much planning to be done as the people in charge that the group had worked with last year had all been replaced. The day became a bit of a free day as there was much planning to be done.
I remember breakfast being exceptional this morning, but maybe it was just the anticipation speaking.
Vultures were riding the morning updrafts nearby.
And families were out for morning strolls.
Allegra decided to sleep the morning away while the rest of us help with preparations and than had an hour or so to poke around town before lunch.
Many of the yards had wonderful gardens, if you looked past the raw sewage nearby.
I of course was walking as quickly as possible to the outskirts of town trying to find the forest. After crossing the futbol fields I eventually found a short trail and some animals hopping around. Slender Anole Anolis fuscoauratus
A frog I believe to be Adenomera hylaedactyla
And another I believe to be Adenomera andreae
There were also a few Bufo sp. that I lost in the leaf litter. I returned early afraid of missing the departure of the boat and having separated myself from any signs of other humans. I guess while I was searching for critters, a couple of the girls saw a girl that was swimming find this in the water...
Photo Marquia Grier
The boats left shortly and I occupied myself with more photos as we traveled toward Lake Anama. One of these again...
Yellow-headed Caracara Milvago chimachima??
Drinking, eating, bathing, defecating...
Swimming
Gray Dolphins were swimming all around us.
We decided to dock up for a bit.
Within a few minutes of docking, a few of us had already decided we would be swimming. We had been joking about it for the last few days, how could you come to the Amazon and not swim?? Our elders on the trip were full of dangerous tales of creatures, large and small, of the deep dark waters. I was always quick to point out bullsharks have been caught all along the Amazon, as far as the base of the Andes, but I think we all feared the Candiru, a miniscule freshwater catfish that normally lives its life by lodging itself in the gills of larger catfish and feeding on the host's blood. It is thought to be attracted to the nitrogenous waste products, but it can become confused and swim up any hole a human may offer, most commonly the urethra. The local legends have it that they will even swim up a urine stream if someone is urinating from the banks. Having been a collegiate swimmer, urinating when jumping in water was something of second nature. I had to quickly train myself to ignore the urge if I wanted to swim. Well swim we did, and we did it well. I mentioned earlier that I never used the formal showers in the boats. We made it a point to swim everyday, usually after afternoon clinic while dinner was being prepared. There were showers on the back of the boats that we would then rinse off under. We usually jumped in cloathed, which also helped to "clean" our sweaty garmets. Swimming became a bit of a production. From the start, our first jump was from the second level off the front of the boats. From there after we would climb on anything we could for greater height, and clear paths for running for greater distance. Footballs were tossed, flips were thrown and many a good time was had. Some of the trip leaders never really were happy about us swimming, but one of the Brazilian physicians loved a good swim. He was always responsible for getting the captain to seek out a good swimming hole and once he was seen walking around in his speedo, the rest of us would quickly get ready. To the best of my knowledge I did not obtain a Candiru, but if I ever start pissing blood... On this first day, we were blessed by a pod of dolphin hunting the waters near us. The dolphin were commonly seen surfacing 10-15 feet away from where we swam. They seemed to be curious and actually came closer once we got in the water.
After our swim, we enjoyed dinner and returned to Anama. We got out the frisbee, football and soccerball and enjoyed playing games with the kids late into the night. The girls were actually the best at football. I guess they play a game called graveyard or something that involves throwing and they all definitely had better arms than the boys.
As I mentioned earlier, my boat visited clinics along the Lake Anama region. I took GPS points many times along our travels and was able to plot the villages we visited on a map. Thanks to google for all the wonderful maps I have stolen.
The first village was Primavera. They were not totally aware we were coming and I guess there was an important ceremony taking place nearby. We only saw 79 people for the day, but we were able to help a very sick baby. After some initial failed attempts to acheive IV access we were able to convince the gas company working on a pipeline nearby to transfer the baby, mother and Dielson (one of our Brazilian physicians) back to the hospital in Anama in less than an hour by their fastest boat.
The pharmacy is hard, hot work, with many dangers...
Allegra had been feeling down for a couple of days and she really let herself get dehydrated. We had to use one of our precious IV bags to get her feeling better. She spent the morning in "bed".
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© 2006 Last Updated: 2/11/07