Pantanal - Stunning Wildlife
Trip Start
Nov 01, 2004
1
80
133
Trip End
Nov 01, 2005
Pantanal,
Brazil
Sunday, May 29, 2005
We headed for the Pantanal today - in Portuguese it means Epic Wetland and it´s the world´s largest swamp. We started off with a four hour minibus drive through cow farm countryside and a brief stop for lunch - which we both tucked into as we have learned to be afraid of tour food! On our tour we had 2 Belgians, 2 Israelis and 1 older Italian with very little English. We arrived at a bus stop and then changed our comfy minibus for a 4x4 wooden benched truck. We had another 4 hours on the truck over dusty (and yes - we were on the open back of the truck with 5 others) bumpy roads - we were in bits at the end of it. The upside is that during the truck journey we saw the start of the swampy scenery, alligators, a jubaru stork, herons, one capybara (world´s largest rodent), wild deer, parrots, toucans and even a giant anteater - though the dark blob bounding off in the distance could have been anything at that distance in the dusk
01 Hawk
. We spent the last hour or so looking at the amazing sunset - a terrific yellow and orange band beneath cloudless brilliant blue. Wow. We arrived at our camp and were shown round - they have running water for toilets and showers, a bar, a canteen and some hammock rooms. The hammock rooms are meant to be mossie free but sadly our door didn´t close and there was a hole in the netting anyway! We complained about this to our guide (Pepinho) who promptly did nothing. The camp is located about 5m from a lake which is prime mossie territory and also contains some caiman which you can almost step on in the dark. We had dinner (a meaty dish, rice, noodles, beans & some salad) before hitting the hammocks to try to sleep. The Belgians had given us a mossie coil which kept the bites down (they had their own tent which they had quickly decided to use). It was alright - apart from bumping into each other occasionally as the hammocks were too close together - and apart from the fleas/ticks that we caught from the hammocks. Thankfully both of us had sleeping bag liners which kept most fleas/ticks away - others weren´t so lucky.Day 212 Monday 30/05/05 Pantanal
We got up at 6am and after a quick breakfast we headed out for a 3 hour walk. We saw howler monkeys (what an amazing noise), yellow crested woodpeckers (again - what a noise), coatimundi, toucans (which have a fabulous flying motion due to their heavy beaks), storks, hawks, blue & yellow macaws and red macaws. The walk was through scrub lands and occasional patches of small forest. We headed back to camp and had about 5 hours to relax (and have lunch which was remarkably similar to dinner). About 2.30 we headed back out for another 3 hour walk. This time it was a little wetter
02 View From The Camp
! We had to cross 5/6 stretches of water (flooded tracks) which came up to about mid-thigh. The muddy gloopy crossings were the worst - they sucked off your sandals so you had to go barefoot. We again saw lots of birds - and added ibis to our list! We saw two armadillos close up and the first one was brilliant! We spotted him and circled downwind, the guide then went behind him and moved him our way. Armadillos´ eyesight isn´t the best and at one point he came round a bush to find the Italian crouching there - we then found out just how quick an armadillo can move!!! We stopped for a swim to cool down - and swam in a river that had caiman (ie alligators!) swimming in it! (Gillian opted for the safer paddle). After our dip we had our touch-the-alligator picture taken before heading home. We found a field of cows and it also had 15-20 blue macaws in it. The cows eat a fruit which then passes through their system - now devoid of the outer covering. What comes out is like a nut and the macaws find these in the shit and break into them to get the nice nut from inside! We´ll call them Cow-Shit-Nuts.....we´ll come back to them! As we approached the macaws they took flight and seeing that many macaws flying in the open is fantastic. We got back to camp and waited for dinner - about 3 hours wait! That night 31 people arrived at camp and being aware of this we queued for food - and some bits of food actually ran out so people at the end not in the know were unhappy. Oh and the food was almost exactly the same again! That night there was an electrical storm and we had lightning going off all around us in 4 different locations - stunning. Day 213 Tuesday 31/05/05 Pantanal
After breakfast we started off with a 2˝ hour horse ride
03 Tree In Camp
. Sadly some of the horses were too thin and under-nourished. We both got ok horses though Gillian refused 2 horses that she was offered. It was an uneventful ride and the only new sights were fabulous pink rosetta spoonbills. At one point there were 14 riders with one non-English speaking horseman (the guide had taken a half hour break). We had our 5 hour break before going out fishing. Stewart sat by the lake reading and saw kingfishers, storks, hawks and jacarenas. We went piranha fishing and unlike in the Amazon you actually stand in alligator infested water (most people only going to waist level or a little below!!!!!) and fish for the piranhas swimming around you. We kid you not! If one of the gators came too close you whacked its nose and it went back out a bit! Gillian caught 1 and Stewart was the best fisherman - catching 6. One guy actually hooked an alligator which thrashed about breaking his line - the guy seemed relieved! We headed back to the camp where they cooked our piranha for us - they were surprisingly tasty though there was very little meat on them so you really had to pick at them to get the meat. We had dinner (actually better than the last 4 dinner/lunch meals) where Stewart had seconds!!!! We then headed for the bar and had a few drinks - though Stewart and the Belgian stayed up having quite a number of caipirinhas - Pedro (the camp owner) makes really strong ones whereas his assistant makes weaker ones. 
