27th July 2009 - Pantanal
OK so staying in the Pantanal is now starting to wear thin. It was great to be here an extra day but now this is starting to eat into other places. On the Brightside the weather is warm and the quagmire is drying out nicely. I went for a walk with Eugene this morning. We walked over to where Eugene had seen the Ocelot (a small cat with similar markings to a Jaguar) the previous day. At first we though we were heading to the river but it turns out we were walking in the opposite direction. We carried on along the path we had trekked with the horses, but apart from a Racoon we didn’t see much wildlife.
We got back for breakfast and then set about making plans for our escape from the pantanal. Dion had some work to do on the truck and it looked as though we needed a raft of sorts to drive over the worst of the mud so that the truck wouldn’t bed in. If the truck sank at all in the mud it would be game over and we would be stuck for a long time. It so happened that the previous day in walking with Maxine I had spotted a pile of timber in the woods. I had no idea whether this belonged to anyone, probably the adjacent ranch, but it just seemed to be there doing nothing. I spoke to Dion about this and we decided we’d scope it out later. Pretty much spent the rest of the morning chilling in the hammock.
I would have happily drifted of, but there was a bit of excitement from outside the dining hall. The guides had decided to bring the anaconda back from the tree. Why, I’m not sure, perhaps to give the guests a closer look. Though I think they should have left it alone, it allowed me to get really close to the snake.
I asked the guide who was holding it whether I could hold it. I’ve never held a snake before and it was not what I expected. The skin was very dry and I could feel the muscles under the skin rippling as I held it. Speaking to Jesper later for such a large snake you should support the weight of it in the middle. I could feel the anaconda trying to pull it head from my grasp and it was getting distressed. I was worried I would hurt it in some way and Diceasar was also saying “don’t break its neck”. In the end I gave the snake back to Diceasar who put it down near a tree so that it could climb to safety. A great experience though not sure I would like to meet it again in a few years when it’s grown up.
Dion and I looked at the timber I had seen in the woods and asked the guys at our Posada whether we could use it for building our raft. Max, the guide said it wouldn’t be a problem. In hindsight we should have confirmed this with the owners of the posada. Later that afternoon Ian, Jesper, Eugene, Kent, Webster and I headed back to the planks and started moving them out of the woods. In all there were about 60 timbers we could use. The wood looked as though it had been stored in the woods for some building purpose but was now quietly rotting. In fact moving the timbers we disturbed several terminate and ant colonies as well as discovering huge cockroach type bugs and spiders. For now we just moved the timbers from the woods and stacked them with the intention of getting the tractor and trailer there the next day.
After an hours hard work we felt that we deserved to cool down in the pool. A bit of synchronised jumping/bombing was a great way to round of the day. Fi was also unceremoniously thrown into the pool. Well she looked as though she really really wanted to get into the pool, but didn’t want to, so I just helped out! How kind am I?
Another great sunset rounded the day off nicely and everyone was excited for our great escape the following day.