It started with a conversation late at night in the upstairs of a dirty pub in Cusco, Peru.   Maybe in Peru Coca-Cola still has the original ingredients, maybe it was the whiskey, either way the talk had turned adventurous. There was John, who was young and fearless and described his profession as rich.com.  His friend Sam, an aspiring theatre man, was there taking a trip after the recent death of his mother in hopes of finding some healing along the way.  Both, like myself had been gallivanting around South America for several months and our paths crossed during a four day hike through the Andes Mountains to Macchu Pichu.   The Manu Bioreserve was the topic that night.  It’s a part of the Amazon that the Peruvian Government couldn’t seem to tame, so they made it a reserve and only doctors and scientists are allowed to go there.  Supposedly the last cannibalistic trip still inhabits it but other than a recent village storming (with bows, arrows, and machetes) no one really seems to know what’s going on there.  

So we put together a small team, ourselves of course, an interpreter of the tribal languages, a guy who knew the terrain, and someone who could translate it all into English.  We invited three Israelis who were also traveling in South America after serving there time in the Israeli army.  We figured they might come in handy. We also brought a cook, mainly because she was female and we didn’t want to look like some sort of war party.  That was our plan, and unlike most late night conversations at bars, we actually did it.

We loaded into old Toyota’s early one morning and drove till the dirt roads ran out.  Then we loaded up a large wooden boat, which resembled more of a large canoe or and Asian long-tail boat without bright colors. Along with our expedition gear we loaded up bartering chips like cigarettes and live chickens.  We weren’t sure how effective money would be in a predicament. 

The first couple days were relaxing as we traveled the river deeper and deeper into the Amazon.  Gigantic birds exploding with colors, monkeys howling, and stars that blazed every night.   We stopped at little villages along the way were people were extremely friendly and curious.  At one point I was sitting in a circle with a group of topless native women, with bad teeth, drinking a bowl of corn whiskey they were passing around.  I later learned that they made the whiskey taking turns spitting into the bowl and the spit ferments the corn… yum…  

A couple days later I would run into 3 other westerners deep in the Jungle at another village.  One caught my eye in the distance.  I thought it was some sort of ghost at first and they thought the same of me.  But I met with them and learned they were “Doctors without Borders.”  My conversations with these incredible men inspired me to go PreMed at the UW of Madison some years later.  In another village the locals had rescued a baby monkey.  I also spotted a Capybara, the worlds largest rodent.  

I can’t say what day it was that the food just sort of disappeared.  We weren’t to concerned about it, and maybe that was the problem.  We went fishing using a rickety old raft which was really boards nailed between two dug out canoes.  We were catching parana but they small.  We used the Parana themselves as bait and caught some slightly larger ones, but 6 inches at the most.  We noticed some caiman (crocs) in the area and thought we might be able to catch one that night.  I had noticed caiman tracks around my tent several of the mornings along the way, but I had not paid too much attention since I was more concerned with tarantulas and snakes.  Hunting caiman is a lot like shining for deer, well kind off…

That night we dragged the raft to a lagoon and loaded onto it with headlamps and our brightest torch.  The night was thick with humidity and there was heat lightning in the distance.  We slowly paddled through the murky waters.  Our translator “Manuel” shined light out over the water. The eyes of a croc glow red in the night when a flashlight shines on them. I looked over the lagoon and see what looks like a night ski filled with red stars. With the flickering of heat lightning and the ever darkening mist of the scene makes my heart sweat. Mangu our Terrain man is leaning off the front of our rickety wooden raft with his steady hands for the catch. I might protest the whole event, but I’m 9 nine days from the nearest dirt road and hungry.  He has no luck getting there mouth in his grip.  After an hour I give it a shot myself.  After a few thrusts I realize that fear might be slowing my abilities.  After all, what if I catch it and it drags me in with it?  Our main problem seems to be that they are to small, maybe only 4 or 5 feet long, and thus still pretty quick at getting away. We have no luck, and sleep with hungry stomachs that night.  The fact that everyone is still alive is nourishment enough for me at this point.

The next day we decide we should head for home and the long voyage back begins.  I can’t say that I have ever been so remote.  When I was 18 I had hitch hiked/hiked to Alaska and I felt like the mountains at points had swallowed me whole, but the stomach of the Amazon has a way of digesting civilization that you cannot imagine.  Just as the grandeur of the night stars can make you feel so insignificant, or the Redwoods can make you feel so small, the jungle can make you feel terribly disposable.   At first it’s an uncomfortable feeling, but later you seek it.