Ninja of the jungle

February 14, 2012:  The obvious thing with observing wildlife is that you can only place yourself in good location and hope for the best.  You cannot be guaranteed to see anything, unless of course you visit a local zoo.  With this said, I went on a 4 day Jungle tour a few hours outside Manaus but unfortunately didn’t see much wildlife besides some pink dolphins, fascinating spiders and a new species of Toucan. 

During the hikes and boat trips exploring the area, my guide was like a ninja of the jungle as he would whirl around his machete; cutting, dicing, decapitating and maiming almost anything in his path.  Fish, trees, plants and even the spiders felt his cold steel if they crossed his path.  Staying at an eco-lodge with solar power and such, you would think that the guides would also be at least a tiny bit eco-friendly.

Though my guide seemed to know an ample amount of what the jungle provides for survival…I did one day question his knowledge about the medicinal plants of the Jungle.  When he found out that another tourist and myself was suffering from some sort of stomach ailment, he pulled out his trusty machete and scrapped some bark off one of the trees…making some drinkable concoction with it. 

Not even 1 minute after I drank it, I saw the guy who drank his a few minutes prior to me make a dash to the edge of the deck, violently vomiting.  “Oh noooo,” I thought, maybe my guide scrapped the bark off the wrong tree or maybe he gave us too much?!  He didn’t even ask me for my weight, age, shoe size, previous health conditions – nothing.  And here I just drank something he hands me without even knowing what type of tree it came from!  Seconds slowly ticked away as I was bracing myself for my body’s turn to reject this root…which thankfully never came.  My guide’s explanation about the other tourist was that he didn’t eat enough breakfast.  Today, I am very glad that I am one of those people who capitalize on all-you-can-eat breakfasts. 

When I was piranha fishing, I ended up catching the most amazing looking sardine – not realizing until I grabbed it, that sardines in the Amazon have fangs.  I would have passed it to my guide to take out the hook if I knew prior to grabbing it.
 

I was invited back to this lodge as a guest to see it again when the water level is higher.  I am hoping that I can take the owner up on this offer in a month or two and I also hope that he realizes that it might be hard to make me leave.