Jumping Jacare Flash
Tuesday, August 9th, 20055 August 2005 (Friday) – Manaus to Lake Mamori, Brazil
As it turned out, the tour had many things that were NOT what were marketed to me.
Firstly, I wanted to see the meeting of the water and I was told that the tour included this.
Manaus is situated near the confluence of Rio Negro (Black River) and Rio Solimões (Amazonas). If you look carefully, the water right in front of Manaus is black. This is the Rio Negro and the source is from Venezuela. This river is very old, the base of the river is rocks. The mineral composition is also different, very acidic and hence, there is little wildlife along this river.
Meanwhile, Rio Solimões is brown. The source is from the Andes mountains and the river is comparatively young, still full of mud below.
When the two rivers meet, forming Rio Amazonas, they actually do not mix for, some guidebooks say, up to 18km. So you can see an entire stretch of river with two colours – black and brown. It would be quite an interesting sight.
Well, I could not see the meeting of the water because the tour company put me on a public ferry that transported me from Manaus to Careiro. The boat obviously did not stop for me to observe the meeting. Jorge, the guy who sold me the tour yesterday, and who was now accompanying me on the trip, assured me we would see it on our return. But as I stared at the water, I did see the colour change from black to brown.
Jorge would also provide the translation for me, it seemed. He is a Venezuelan and a political refugee, no less!! Gosh. Well, this is his fake name, just in case someone from the Chavez government is reading this. Anyway, on learning that I would be heading to Venezuela next, he said he would provide me with some contacts. And he did later, his sister, cronies, ex-business partner… which was very very nice of him.
After a 40-min bus-ride and 1.5 hour boat-ride, we finally steered into Lake Mamori and arrived at the lodge. Along the way, we saw some birds and finally, where the river enters the lake, we spotted some river dolphins. I saw an entire flank of the PINK body of a dolphin move in a curve into the river. Wow, what a sight! I cannot believe how pink the body of the dolphin was! I was speechless!
There were a few other guests, from Spain, already at the lodge. One of them started to ask about the plate of jacare (cayman) meat. Huh? Jacare meat??? I thought it was a joke, surely.
After a short rest, we headed out to observe more dolphins and do some piranha fishing. But before we left, Fernandes, our local guide, showed me a jacare which had a harpoon pierced right through. It was still alive, but barely. Fernandes then tried to yank out the harpoon, taking out some guts along, before releasing the jacare back into the river. I was so naive that at that time, I thought the jacare had gotten itself trapped with the harpoon by accident and Fernandes had FOUND it.
Anyway, at the end of our piranha catch – Fernandes caught 4; I caught 2; Celso and Marian, the Spanish couple, caught 1 each; Jose, the boat guy 1 and Jorge zero. These piranhas were not as easy to catch as during my previous experience in the Pantanal, and they were much smaller here as well.
After sunset, we headed out to look for jacares. What was marketed to me was that the local guide would catch the jacare, show us, let us touch, take photos, and then release it back to the river, unharmed. However, when I saw Fernandes holding up a harpoon in his hand, it suddenly dawned on me that the jacare I saw earlier did not have a harpoon in its body by accident! Fernandes put it there!!
I asked Jorge if Fernandes was going to kill the jacares we find. Jorge replied that he did not know. We searched for a long time in the dark, and found nothing. Actually, if Fernandes wanted to kill the jacare, then I preferred that we find nothing tonight. I lost interest in what was going on with Fernandes and the Spanish couple and lay on the seat of the boat and stared right at the sky.
Tonight was a true NO MOON night. The sky was filled only with stars and the stars were lighting up the area here by the lake. Imagine that! And the sky was so clear that we could see the Milky Way. Gosh… how wonderful to see the Milky Way!!! It is so so so so rare to see it. I think you can only see it in the middle of the desert, in the middle of the ocean and in the middle of the jungle where there is absolutely no artificial light around. And this is it!!! Such an amazing sight!
I was awakened from my daydream by a confirmation that Fernandes was about to catch a jacare. Jorge shouted to him not to kill it. So, we looked at it, examined it a little and released it, unharmed. At least, this jacare was safe, for now.
swesn