On the second day walking in the Ecuadorian Amazon, I proudly wore mud to the tops of my gumboots. I visually feasted on the dense, chaotic surroundings and on Sergio; the indigenous Quichua guide, occasionally swinging his machete to clear the track from the rapid jungle creep. I forgot about the intense humidity as we searched for forest wonders; monkeys, birds, spiders, butterflies, beetles, fungi, fruits and flowers. It was amazing how every field of view is occupied by something living.
Sergio diligently catches a tailless whip scorpion and a brightly-bellied poison frog, and I ogle in childish wonder and hesitancy. At one point, Sergio leaps quickly onto the forest floor and with the blunt side of his machete, he secures the head of a viper. I could tell by his cautious actions it was highly venomous. After we have a closer look (but not too close) he releases the snake from his grip. He said he had dreamt last night of the sign for seeing a snake, and I believed him. I love the idea that someone can be so connected to his surroundings…his world…to experience foretelling.
At one moment, I feel something skitter around my head and I panic. I kneel down whispering urgently, ‘What is it?’, imagining something venomous that I shouldn’t touch! Sergio starts chuckling and I feel such relief. It’s a green anole lizard. After more chuckles and photos of it posing on my head, the lizard races to a tree trunk and freezes, where I admire its wide alert eyes and bright green skin. Later I check a guidebook at the lodge and realise it has a throat that extends into a scaly orange sail. What a privilege for me to be crowned in the jungle by this glorious fire-throated miniature dragon.
Further down the track, Sergio is genuinely excited as he points out tracks of a great anteater. He was so elated because he hadn’t seen tracks for a long time. I had seen these pig-sized animals in the Buenos Aires Zoo so I could truly imagine one moving through the jungle, foraging with their probing nose and wiry coat. He told me the story of his grandfather who met his untimely end, gutted by an attacking great anteater. He told it with pride, and I stand in the dense forest, in awe of life here.
That night we paddle by canoe through the black lagoon, sitting in pitch black, a foot above the water. The symphony of insects and frogs is almost deafening and the call of the ‘moon mother’ or Great potoo bird, is eerie and beautiful. When Sergio spots something he turns on the torch beam; small bats darting above, and caiman eyes shining along the lagoon banks, a kingaku racoon high in a palm, and a boa snake overhanging a branch just a few feet above us. The torch beam would snap off again and we would plunge back into the nocturnal world.
I heard in the organic symphony the occasional splash of fish jumping. Suddenly, something hit my shoulder very hard, ‘what was that!’ I exclaimed as I heard something banging around behind me in the bottom of the canoe, and then a splash as it reached freedom. In the darkness, we’ll never know just how big that fish was. A piranha? This black lagoon was full of them because I had fished for them off the canoe ramp earlier that day. What was this fish escaping from with such force and urgency? Caiman? Sergio said that once a fish jumped out and slapped a guest so hard in the face it cut her lip! I’m glad that wasn’t my fate! Later at the lodge, I found a small scale on my shirt. The next day my shoulder was bruised! The animals in the Amazon are literally throwing themselves at me! It was of great amusement to my canoe colleagues and other guests at the lodge. My animal magnetism remains unattested.
(Abridged version from my travel blogspot in 2013: 'Kat in South America – 5 countries, 4 months, 2 languages, 1 backpack'. December, 2012.
Animal tracks in the muddy Amazon rainforest floor including the Tapir (centre).
Photographs by Kat McArthur. All rights reserved.