Pantanal & Bonito
Trip Start
Sep 04, 2007
1
25
59
Trip End
May 28, 2008
Bonito, Brazil
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
I don't react too badly to bites, but some of my friends were covered with hundreds of bites and kept scratching them, which makes things worse! For this reason the area got the nickname Panta-hell.
We stayed on a farm with basic accommodation - the toilet & shower doors didn't close properly, there was no electricity (shower by candle light) and we slept in hammocks. It was very hot during the day, but we had to cover up with long sleeves and long trousers to avoid all the mosquitoes.
Despite all this though, I did enjoy the Pantanal. We went for walks in the jungle, horse riding and piranha fishing. We saw loads of wildlife including howler monkeys (very easy to find as you just follow the noise), coatis (related to racoons), giant otters, capybaras, caiman, anteaters, toucans, jabirus (third largest flying bird in the world) and hyacinth macaws (largest parrot in the world). We didn't get to see any jaguars or pumas, but there were some in the area.
One of the most memorable moments for me was piranha fishing waist deep in water. Piranhas do not really live up to the Hollywood image, and although they have sharp teeth it is apparently quite safe to be in the water with them. On our second fishing trip we were wading in the water and started fishing, only to attract attention from 5 caiman. They kept getting closer to us whilst we were fishing, but the local guy seemed to indicate we would be ok (none of us understood Portuguese, and he didn't speak English). Everytime we caught a fish the caiman would try to grab it off the line before we could. One of the girl's ended up catching a large caiman, which eventually snapped the line.... and then spent some time trying to cough up the fish hook! It was really good fun, but a bit scary having caiman less than 2 meters away.
I caught quite a few piranhas and several dogfish, so there was some fish on the dinner table. But there isn't much meat on a piranhas, and they don't taste particularly amazing either.
After the Pantanal we headed to Bonito for Christmas. The area is famous for crystal clear river waters. I spent Christmas day snorkeling down Rio da Prata, which was like swimming in a huge aquarium. The water is so clear that you are not allowed to go in wearing sun cream or insect repellent. The visibility was amazing and there were loads of fish including huge dourados.
I am currently traveling with a small group, so in the afternoon we exchanged our secret Santa presents. It was great to have a couple of presents to open on Christmas day. The afternoon was spent drinking Champagne, cider and beer, whilst playing around in the swimming pool. In the evening there was a Brazilian barbecue with loads of meat.... all very different from being at home.
