BEFORE YOU GOoooo.........

> Waters Flooded With Life
>
> January 5, 2003
> By CONNIE ROGERS
>
>
>
> "SWIM in the Amazon? Sure, I swim every day." This was the
> cheerful response of Patrícia Spina-Ribeiro to our first
> question when we arrived at the floating Uakari Lodge in
> Mamirauá, a reserve at the heart of the Amazon River basin
> in Brazil.
>
> Lithe and petite, she looked more like a water sprite than
> manager of the lodge. "Actually, swimming is not officially
> recommended," she added.
>
> We climbed out of the small outboard that had carried us an
> hour west from the river town of Tefé, where we'd flown
> from Manaus. The lodge's five bungalows and dining area
> were strung out along a walkway like a necklace of white
> baubles on the coffee-colored river.
>
> As we stood up on the dock in front of the reception area,
> the full weight of the heat hit us. It was midmorning on
> the Equator in July. The idea of a plunge in the river,
> which curled serenely through the green forest and made a
> graceful U turn at the dock, was hugely tempting. "I think
> I'll wait," I heard myself say.
>
> Mamirauá is one of the richest aquatic systems in the
> world, with hundreds of lakes and shifting channels at the
> confluence of the Japurá and (as the Amazon above Manaus is
> known) the Solimões.
>
> The peaceful-looking current in front of us is an
> underwater highway full of piranha, electric eels,
> stingrays, manatees, dolphins, water snakes and hundreds of
> other creatures of questionable motivation. Crocodilians
> are more numerous here than anywhere else in the world, and
> 10- to 15-foot black caiman laze about on the forest edges.
> My husband, Ted, lifted our bags out of the boat and seemed
> equally willing to wait.
>
> "How about a quick tour of the forest before lunch?"
> Patrícia asked. The shade looked inviting so we handed her
> our luggage and climbed into a shallow canoe just large
> enough to hold João, our local guide, and the two of us
> sitting single file. João had a deep furrow in his brow
> that provided a roof for his smile and the powerful upper
> body of someone who'd spent his life propelling himself in
> a boat.
>
> With a few strokes, he took us to the forest edge, where
> vines hung thickly over low trees like dust covers in a
> warehouse of oddly shaped furniture. He lifted a leafy flap
> and we floated right into the treetops. Our feet wouldn't
> touch the ground for the next five days.
>
> Mamirauá, about the size of Connecticut, is the largest
> flooded forest reserve in the world and a place I'd never
> heard of until John Robinson, the head of International
> Conservation at the Wildlife Conservation Society in the
> Bronx, told me it had some of the best wildlife viewing in
> the Amazon.
>
> Beginning in January, the river swells up with melting snow
> from the Andes and 10 feet of seasonal rains. It overflows
> its banks and rises up to 40 feet in the forest by May. The
> river becomes a limitless viewing platform in the
> rain-forest canopy. Its peak fruiting season is from April
> to July, and howler monkeys, three-toed sloths, umbrella
> birds and giant tambaqui fish come to stuff themselves at
> the feast.
>
> At first I felt a little disoriented in this weird, watery
> world. We were at nose level with orchids and bromeliads
> and face to face with cutter ants carrying tiny leaf flags
> up a tree instead of across the forest floor.
>
> Even the boat was strange. With just an inch of freeboard,
> it could have been a floating leaf. We glided silently by a
> sleeping red howler monkey with his voice box tucked into
> his chest like a rotund little Buddha in deep meditation.
>
> All around us, things were behaving in unlikely ways. We
> saw a fish spring three feet out of the water to eat fruit
> from a tree. We saw lizards run on water.
>
> Hoatzin birds with blue faces and orange crests ate leaves
> and hissed like snakes when we came near. Their babies have
> claws on their wings and can climb trees before they can
> fly. Strange as it all seemed, I knew it was natural. In a
> constantly shifting landscape, there are countless new
> niches and evolution is working overtime to mold creatures
> to fill them.
>
> I'd come to see one of the strangest, the white uakari
> monkey with a brilliant red face. It lives only here, and
> Mamirauá was created to protect its home range. João says
> it looks so human that his fellow villagers refuse to hunt
> it for food. And its scarlet face isn't from embarrassment
> but to advertise its good health.
>
> I couldn't search for them just then. We were paddling so
> close to furry, fist-size tarantulas nestled in knotholes,
> I went on red alert waiting for João to hit a tree and
> knock one into my lap. But he swung the boat skillfully
> behind him with well-practiced precision. I began to relax
> and sink down into my seat until I was flat on my back.
> Looking straight up, I fell into a kaleidoscope of green
> leaves and shifting shapes. The air was humid and suffused
> with the shimmering half-light of a shallow, sunstruck
> pool.
>
> Seconds later I sat bolt upright. A barrage of chirps and
> chicks, whistles and screeches broke out all around us as
> if the forest were staging a fire drill. The birds joined
> in the alarm call and the bushes burst into life as I saw
> bits and pieces of the fleeing monkeys flashing by. All of
> a sudden a tribe of red-faced trolls stood upright in the
> treetops - the uakari must have been there hidden the whole
> time - and looked ready to hurl missiles down onto our
> heads. A tiny howler sped over a branch in front of us and
> dove into a tree for cover. The crisis - a harpy eagle -
> flew away, frustrated in its hunt for something small and
> tasty.
>
> I was rhapsodic about the wildlife when we returned to the
> lodge for lunch, but Patrícia was having the opposite
> reaction. She'd been kept awake the night before by a raft
> of long-nosed bats that had slipped through a broken screen
> and spent the night flying low over her bed. She'd enlisted
> Óleo, her fellow biologist and the lodge's natural history
> expert, to help evict them.
>
> Both of them knew how to carve out personal space against
> daunting odds, having worked at different research stations
> in Mamirauá - Patrícia studying dolphins for a year and
> Óleo snakes for five. He and Ted went to examine a new one
> he'd just collected and put in an oil drum on the porch. I
> went straight on to the luncheon buffet.
>
> A young Brazilian couple and a Spanish diplomat with his
> family were serving themselves. We swapped trail stories in
> a hybrid of three languages as I tried to pretend that the
> meal we were eating was entirely normal. The tambaqui, a
> staple food fish of the Amazon, has sweet, succulent flesh
> that tastes as close to a peach as a fish can get. We drank
> cashew juice, which was surprisingly bland, and took large
> helpings of what I thought was chocolate pudding that was
> actually made from the black fruit of a palm tree.
>
> I went into the kitchen to compliment the cook and found
> her out back scraping the plates into the water in front of
> a baby caiman that was snapping up the scraps. This
> disposal system, along with the solar powered electricity
> and an innovative filtration system, makes this an entirely
> eco-friendly lodge. But it didn't immediately increase my
> enthusiasm for a swim.
>
> As the days passed, I grew more and more fascinated by the
> river. We stayed in a simple wooden bungalow floating on a
> pontoon of giant logs. Our room was the farthest upriver.
> Two full-length windows opened directly onto the oncoming
> current, giving us the same view from our beds a river
> otter might have from its den. The river swished and
> swirled us to sleep at night and sang us awake in the
> morning. It was easy to believe in the local legend of
> Encante, an underwater city where pink dolphins live and
> there's music and dancing day and night.
>
> We went fishing the next afternoon in a motorized longboat.
> For most of the lodge's guests, fishing involves dropping a
> baited line into one of the quiet lakes to catch a piranha.
> But Ted had brought his fly rod and was eager to see what
> he'd find. His two boxes of flies had been confiscated by
> security at Kennedy Airport, but he had managed to tie some
> credible looking new ones from odd things purchased at the
> five and dime back in Tefé. He settled into the bow with
> João, who fished with a bow and arrow. The lake was still
> and the sun slanted down on floating meadows of grass and
> giant lily pads the size of banquet serving trays.
>
> I put my feet up in the stern and watched a soap opera of
> black-capped squirrel monkeys in a condo-like bush 20 feet
> away. They chased one another from floor to floor, tumbled
> around in twosomes, got into fights and paused to tear into
> insects like so much fried chicken. José Márcio Ayres, a
> Brazilian biologist with the Wildlife Conservation Society
> who came to study the uakari (which were virtually unknown
> in 1983), stumbled onto this new species tucked away in a
> tiny corner of the reserve. They live in a neighborhood the
> size of Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx, one of the smallest
> home ranges of any primate on earth.
>
> João and Ted had no luck with their fishing, and as they
> put away their equipment a pair of pink dolphins came up
> for air with a whoosh and a blow, to let us know there was
> plenty of life in what seemed a deserted lake. João said
> goodbye to the place with a deep grunting sound and a
> chorus of caiman sang out from the grass all around us. We
> had lots of company - more than we realized at first. As we
> sped home in the dark, Óleo shone a flashlight at the
> passing forest edges. They came alive with little red
> lights - the eyes of black caiman getting ready to go out
> for the night.
>
> Mamirauá wasn't always such an unquenchable font of life.
> Before 1990, it was heavily fished by commercial boats from
> Colombia and Manaus, and logging and hunting had brought
> the black caiman, giant river otters, tortoises and
> manatees to the edge of disaster. At the urging of Dr.
> Ayres and others, the Brazilian government passed
> legislation to make it a sustainable development reserve.
> The 8,000 people who live here - a mix of Amerindians and
> Europeans - are allowed to stay and be part of the team
> that manages the resources. Parks everywhere suffer from a
> shortage of guards, but Mamirauá has an army of
> enthusiastic ones.
>
> João's home is a half-hour away in Vila Anlencar, one of 70
> villages in the reserve. Life here is as unexpected as the
> forest. A line of houses and a bright blue phone booth sit
> high above the water on stilts, and toddlers paddle around
> in canoes. People were bringing grass from the lake to the
> cattle in floating corrals and chickens strutted around in
> boats. A volleyball game was going on waist deep in the
> water, and just about everyone was swimming.
>
> We went for our first swim the next day at dawn. The river
> looked peaceful and felt dense as a velvet coat. Listening
> to the roar of howler monkeys rise and fall in the forest,
> I drifted dreamily off and was caught up in a powerful
> current. I suddenly realized that this river had carried
> tons of sediment and the largest volume of fresh water in
> the world 1,000 miles from the Andes to here. I'd hardly be
> a noticeable addition for the next 1,000 miles to the sea.
> Alarmed, I swam hard to get back to the dock. Lying back in
> the early morning sun and listening to the lyrical riff of
> the river eddying around the lodge, I realized that nothing
> at Mamirauá is quite what you expect.
>
> Visitor InformationThe Uakari Floating Lodge is a 90-minute
> ride from Tefé in a large motorboat. The lodge has five
> floating bungalows, each with two suites and private baths.
> The rooms are basic with solar-powered lighting and private
> baths with shower, natural ventilation and balconies on the
> river. There is usually a breeze so the temperature in the
> shade is comfortable.
>
> We read or watched a video in the simply furnished lounge
> at night and never left our lights on in our room to avoid
> attracting no-see-ums and mosquitoes, but we had several
> visits from frogs.
>
> The lodge's menu introduces guests to local dishes of
> freshly caught fish and fruits you've never heard of. More
> familiar chicken dishes, rice and even lasagna are also
> served. I particularly enjoyed the desserts, all of which
> were unidentifiable. The guides and lodge staff are all
> from the reserve and rotate the jobs among themselves to
> share the tourist income.
>
> The lodge has a full-time manager and natural history
> expert; each is a scientist who has lived in the reserve
> and knows the area well. Trips to a nearby river dolphin
> research station can be arranged. Rates range from $280 a
> person for one night to $828 for four nights. Double and
> triple rates are slightly less. Rates include meals. I made
> our arrangements through Nelissa Peralta, who speaks
> English and can be reached by phone or fax at (55-97)
> 343-4160 or by e-mail at ecoturismo@mamiraua.org.br.
>
> Visas ($100, money order only) are required for Brazil.
> Contact the Brazilian Consulate, 1185 Avenue of the
> Americas, New York, N.Y. 10036; (917) 777-7777, on the Web
> at www.brazilny.org. The consulate recommends a yellow
> fever shot and malaria pills. You can consult your doctor
> and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
> www.cdc.gov/travel/tropsam.htm, for more suggestions.
>
> Manaus can be reached from the United States directly (from
> Miami) or through São Paulo, Brazil. Round-trip fares from
> New York start at $800. Varig flies to Tefé, the gateway to
> Mamirauá, as do regional airlines ($210 round trip). Some
> late-day flights require an overnight stay in Tefé, where
> we got a room and breakfast at the Hotel Anilce for $100.
>
> All our arrangements - airport pickup, hotel reservation,
> transport to and from the reserve - were handled
> efficiently by the reserve staff in Tefé.
>
> CONNIE ROGERS is a book editor in New York who is studying
> primatology.
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/05/tr...95ccbb8929f4cb
>
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[BlueTurquoise]

Wow! sounds like an awesome holiday experience! So when are you off to that then Cary?

Chong