A Traveler's Log


Toucans and Hornbills represent the unexpected in travel, wildness, delight, and surprise. Where they live, other wonderful animals and plants flourish.

Travel entails new experiences - new sounds, different smells, surprises, sensations not like those at home. Some ideas, feelings, and impressions must be recorded immediately or they are lost; others are best recollected in tranquility (with a nod to Wordsworth).


Bethought: to think; to remind (oneself); to remember
Images and scenes bethought - evoking the moment and reliving it.
Why in the World? Where in the World?

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

"On the Edge of Ruin"

 "These hobbits will sit on the edge of ruin and discuss the pleasures of the table, or the small doings of their fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, and remoter cousins to ninth degree…" Gandalf. The Two Towers, J. R. R. Tolkien



Almost everywhere we go, the remaining natural areas--the native habitats-- are circumscribed by destruction, monocultures, hard scrabble farmers, sprawl from cities, shanty towns filled with people looking for a better way of life. People everywhere, way too many people, doing what people do: cutting down trees, plowing the land, fouling the water, killing wildlife to eat, or for their skins, or for their hearts, gallbladders, or whatever someone in China or wherever thinks will cure their impotence, prove their masculinity, improve their sex appeal or cure some ailment or other. It just goes on and on, and all of this is just us beavering around, doing what we do. 

Our latest trip to Brazil brought home the juxtaposition. We visited two wild areas. The contrast between the wild and the "tamed" is stark; wild is complex and tamed is boring. Cristalino Jungle Lodge is located in the Southern Amazon, and consistis of 46 square miles of private, protected, pristine jungle; a clean, black water river runs through it and the region is recognized as an important area of biodiversity. The jumping off point for Cristalino is the 40 year old city of Alta Floresta. It used to be surrounded by forest all the way to the river; now it sits amid over-grazed ranches and poorly producing little farms. It takes about an hour to reach the edge of the forest; one moment the sun was blasting down and in the next trees overhanging the road filtered it into dappled shade.

Our other destination was Emas National Park located in south-central Brazil. The habitat is called Cerrado and is one of the world's oldest and most diverse tropical ecosystems.  It is a savannah, a grassland scattered with red-earth termite mounds; a clear, green river with a gallery forest  provides a habitat for its own flora and fauna. From Campo Grande, it takes 5 hours to reach Chapadão do Céu, the only city with a hotel close to the Park.  The area around Campo Grande was converted to ranching and farming long enough ago that it has lost its raw edge. The land around Chapadão do Céu, on the other hand, is surrounded by intensive farming for biofuels--sugar cane, corn, sorghum, and soy. After the blacktop road ends on the way to the Park, everything is coated with red dust. Huge otherworldly trucks ply the roads creating huge dust storms. It is hot, dusty, red, ugly. And it is planted right up to the edge of the Park. Stark contrasts and the ugly face of biofuels.

Granted, these and other marvelous natural areas seem big, especially if you are on foot or driving slowly on rutted, dirt roads. But make no mistake, these places are sanctuaries, preserves, reserves, and they are circumscribed by monocultures created by people. Outside the enclaves, the diversity is gone; the plants are gone; and the animals are gone; teeming life is gone. It doesn't matter who does it -- individual people nibbling and gnawing or corporations gobbling; the result is the same, only the rate changes.

So here we are sitting on the edge of ruin, refusing to deal with the single most important factor in the health of the earth, the human population that is about to hit 7 billion. Quibbling, caviling about - you name it - discussing the inconsequential.

Robinson Jeffers took comfort in enduring nature, writing:
         "I know that tomorrow or next year or in twenty years
           I shall not see these things--but it does not matter, it
                  does not hurt;
          They will be here..."  From: Their Beauty Has More Meaning

I too thought this way once. Now I very much doubt it. 

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Sweat and Butterflies

Cristalino Jungle Lodge - Day to Day

Back from a tramp through the jungle, I usually had just enough time to get out of my sweaty clothes, rinse off in the outdoor shower, and pull on shorts, t-shirt, sandals for lunch. Our outdoor shower was in a small private garden, leafy with plants, floored with smooth pebble-impressed concrete pavers. It was frequented by lizards and butterflies enjoying the water from the shower.  I took to undressing outside after I found way too many ticks. Off with the boots, socks, ankle support, long sleeved shirt, t-shirt, pants, bra and briefs - all left outdoors - hangable clothes on the clothes line, footwear spread out in the sun.  I figured the ticks would abandon all hope and flee.

The afternoon excursion usually started at 3:30 with hope that the mid-day heat would be waning. Stepping into the little secret garden was a treat.  Butterflies fluttered up momentarily from my socks, shoelaces, pants, t-shirt, but salty sweat is delectable and they soon settle back, until I shook them off in a cloud of yellow and brown.

Monday, August 1, 2011

Cristalino Jungle Lodge, Brazil 2011





Sketches of the Jungle--Prose and Poetry


Five days in the jungle, experiencing the forest, the heat, the humidity, the sounds from everywhere; we walked, we climbed, we sweated, we stood. We relaxed on the river; the sparkle in our eyes, the cool air, the little thrill of baby rapids, and the surprise at the edge of the forest, the silhouettes of macaws and toucans crossing the river, otters diving amongst the roots on the river bank, primates in the high tree tops, and curassows on the shore.

Our airy, screened bungalow featured an outdoor shower with cool water, an indoor shower with lots of hot water, a hammock on the porch and a fan to stir the air.  Just before napping, my eyes are drawn to butterflies on the outside of the screen, the breeze ruffling the tree tops - always the possibility of...something. Lulled and tired, I fall asleep.

Prose seems too prosaic a way to describe it all.

Cristalino Lunes
Tropical alarm clocks
Howlers boom in the morning
we are here




Early morning river
chilly mist rising, curling, wreathing
soon burned off











A yellow patch
rising from the shore
in a cloud





Sulphur butterflies Pierids
puddling in the damp sand
essential vitamins minerals






Morphos-tongues out
wings flicking brown to blue
on monkey shit































Neotropical river otter
eating fish from the river
glances at us





Herd of larvae
setae waving they sweep around
one following t'other


Lizard nose down
matched to the tree bole
alert to danger

Songs on high
birds flit in the canopy
almost impossible



A pattern original
the military copies the splatter
easy for trees










In the west
light slants from the sun
creating long shadows

Into the canopy
up and up and up again
visiting the birds


High foliage shaking
Capuchins, Spider monkeys, Howlers brachiate
at home high
 

In the tangle
long legs, sharp beak poised
Sunbittern to strike








                                   Red-tailed boa
                                   stretched out a limb motionless
                                   almost as one











Dark forms fly
Birds cross the river silhouetted
outlined shapes distinctive




Late afternoon fatigue
relaxing feet up on gunnel
beer in hand






Doing the list
what did we see today?
perfect complement-Caipirinha













A healthy jungle
open, leafy, shady, tall, diverse
alive and living

Good food, beer, birds, endless possibilities for surprise--what more could you ask?

Cristalino Jungle Lodge is reached via the city of Alta Floresta in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. There are daily flights from Cuiaba, the state capital, to Alta Floresta. The lodge is only accessible by boat. After the arrival in Alta Floresta, there is a 1/2 hour boat ride.