The Feast and the Famine: The Famine

Firstly lets just establish that this is a reference to a lifestyle famine and not my food intake. I know how parents and grandparents do worry when they think little Liam isn't getting enough nourishment. He is. Now onto the important part: pink dolphins, crocodiles, snakes, piranhas and mosquitos (and Swedes so I've been forced to add).

We awoke early in a whir of excitement, except for Nick who woke and got ready as late as humanly possible (but still in a whir of excitement). Today was the day we were to embark on the Pampas tour (or what we had now labelled 'the pump arse tour'). We piled into the Fluvial Tours office to be greeted by 'johnny five', the tour sales man slash marijuana dealer, who introduced us to two grinning Swedish girls before piling us into a jeep for a four hour ride on a road that resembled the surface of the moon.

We arrived sore of bottom yet high in spirits, and were bundled onto a little boat before we were aware that there was a river for it to float on. The sun beat down in a firey wrath from above, and before long we were 8 hot, sweaty and bothered individuals. The wildlife was abundant with birds, monkeys and alligators, and by abundant I mean there was rarely a point where you couldn't see one of the snap happy beasts sunbathing on the shore. So it came as a great surprise when Negro (our 9 fingered guide) stopped the boat and barked "swim". We looked at him, then each other... "but what about the crocs?" one of us replied. "pink dolphins in the water, crocs stay away". That was more than enough for our intrepid team, and we piled off the boat like it was the Titanic. The cool river water was a blessing in spite of the initial concern about cayman alligators ripping limbs off. We returned to the boat to view more of the abundant wildlife and watch the sun set over the wild terrain. The night was far from over, however, as we still had to go nighttime croc hunting (not killing just spotting) clad with torches and mozzie spray. We left in the midst of darkness and trawled down the river; our torches flashing around to expose the two reflected eyes in the water. Negro, the guide, pulled to the side, jumped out of the boat before climbing back in with a 4ft alligator in his hands. We took turns in touching the scaley beast while he pointed out various characteristics. The night ended soon after as we were to be awakened for sunrise over the Pampas.

Day two commenced with the aforementioned beautiful sunrise, followed by breakfast and preparations for the day's main event: big snake hunting. We walked under the strong near equatorial sun hours, clad with boots and suntan lotion, through thickets, bogs and marshes in search of snakes. At one point we waded through a marsh filled with crocodiles and reeds up to our waists, our boots filling, and clothes becoming sodden, with the putrid water. After pretty much giving up hope, on our return journey back to the boat we came upon an anaconda, which was passed around to be held. However, as I was about to elect to hold the snake, it bit our guide on the hand. He casually removed the venomous little shit, assuring us that he'd be fine. This, though, was enough to put me off holding it. We returned to find a large anaconda constrictor wrapped around a tree in the camp, which was not poisonous. This snake I gladly held and the necessary photographic evidence was captured. After which we ate, showered and were ushered out to go Piranha fishing. I caught three. We returned to the camp to try our Piranhas after stopping at some river bar for sunset, beer and a game of volleyball.

The next day we undertook our daily routine of swimming with dolphins whenever possible before finally being returned to Rurrenbaque. We ate, drank cocktails and swung in hammocks before my parting ways with the guys. The fllowing morning I would fly back to La Paz before leaving as quickly as possible for Peru and the north.