Retrieving myself from the overhead locker, I looked over at my partner who clung white-knuckled to a bottle of neat gin. "Have we crashed?" he mumbled and swigged thirstily. Luckily, our 'stunt' pilot had made good and after kicking open the plane door, which creaked violently on its rusty hinges, we clambered down the steps.

The screaming jungle
The humidity hit us like a Mack truck. Making our way over to an ancient Landrover, the hot, thick air sucked at our skins and walking turned to wading. Everywhere the jungle shrieked – parrots, macaws, howler monkeys – all watching us, as we slid over the muddy road, clamped to the back of the truck.

After a night of fitful sleep, heavily aided by a local Amazonian brew, we woke to the sounds of our tour operators, Agencia Fluvial, revving the Landrover. We had chosen a three-day trip down one of the Amazon’s many tributaries, the Rio Yacuma, which would take in all the wondrous sights of the river – ending in an anaconda hunt in the pampas.

Overnight, the road had turned into a gurgling jacuzzi of oozing mud. Sliding treacherously from one side of the road to the other and every five minutes, having to get out and heave the vehicle out of a crater, I promised myself that I would never again complain about England’s tiny country lanes or pot-holes in the Transkei.

Creatures great and small
It was our tour guide, Sito, who made the journey bearable by amusing us with anecdotes of the wildlife we would encounter on the way. His genius lay in firing up our interest in even the smallest creatures with his enthusiasm and knowledge. ‘Ees my favourite,’ he’d bellow and gesticulate wildly with his binoculars at a bush or tree where a scrap of feathered rareness was trying to sneak past without being noticed. Ferreting around in the mud, he’d reappear, hands proudly clasping some minuscule species such as the lesser-mottled-tree-frog or jewelled-tropical-fruit-bat.

Not that the bigger animals lost their attraction. He pointed out moss-covered sloths, hanging lethargically from the treetops as well as the capybara (which looked to me like a large guinea pig crossed with a miniature schnauzer) trundling through the grass with its young. Jewel-coloured macaws flew high overhead and the prehistoric screams of the birds of paradise had us all looking wild-eyed over our shoulders for some toothy beast from Jurassic Park to erupt from the undergrowth. None came and we settled back to listen to the cacophony of squawks and roars from within.

A few hours later we swapped the Landrover for canoes. The tributary was much narrower than any other part of the river we had seen and the water was clearer. It was also far less claustrophobic and the dense jungle had been replaced with intermittent clumps of trees and bushes. For the first time, the closeness gave way to a sense of space and the chaos was replaced by calm. Drifting gently down the river on the current, hands trailing through the water, giant butterflies came to rest on our bodies, flapping their wings earnestly, as if trying to dry our perspiration.

A little further down we noticed the water come alive with bubbles. Fearing a full frontal attack from an enraged caiman or a shoal of ravenous piranhas, we hastily removed all body parts from the water. Sito, on the other hand, grinned broadly and with a flourish of his hand said ‘Ees okay, you now sweem.’ Thinking that Sito had taken leave of all his senses, we were amazed to see pink humps rise out of the water in graceful arcs. The river dolphins had arrived. ‘Alligator, he no like dolphins,’ Sito explained, ‘they scare heem.’ Hoping we had understood his broken English, we threw all caution to the wind and jumped in.

Swimming in the Amazon was unlike any other swim I have experienced before. The water is warm and the colour of deep ochre. The currents are strong and pull from underneath. Insects pirouetted in the sky and a few metres away the dolphins frolicked. Something then brushed past my leg and I froze, wondering if I was to become some creature-of-the-deep’s tasty snack. A few nonchalant strokes later, I scrambled over the side of the boat and collapsed in its depths to dry off.

Anaconda hunting
Whiling away the time fishing for piranhas, we eventually came to a sandy bank where we docked the boats and made our way through a swamp to the open planes of the Amazon’s natural grasslands. In the distance, the outline of the jungle could be seen — a thick smudge of darkness against the brilliant greens of the pampas. Thigh-deep in sludge, Sito removed his shoes and began to feel with his toes for anacondas. Beckoning for us to follow him deeper into the grass, we found ourselves hoping (!) to be the first to catch a glimpse of one of the world’s largest snakes.

An hour or so later, a short, excited shriek exploded from a clump of grass a few metres from me. One of our party had stumbled quite literally over an anaconda’s large coil. We lifted the magnificent creature out of the grass and marvelled at the size of it – about five metres – and stroked its diamond-flecked skin. It eyed us lazily, forked tongue flickering, quite unfazed at being hauled out of its nest.

Later in the evening as I sat on the riverbank next to our camp, a forkful of piranha poised to my lips, I wondered at the close encounters and dramatic surrounds of the day. Everywhere around me, I could hear the rustles and whispers of the mighty jungle preparing itself for night. A black eagle spiralled over the treetops and a thick mist began to form over the jungle, as if it were exhaling deeply after a long day. Two more days to go, I thought... I wonder if we’ll spot the ever-elusive jaguar.

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