Blogs from Pantanal, Brazil, South America - page 5

Hi there folks, apolgies for the delay in blog entries. We´ve hardly had a day free but here we are . Well we made it to Bonito after a 16 hour horrificly bumpy minibus ride (which wasn´t helped by the fact that one of our comrades kept farting every 5 seconds...in an enclosed space...you know what I mean!!). Prior to starting the journey we spent an hour in Subway waiting for about 86 employees to make 3 take out sandwiches. Mine (Neil), the italian BMT had to be scrapped twice whilst the "sandwich engineers" free styled on the ingredients. Once we got on the bus at 10pm the two drivers (little and large) decided to play bangin Brazilian house music with the air con on over drive. Anyhoo, on our first day we went to a ... read more

We had a few more nights out in Rio after this. I kissed a sexy Isreali girl one night before we headed onto the Panthanal. We made the mistake of travelling to Corumba, a one hourse town that belongs in a county like Laois, to enter the Panthanal and ended up retracing our steps for 2 hours to enter the National Park. The Panthanal is an area bigger than France, made up of swampland and jungle. We were greeted by a jeep with a big box on the back that brought us to Santa Clara Pousada, which is in fact a farm. We were worried by the lack of guests on the first night and are fears were compounded each day as the numbers dwindled and not a single bird never mind a looker in the ... read more

PANTANAL The Pantanal is a vast network of wetlands that extends into Paraguay and Bolivia, but the vast majority is in Brazil. During the rainy season the numerous rivers swell, forcing exotic animals to cluster together on small patches of land, making for some amazing wildlife viewing. It's not uncommon to spot a wild jaguar this time of year. Originally we were planning on seeing our wildlife in the Amazon, but everyone we talked to said that you never see anything, at most you just hear the animals. We usually don't take organized tours, but the amazing number of activities they pack into a few days made it very tempting. We packed our bags into a small van along with a British couple, Tristen and Ceri, that proceeded to drive for 5 hours over a dusty ... read more

THE PANTANAL The pantanal was our highlight of our trip to Brazil. It is the worlds largest wet land although we were here in the dry season. We spent 4 days 3nights sleeping in hammocks in the middle of nowhere. We saw loads of wildlife, went on jungle treks, rode horses, fished for phiranas(i managed to get bitten), saw amazing sunsets and got drunk with great people. Pirayaer er djevel-fisker!... read more

Dag 132. Eirik vaaknet i panikk kl. 05, noe krop i haaret hans. Han borstet det vekk og lop for aa slaa paa lyset. Det kalde, sleipe og ekle (som han var sikker paa at var en slange) viste seg aa vaere en sot, liten frosk - som hadde valgt aa tilbringe morgentimene i det bustete haaret til Eirik. Etter den braa oppvaakningen var det ikke lenger mulig for Eirik aa sove - saa han gikk ut for aa ta noen bilder av soloppgangen. Paa formiddagen skulle vi paa tur langs elven - i en liten, smal motorbaat. Vi skulle bli hentet kl. 08.30 av jeepen, som skulle ta oss til elven. Det var en biltur i aapent beiteomraade paa ca 15 minutter. Baatturen varte i litt over 2 timer. Levi, guiden vaar, var veldig flink ... read more