The Berry Islands

The Berry Islands

The Berry Islands are now the most logical Port of Entry to the Bahamas for Let's Dance and crew. With the Love Me Tender incapacitated, we must dock at a marina to get ashore to clear Customs and Immigration. The Berry Islands lie 55 miles north and east of Andros... our first choice for entry.  Thirty-odd cays make up the small, crescent-shaped island chain. On the lee side, the water is skinny, with exposed sand bores at low tide and not at all a place we want to be. The eastern side of the chain boasts ocean depths of up to a mile within just yards of the coastline. Our chosen route takes us in a wide arc around the western bight, to the northern edge of the Berrys. After about ten hours of travel at our typical 6 knot pace, The Stirrup Cays come into our sights.  Much more obvious than the low, sandy slope of Little Stirrup's shoreline is the distinctive tail of a Carnival Cruise ship! Then the tail of a Norwegian Cruise liner comes into view!   As we sail closer we can see a long, blond stretch of sand,  beach umbrellas, colorful, thatched tiki huts and tourists!  Again, not at all a place we want to be.

 Bill checks our AIS (electronic identification system of boats with all kinds of useful information, including destination) and discovers that the next stop for the Carnival "Fantasy" in our sights is Charleston! I could jump ship here and be home in a flash.....but I think not.  Let's Dance has infinitely more appeal, and besides, I have an in with the captain!  We continue the voyage together.

There are two marinas in the Berrys, but only the one at Great Harbor Cay can service all our needs.....a Customs official, a marine mechanic and a BaTelCo office. This marina is accessed through a long, narrow cut that was blasted through solid rock and is very sheltered from the wind and waves of the Atlantic.  A hearty young Bahamian named "Trumeeko" greets us at the dock and takes the lines I feed him as we snuggle into slip #9.  It is mid-day Friday -- plenty of time to take care of business before the islanders take off for the weekend.  As soon as we are settled into our slip and the electronics are turned off, the shore power connected and fenders in place, Bill hops onto the dock with our packet of immigration necessities and disappears.  He is back quickly with the report that the Customs official is on his way and the advice that we best hoist something yellow -- anything yellow -- in lieu of our missing yellow quarantine flag. Oh, no! The only thing yellow that I can think of is a kitchen dish towel. Hmmm. That will have to do.

 
Luckily, the official called to the marina to deal with us is young, smart and not the least bit interested in our dish towel.  We are soon in possession of a 120-day permit to float through Bahamian seas legally and at our leisure.  Down with the dish towel and up with the colorful courtesy flag.  We are IN!

The next priority is repair of the 25 hp Yamaha engine on the Love Me Tender whose shameful failure at Andros led us here in the first place.  Kimberley, at the marina office, gives Bill the name and number of the best mechanic on the island for small engine repairs.  (He is also the only mechanic on the island.)  She even writes down his name.  Old Turb.  Seriously, Old Turb!

It gets better!  We have stumbled into this off-beat little marina on Wedding Day.  It seems that there was a contest called “Sixteen Islands, Sixteen Couples, Sixteen Weddings.”  Very catchy name!  Once a year, on this particular Friday in January, sixteen contest-winning couples are wed simultaneously on sixteen of the inhabited Bahamas islands.  Note the word “inhabited.”  That leaves approximately 684 islands with no contest-sanctioned weddings today. In case you were interested!
So, the entertainment while we await the arrival of Old Turb becomes anticipating the local wedding.  I position myself on the flybridge with camera, binoculars and a cold drink to wait for the show.  The marina manager has raked the sand adjacent to the dock and wrapped plastic flower garlands around the fish weigh-in station.  It is very festive.  I see the groom arrive and his friends give him high-fives and whistles.  Then a car pulls up and the preacher alights and pulls on his vestments.  We must be getting close!

It is then that I notice a white SUV that has been in the parking lot for quite a while.  A telltale glimpse of white tulle hints of a potential bride-to-be in the back seat.  Meanwhile, Old Turb arrives and he and Bill survey the finicky motor on the aft upper deck of our little trawler.  I am strategically situated between the mechanics on deck and the bridal party on shore – ready for action on any front!  Bill watches with growing concern as Old Turb dismantles the Yamaha engine and lays the parts neatly on the deck.  I provide color commentary to the on-board mechanics as it becomes apparent that the bride in the white SUV is not coming out!  Various people go to the car door and talk to her, but she is apparently having none of it.  This is great theater....at least for one who has been boat-bound for a few weeks.

Old Turb finishes his task before the bride alights and goes on his way.  With no tools or parts, save what Bill could scrounge up from his own tool chest, Old Turb repaired a corroded ground wire to the ignition switch.  The little engine now purrs reassuringly and it looks like the Love Me Tender will regain her place in our good graces.  After a few test drives, of course.  Meanwhile, the bride is finally coaxed from the SUV and poses on the arm of her father under the yardarm.  The entire wedding party then boards a parasail boat and heads gamely out towards the ocean.  A wedding at sea!

Suddenly, I realize that it is after 3 and I still need to get to the telephone company office to buy data time for the internet so we can stay in touch with home.  The office  closes at 4.  The marina manager points out a shortcut through a weed-choked parking lot and I am off for the 15 minute walk.  The road is nicely paved and there is welcome shade along the way.  I soon arrive at the Bahamas Telephone Company's yellow office building, strategically located directly underneath their giant cell tower.  It is about 3:25.  There is a neatly printed sign on the door that reads “Closed”.   Well then.  Guess the weekend started early and we will get to spend some quality time together on Great Harbor Cay in the Berry Islands.

And so we do, and it turns out that the Berry Islands, often overlooked by boaters (and everyone else, apparently), have an interesting history.  Sponging and boat building were the major industries up through the 1920s when a sponge blight ruined the crop and most of the islands' inhabitants moved away to find work.  Meanwhile, an ocean away, a wealthy young American woman was making a name for herself in power boat and motorcycle racing.  Her name was Marion Carstairs, but she preferred to be called “Joe.”  She gained notoriety through her wild parties and Hollywood lovers.  In search of privacy for her increasingly risque lifestyle, she decided to buy an island.  Whale Cay in the Berry Islands seemed just the ticket.  The catch was that she had to buy all of the Berry Islands just to get Whale Cay.  She did.  She bought the entire island chain.  Joe sold off the cays she didn't want and built an elaborate infrastructure on Whale Cay...houses, motorcycle race courses, a landing strip.  Tycoons, movie stars and royalty visited in equal number.  A 1949 hurricane devastated the private retreat, and a disillusioned Joe finally sold Whale Cay in 1975 for $1 million.  An interesting character......

Anyway, by Monday morning, Bill and I are more than ready to complete our errands and resume the voyage. We still need internet time, of course, and decide to add a quick diesel top-off stop, too.  Coincidentally the phone company and the fuel dock are located right next door to each other.  What luck!  The phone company office opens at 9 (or 9:30, depending on your source) so we leave the marina about 8:30.

  At first glance the fuel dock does not look very accommodating.  A sagging, center wooden pier, about 20 feet long, with two sets of pilings on either side.  We drift off the dock for a few minutes deciding if the pilings are set widely enough apart for our 17 foot beam.  We give it a go and Captain Bill backs Let's Dance handily into the rough slip.  Big Hector is there to take our lines and, with my usual agility, I lob the stern line directly into the water.  Embarrassed, I pull the salty line back in and hand it gingerly to a grinning Hector.

While Bill and Hector begin the fueling process, I set off on foot for the phone company, again.  This time, the path is through a weedy field at the rear of the island's power plant.  It is muddy and full of sticker burrs, but direct.

Naturally, the phone company opens at 9:30, so I wander back to the dock to watch the fuel pump gauge click and click and click some more.  350 gallons fill the port side tank making our little ship list slightly towards the dock.  Bill switches the hose to the starboard tank and adds another 350 gallons.  Now we are back on our usual even keel.  This seems like more than a top-off to me, but Hector is a very happy man.  I do believe we have made his day!

Back to the phone company office for the third and possibly final time.  Bill goes with me for tech support; the office is finally open for business and the woman in charge is delighted to sell us as many gigabytes as  we can afford.  We return to Let's Dance, via the power plant side yard, now gorged on  bytes.  We have a nifty little gadget in the pilot house that allows us to capture internet signals from cell towers as far as 15 miles away.  It is called a GlobeSurfer III.  We can reach even further when its mini antenna is placed on a thick metal surface.  (This seems like high-tech voodoo to me, but....)  Surprise!  There are no built-in thick metal surfaces in our bridge.  Necessity being the mother of invention and all, we bought a 12-inch square, cast iron griddle at a kitchen store which now resides just to the right of the magnetic compass on the dash.  We use the flat side, rather than the ribbed, as an antenna base.  Naturally.

And so, only six days after leaving Florida, we are finally outfitted with our Bahamian courtesy flag, an internet card and a finely tuned little Yamaha engine.  The Berry Islands exceeded our expectations and we are ready to move south and enjoy more of the wonderful mysteries that make life aboard Let's Dance a never-ending voyage of discovery.

Let's Dance.......Carol & Bill

Off We Go!

It is the second week of January, 2015, and the weather in most of the lower 48 is atrocious, so  Captain Bill and I decide that it is time to head south for our fifth (!) winter in the Bahamas.  For a change of pace, and because we now consider ourselves seasoned old salts, we decide to start the ocean crossing from West Palm Beach instead of our more customary southern departure points.  Having made all the necessary mathematical and nautical calculations, the Captain is confident that we can cross the powerful Gulf Stream and arrive at our desired anchorage in an easy 10 hour haul.  Non-stop, West Palm to the northwest corner of the Great Bahama Bank. We are professionals!  So, in preparation for an early Tuesday departure, we position ourselves in an anchorage near the Lake Worth Inlet.  The inlet is a mile long chute that connects the harbors and marinas of the Palm Beach area with the Atlantic Ocean.  The anchorage lacks charm as it abuts a major turning basin for cargo and cruise ships, but its proximity to the Atlantic is appealing for an easy exit.

Our exit strategy, then, is to raise our anchor just after dawn and slip into the line of sailboats and sport fishermen leaving Lake Worth to go on their various ways.  The man-made channel at Lake Worth is narrow, long, and well-trafficked.  The day is cloudy and gray with scattered squalls forecast. We slide in gracefully behind a 35 foot sailboat named 'Maestro' to join the outgoing parade.  The fishing boats pull ahead by burning copious amounts of fossil fuels while ‘Maestro’ soldiers on at around 5 knots.  Right about our speed.  We are on the way!

Bill asks if I can identify a small boat in the distance as we are about half way through the channel. Yep, a pilot boat, clearly marked.  This can only mean one thing: a big ship is being led  in from the ocean as we are on our way out to the ocean.  And there she is, just now visible around the buildings at the channel entrance.  We have learned that it is best to stay as far away from these behemoths as possible.  Always.  That being said,  halfway through a narrow, two-way channel is no time to change course.  We opt to stay behind 'Maestro' for the duration.  'Maestro' however suddenly changes her course to port as if to cross in front of the giant ship!  Is she nuts?  There is clearly not enough time or open water for the sailboat to cross the channel safely.  Then we hear it.  Five short blasts of the horn from the huge freighter.  Five shorts means "There is imminent danger of collision!  What the #!~?!*## are you doing?"

Finally the captain of 'Maestro' gets the picture and swerves in behind us to avoid the snarly ocean giant.  There is a woman at the wheel and she looks pale.  If I attempted a move like that while at the helm of Let's Dance, I would spend some serious time in the brig reviewing Chapman Piloting, Seamanship and Small Boat Handling, Section 3: The Art of Seamanship, Chapter 7: Rules of the Road -- contemplating my error in judgment.  So, before 0800 hours we have had our excitement for the day - we hope.

As the morning progresses, our voyage towards the Great Bahama Bank is slowed by winds from the northeast encountering Gulf Stream propulsion from the southwest.                                                   When added to the 4 foot waves attacking us from the portside bow, it gets a little ugly.  Our speed drops hourly....from our standard 6 knots to 4 1/2 to only 3!  People on foot could walk to the Bahamas faster!!  (Well, except for the water thing.)  Perhaps we should re-think the route so we can arrive before spring.  We do.  By altering our heading slightly we are able to use the force of the Gulf Stream more effectively, overtake all pedestrians and arrive at our destination in time for dinner.  A romantic, fashionably late, dinner by moonlight in our solitary anchorage off Great Isaac Rock.

At 0730 on day two of the eastward passage, Bill raises the anchor remotely by himself while I wake up over of bowl of Cheerios in the saloon.  We have an uneventful day with calm seas and speeds averaging 6 1/2 to 7 knots (now we're upping our game!!)   Along the way I see a notation on the chart:  "Lark's Two Fathom Bridge."   There is nothing here except clear, teal-tinged water with occasional chunks of reef and coral....twelve feet deep.  Hmmmm.  (Apparently my friend Lark has taken back her bridge!)  Our plan is to spend another quiet night anchored at the shallow edge of the Northwest Channel, then make a quick run across the Tongue of the Ocean to Andros Island in the morning where we will celebrate our 32nd anniversary by clearing Bahamian customs!

And so, that is just what we do.  By 1030 hours on day three, we have (finally) successfully set our anchor (third time's a charm) in the shallows of the tiny, round harbor at Morgan's Bluff on the northern tip of Andros.  This anchorage offers poor holding because the bottom is mostly  rock...hard layers brushed free of both sand and vegetation by decades of wind and currents.   The harbor is bowl shaped, with a crumbling concrete wall along one side where the water barge comes weekly to fill its tanks for delivery to thirsty outer islands.  Wrecked boats litter the remaining ragged shoreline.  It is not a scenic spot.

We plop the Love Me Tender gently over the side of our ship so the Captain can go ashore to clear customs.  We cannot locate our bright yellow "Quarantine" flag which should be flown until we clear customs.  Oh, well.  Bill gathers our documents -- passports, vessel registration, etc. -- to take ashore with him.  As he starts the dinghy engine, I jokingly ask, "Do you have a paddle?"  Luckily he does, as the little engine sputters and dies not far from the mother ship.  Still, there is a bit of current, and getting back is tough.  I see the predicament from the saloon and pull out a light, nylon tow rope to throw to Bill.  (It should be noted here that I throw like a girl.) Three being our lucky number today, that's how many tosses it takes for me to get the line within range of the dinghy for the current to float it to Bill.  He then easily pulls himself and the recalcitrant Love Me Tender in to the stern of Let's Dance.

Now what to do?  We cannot clear customs if we can't get ashore and we can't get ashore without the Love Me Tender.  We need to find a marina where we can pull in to get the tender's engine repaired.  It would also be pretty perfect if this marina had a Custom's agent nearby and walkable access to a telephone company office.  Bill scours the charts and decides that the Berry Islands are just the ticket.  The small swath of cays that make up the Berrys lies about 75 miles north of us, too far to go this afternoon, so we decide to retrace our route and spend another romantic evening anchored on the blue Bahama bank.  Life is so hard!

We will begin our 33rd year of togetherness, well, together!  Tucked in under a crescent moon and plentiful stars, softly rocked by lapping waves, safely anchored in shallow seas, very happily together.

Let's Dance.......Carol & Bill

Amazing Amazon

We could have done it. Yes!  We could have eased Let's Dance from her comfortable Ashley River slip, scooted across Charleston Harbor and up Shem Creek between the idle shrimp boats to the fuel dock.  With topped off fuel tanks, we could have motored out past Fort Sumpter into the Atlantic Ocean for the first leg of the journey.  We could have navigated close to shore to minimize the effect of the north-rushing Gulf Stream as we tackled the first short haul from Charleston down to Key West.  Five hundred and fifty nautical miles.  Watches of four hours on, four hours off, 24/7.  We could have made landfall in Florida in a mere six days.

Slightly bleary-eyed, and a trifle cranky, we could have said good-bye to Key West and looped around the west side of Cuba, thereby avoiding the tricky Windward Passage and Guantanamo Bay to the east.  We could have waved at Grand Cayman before reaching the relative safety of Central American waters.  On down past Belize, Honduras and Nicaragua.  By now, our stores could be low and we could be eating mostly canned vegetables with our freshly caught fish.  We could have flown past the Panama Canal and bounced off the coast of Colombia.  Oops!  Bad choice.  So, we could stop for a short while on the little Dutch island of Curacao where we could sip chocolate and local liqueurs.  Another 1500 nautical miles under our collective belts.

From Curacao we could have set our sights beyond Venezuela to the shores of Guyana, Surinam and French Guiana for the final push.  Down to eating peanut butter and crackers with a side of canned fruit cocktail.  Four hour watches.  But we could have gone on.  We could have crossed the equator just south of the Brazilian border and, through careful GPS analysis and well-honed chart reading skills, we could have, at last, arrived at the mouth of the mighty Amazon River.  1,650 nautical miles from tiny Curacao and a startling 3,700 nm from Charleston, South Carolina.

We could have done it.  With unlimited calm, following seas; clear blue skies by day and star-filled nights; no mechanical issues; ace navigation skills; electrical systems that purred with content; marital harmony and a surplus of Blue Bell ice cream; we could have done it.  And when we finally arrived at the vast, 25 mile wide mouth of the Amazon, we could have checked and re-checked our charts, scrutinized our logs, recalculated our latitude and longitude, and discovered that the true starting point of our adventure, the city of Iquitos, lay another 1,725 nm upriver near the headwaters of the fabled stream....hmmmm. 

True, we could have done it, but we wanted to get there before high water season in January,

so we left Let's Dance and the Love Me Tender at home and flew commercial to Lima, Peru. 

Ta Da!!

We have traveled to South America, and the northern reaches of the Amazon River, to celebrate my mom's 90th birthday in style.  Some may ask, "Why the Amazon?"  The answer is clearly "Well, she's been every place else!"  Luckily, neither my brother David and his wife Leslye, nor Bill and I, had been to the Amazon either, so it was the perfect location for our little family of five to party.  From Lima we flew two hours north to the jungle-locked town of Iquitos and then boarded a small bus for a fascinating drive through forests dotted with tiny villages to the town of Nauta.   Although it is home to about 10,000 people, Nauta is accessible only by river and the two-lane road from Iquitos on which we traveled.  It was dark when we arrived in the dusty, rutted town and the primary form of lighting coming from the open doors and paneless windows was the glow of television screens.   Children and dogs followed our little bus as we bumped by empty concrete block facades and trash-strewn alleys.  Finally, in a scene reminiscent of an unfolding movie drug deal, a tall, solid wooden gate was pried ajar and our bus slipped inside. 

At last!  We have arrived at the dock.  The real adventure is about to begin as we board our new home away from home and party central -- Aqua Expedition's "Aria."

Daylight reveals a stunning anomaly -- the Aria is a 145 foot long cross between a river barge and a floating pagoda.  There are 32 passengers.  Our party of five (Nita - the birthday girl,  David and Leslye, Bill and I) are the only Americans on the ship.  The 28 person crew includes guides, skiff drivers, pastry chefs, a bartender, masseuse, cruise director, cooks, armed guard, waiters, a paramedic, and naturally, a captain.  We are spoiled from the outset.....and loving it!

On the first morning of the cruise, the passengers are divided into four groups -- 8 to a skiff.  We don life jackets, cover ourselves in bug spray and are off to explore.  Our family is assigned to Julio's skiff and we are joined by a couple from New Zealand.  We take off up the Ucayali River to begin our equatorial adventure.

 Shortly after leaving the mother ship we pull to the shore and pick up a 'ribereno', a young river man with a large machete.  His name is Antonio and he will help spot wildlife and cut swathes through the jungle for us.  Wow!

He is very practiced and soon spots three rare red macaws, a ring kingfisher and a cocoi heron.  Beautiful birds are everywhere!  Social flycatchers, swallow-winged puff birds, red-capped cardinals, bluish-fronted jacamar, and of course the white-eared jacamar....so many!  We pull ashore and climb up the bank (are there snakes?) to get a close look at a trio of owl monkeys that Julio sighted high up in a tree.  The owl monkeys stare back at us solemnly while the little squirrel monkeys perform high canopy acrobatics for our amusement.

After a few hours of intense river scouting we say goodbye to Antonio with our thanks and a couple of bottles of Coke, and head back to the Aria for the first of many gourmet meals.  A quick siesta later and we are back in the skiffs...this time with Neyser guiding us.  Soon we encounter three fishermen in a canopied canoe pulling what appears to be a floating corral.  In fact, these riberenos  are on their way to the market in Iquitos with their live catch of fish gathered into a clever aquatic cage.  They will be eight days (!) on the river towing their fresh goods to market.

The slowly flowing river is wide and the air is incredibly fresh as we continue up the Ucayali River.  Grey river dolphins surface around our skiff and a lone pink dolphin slides by, revealing only his vibrant dorsal fin.  Neyser spots something high in the trees and we slow to take a look.  Sloths!  Three-toed sloths!  

These cousins of anteaters hang about high in the cecropia trees, eating the leaves and buds while enjoying life in the slow lane.  Once a week, approximately, a sloth will make the 45 minute trek down the trunk of the tree to relieve himself at ground level.  (Other curious sloth facts:  their fur grows away from their extremities providing rain protection as they hang from their arms and legs in the rainforest canopy; the females give birth while upside down; their fur provides a host habitat for moths, beetles, fungi and (ugh!) cockroaches; when agitated, the sloth can travel at a top speed of 0.15 mph.  Way to hustle, Mr. Sloth!)

As dusk nears on our first day on the river, our drivers bring all four of the Aria's skiffs together on a sandy bank for cocktail hour, Amazon style.  We are served chilled mimosas and a tasty variety of nuts wrapped in decorative palm leaf pouches.  A most civilized way to end a perfect day in Peru.

Day two is to begin with a 6 a.m. call as we want to be on the river early to search for elusive capybara and slithering anaconda.  Bill is so excited that he wakes me at  5 a.m., raring to go.  Ouch!  Finally the others are ready and we set out with Daniel as our guide and Freddie captaining the skiff.  We travel up the Pacaya River into the 5 million-acre Reserva National Pacaya-Samiria, home to over 500 bird species and around 100 types of mammals.

We are overwhelmed by the birds -- the Jabiru stork (here from Belize only for breeding season), cormorants, yellow-cheek and orange-wing parrots, long-horned screamers (aka donkey birds for the braying noise they make), ringed kingfishers, etc.  Adding to the unique sounds of the river are the pecky-pecky engines on the dugout canoes, usually small lawn mower motors.

Still, we are looking for the giant anaconda and so we search the banks, pulling in close under fallen trees and vines to peer into the dense undergrowth.  No anaconda are found, but Daniel gives it his all.  Hard work, this anaconda hunting!  We motor on, curious about the holes in the muddy banks left exposed in the low water season.  These holes are made by walking catfish (Clarias batrachus, thank you), air-breathing fish who can "walk" using their pectoral fins for as long as they stay moist.  Very odd.  

Finally -- time for breakfast!  The skiffs raft up together along a shaded bank and the crew produce fresh-squeezed juice, hot coffee served in china cups and a selection of fruits and breads.  Amazing feast!  We enjoy this river delight while watching a bluish-fronted jacamar dine on dragonflies.  To each his own!

Afterward breakfast, we go fishing....for piranhas!!  Daniel ties the skiff to a low-hanging branch near the muddy shore, and hands each of us a short cane pole rigged with a four foot section of line and a simple hook.  Chopped raw chicken serves as the bait and we are instructed to slap the end of the pole on the water's surface a few times to get the attention of the little biters.  (They don't see too well in the murky river water.)  Then, wait for the bite and yank quickly upwards.  It works!  David nabs a big red-bellied piranha first and everyone else follows suit.  Even Nita, who was not optimistic at first, catches one of the bad boys.

These small fish have a deservedly bad reputation, although Daniel claims that Hollywood created most of the fear factor.  Still, their teeth are something to behold.  We toss most of the piranha back (who wants a biting creature, no matter how small, loose in the boat?) but two large ones are saved to become hawk bait.  Daniel skewers one of the fish with a hollow stick and launches it away from the skiff.  Nearby, a vigilant hawk watches, then makes three attempts before successfully grasping the floating piranha in her claws for a clean getaway.

As we return to the Aria from our morning excursion, we are offered cold, scented hand towels........."to refresh."  This is nothing like the rugged Amazon adventure we had imagined!

Let's do lunch!

Once again the American's skiff is the last to leave the mother ship as we set out for an afternoon tour with Roger in charge.  Our futile search for the "Common Anaconda" continues, but Nita and Bill do spot a teeny, bright white frog.  The skies are filled with birds again -- short-tailed parrots and festive parrots and mealy parrots, anhingas, too.   Scarlet macaws and black collared hawks and yellow-headed caracaras.  Oh, my!  Roger spots a "Watson" bird perched in a river-side tree.  Actually it is a "hoatzin", a spectacularly crested prehistoric creature that has claws on its wings and an unfeathered 
blue face.  Very handsome!

Just as anatomically unlikely as the hoatzin is the terrestrial capybara.  This hairy fellow has the distinction of being the world's largest rodent.  They are hunted by the indigenous peoples of the Amazon for their meat and skins.  At up to 100 lbs. and standing about 2 feet at the shoulder, that's a lot of rodent.  But kind of fetching in their own way, I think.

Sunset comes to this equatorial region routinely at 6 p.m. and it is routinely gorgeous.  We abandon our search for the elusive anaconda and set our sights on jungle jaguar as the light fades.  Roger has a car battery powered spotlight and uses it to scan the banks of the twisting Pacaya River as we slowly head back to the Aria. The jaguar fail to appear for us and Roger finds only a slippery spectacled Caiman which he gamely brings aboard for us to admire.

The remainder of the return river ride to the Aria is a magical reminder that there are still huge colonies of fireflies in the world, and bright moonlight and unknown constellations; even the Milky Way is clearly visible here in the Amazon night sky.  Occasional sweeps of the spotlight to search for floating logs or other hazards in our path reveal pairs of disembodied red eyes along the banks and the occasional fishing bat flitting overhead.

The third day of our Amazon tour dawns cool and overcast.  Nita decides to remain on the Aria for the morning so only Leslye, David, Bill and I set off with Julio.  Our destination is a riverside village of about 200 people called Contamanillo, 530 miles north of Lima.  Each year, as snow in the Andes melts and begins its slow, downstream glide, erosion pulls the soil away from the river banks, taking steps and railings and other man-made improvements away.  The Amazon and its many tributaries rise a remarkable 35 feet between low-water and high-water seasons.

We disembark from the skiffs and climb to the top of the rickety steps where we are met by Isabel and Arnoldo who turn out to be long lost cousins of Julio!  As they catch up on family matters, Isabel shows off the bucketful of fish they caught just this morning. I can’t resist the lure of a walking catfish but find him quite prickly.

Word of the outsiders' arrival travels fast, and soon curious children surround us.  The little girls want to hold hands with Leslye and one of the little boys sports a green parakeet on his shoulder.  A large pig is penned near the town's edge and we learn that he serves as an "insurance policy" for the villagers.  Should someone in the village need, say, an operation, the pig could be traded to another village for some other form of barter and so on until the deal is complete.  Very efficient.

We are invited into the home of a local family -- an open air affair that is raised about 5 feet off the ground.  There is a cook fire on the platform and something is rapidly boiling.   One child holds on to his momma, who is pregnant, while an older boy shows us the hand-made grater that they use to slice the manioc root that forms a large portion of their diet.  Families eat only twice a day here, and water for all their needs comes from the river.   Children are especially prone to water-borne illness and parents treat them with the milky sap of the oje tree mixed with sugar cane juice.  The oje is known as the "doctor" tree and apparently one good dose of this concoction will last for a lifetime.

As a special treat, the young children of the village gather in the schoolroom to entertain us.  One by one they introduce themselves, shyly, and then sing a few short songs as a group.  Mothers with babies look on as the 31 of us, tourists from around the world, are then invited to introduce ourselves.  We are prompted to say, "Me llamo David.  Soy de Estados Unidos."  Etc.  After each of us stumbles through this with our own name, the children repeat the name while enthusiastically clapping out the number of syllables it has.  This is done with great enthusiasm.

After the introductions it is our turn to sing for the children!  Whose idea is this?  The Japanese contingent of twelve goes first with a lyrical rendition of "Ue O Muite Arukou", better known to U.S. audiences as "Sukiyaki."  The bar is set really high!  Next the Aussies, who number 8, step up with a rousing version of "Waltzing Matilda."  We are called on third, and since Nita stayed back on the Aria, we have little chance of staying on (or even finding) the right key.  But Leslye is determined and we manage a creditable version of "The Eyes of Texas."

Finally, Roger asks the children to tell us what they would like to be when they grow up -- the standard question to school kids.  One boy says 'policeman' and others agree that this would be great.  One little girl wants to be a teacher, another a doctor and then a small hand in the back of the room comes up.  "I," she says quite seriously, "want to be a tourist!!"  We must be good role models!

The village tour was a great success and eye-opening and we all returned to the boat with renewed appreciation of our own circumstances.  As we approached the Aria, eager for cool drinks and a yummy meal, we could clearly see Nita walking on the treadmill in the second floor exercise room.  Way to go, Mom!

Another delicious lunch, another quiet siesta and we are ready for the final expedition of our Amazon adventure.  Too soon!!   Neyser guides us to an area where pink river dolphin are abundant.  They are reticent to come too close, but surface all around our skiff to give us a peek....always too fast and too stealthy to be well photographed.  Alas.  We motor from the river into Lake Clavero for canoeing and swimming. (Are there piranha?)

Women and girls in long, dugout canoes seem to appear from nowhere to surround the skiffs.  What fun!  Nita and Leslye climb cautiously down into the first canoe and are quickly off to the races.  David and I follow, joining two young sisters -- Lidia and Mara -- in a quite long and obviously old, wooden canoe.  The paddle that I am given weighs about 15 pounds and is almost impossible for me to operate.  Luckily our skills are not needed at all and we have a nice, short ride.  It was Nita's first time ever in a canoe -- a birthday treat, for sure.

All this hard physical labor earns us a treat and a refreshing swim in the lake is just the ticket -- for some.  This means only Leslye and David in our group, although Nita does dip her toes in just for bragging rights.

 

It is hard to imagine that our guides (and all the behind-the-scenes crew) could top the experiences that we have had to date.  But....after swimming and canoeing and piranha fishing and fine dining and bird watching and sloth spying and anaconda hunting and all the other adventures....they do!

Our skiffs are gently beached and we come ashore (each in our own special way) to enjoy an alfresco cocktail party.  Fancy hors d'oeuvres, chilled champagne, wine and beer, lounge chairs and tiki torches -- they thought of everything and it is a very memorable farewell party.

But it didn't end there!  Back on the Aria for our last evening on the river we all gather in the lounge before dinner.  Stories are told and photos swapped.  Promises made to keep in touch and cards exchanged.  And then, crew and passengers join together to sing "Happy Birthday" to Nita.  It is good to be ninety in this adoring crowd!  She has charmed them all -- the Aussies and the Kiwis, the Japanese, Peruvians, Israelis and Greeks, passengers and crew alike -- and this is no surprise to the four of us.  We've been charmed for years!

So, yes, we could have spent the low-water season wending our way south in Let's Dance, and probably found the Amazon, too.  But who wants to spend all that time getting there when you could spend all that time being there?   Exploring the amazing Amazon turned out to be a great way to spend Nita's 90th birthday.  Now the only question is, "What will we do for her 100th?"

Stay tuned!!  But for now, Let's Dance........Carol and Bill