Walking the Americas

by Levison Wood

  As Segundo supervised the loading of the boats, I made a mental note of our equipment and supplies. Enough rations for seven days for fifteen people. Who knows how many Indians we’d need to take? Blashers took sixty, so I hope we can get away with that. Water filtration system and emergency purification tablets. Snake gaiters? Yes, I supposed, just in case. Satellite phone, check; hammocks, yes; lots of mosquito repellent; first-aid kit and a stretcher, essential. It was all there in the waterproof grip bags laid out in the narrow tree trunk that passed itself off as a dugout canoe. The indigenous Indians grinned that they’d got it all in without anything falling off into the water.

  ‘Are you ready?’ asked Segundo.

  I looked at Alberto and he nodded. ‘Let’s do this.’

  I went first, balancing to get into the wobbly little boat and sitting on top of my rucksack. The Indians waved goodbye to their womenfolk, who’d walked down to the waterside out of curiosity. Then our captain for the three-hour boat ride punted us away from the shore using an eight-foot pole, until we were out of the shallows and floating in the middle of the brown muddy river.

  Once we were deep enough, he lowered the small motor into the flow and kicked it into action with a splutter. We were off. The floating tree trunk carrying us and our rations for the forthcoming quest sped along at a rapid pace, gliding upriver like a water skate. The captain navigated the bends with grace and skill, sometimes swerving around fallen trees and floating deadfall. Dugout canoes aren’t the most comfortable form of transport, especially for us fat-arsed Westerners, and it takes some getting used to, sitting still and not causing the thing to capsize. Having said that, the knowledge that the river was teeming with crocodiles and electric eels was enough to keep us from fidgeting too much.

  As we travelled upriver at the relatively breakneck speed of twenty miles an hour, we could finally relax and take in the scenery. What we had forgotten or left behind now we’d have to do without. For the next week or so we would have to be completely self-sufficient, with no backup, little by way of communications, no roads or resupply, and no one to blame but ourselves.

  All around, the jungle closed in. Everything seemed enormous. The trees were the biggest I had ever seen; huge ceiba and mahogany and teak loomed on both sides. We passed through prehistoric swamps, where we saw the crocodiles basking on the matted knots of vegetation. Howler monkeys swung like Tarzan through the branches and dangled from vines as they tried to get a closer look at these intruders into their domain. A six-foot-long python was wrapped around a log as we buzzed past; the slippery length unfurled itself to reveal a small but menacing set of eyes that watched us with intent. All around there were beasts of the jungle: sloths, giant iguanas, toucans, vultures and swooping herons. With every mile we covered, the land got wilder and wilder.

  After an hour or so, the river seemed to get broader, which was unusual since we were going upstream, but it also got shallower. On either side was a great swamp and the trees seemed to emerge directly out of the water. Here, though, it was clearer with less sediment, so you could almost see the bottom. Shoals of fish darted around the boat and sometimes we would bottom out on the gravel and sandbanks so that we’d have to get out and push the canoe. Segundo led the charge with his massive frame, twice the size of the Indians, and he seemed to relish the challenge of hauling the boat up the rapids.

  The river snaked its way uphill and soon the terrain on either side grew steep and to the north-east, vast green mountains loomed under the clouds.

  ‘We’re not too far from Canaan now,’ said Segundo, ‘another hour, so we should get there before dusk.’

  At that moment, I saw a flash of red on the east bank of the river about a hundred metres away. Something was moving behind a log and it wasn’t natural.

  ‘What was that? Did you see it?’ I said, squinting to see what it was.

  ‘I think it was a person,’ said Alberto.

  There it was again. This time I saw the distinct form of a human, no, there were two, crouching behind a log, clearly trying to hide.

  ‘Immigrants,’ said Segundo quietly.

  I looked again. The man in the red was watching us through the fallen branches.

  ‘Cubans,’ whispered the boat captain.

  After a few seconds we had rounded a bend and they were out of view.

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  ‘They are the only ones who don’t use coyotes. They travel in pairs and don’t follow the main trails.’

  We pushed on. It was late afternoon and it gets dark early in the jungle, so we didn’t have time to hang around.

  By four o’clock we reached a wide meander in the river, where several dugout canoes were moored up on a sandbank. Dogs barked at us from the banks and some naked children eyed us warily from the beach where they’d been playing. This was Canaan, the last village this side of the mountains.

  Segundo jumped out of the dugout and tied the boat to an overhanging tree and helped me and Alberto get off and onto the bank, where a load of villagers had emerged out of the bush to come and see the new arrivals.

  ‘Come,’ said Segundo, ‘the boatmen will unload the bags, let’s go and let the soldiers know we are here.’

  We followed our lofty guide through the crowd of villagers along a trail that led to a large clearing, where the village spread out before us. There were about a hundred houses, all of them wooden on stilts spread at equal distances apart. I presumed that the raised platforms were in case the river ever flooded, as well as to keep the people safe from snakes and other beasts. Most of the roofs were thatched from palm leaves and grass, but a few were made of metal tin.

  As the sun fell below the trees across the camp, the shadows of the huts stretched across the clearing where kids played football and women sat on the ladders chatting. These were the Embera tribe that I’d heard about from Blashford-Snell. ‘Rings through their noses … up for a laugh … tits jiggling all over the place …’

  I looked around. There was barely a breast in sight, apart from a few women suckling their brood and a couple of octogenarians combing their long black hair in the sunset. Most of the tribe were in fact fully clothed; the result of proselytising Christian missionaries, no doubt, who’d been meddling with the Indians for the last forty years.

  ‘A shame,’ said Alberto, ‘I haven’t seen a naked woman in months.’

  Semi-feral dogs ran around yapping, searching for scraps of food underneath the houses, only to be chased off by decrepit old men with no teeth. All the men wore tatty old football shirts and rubber boots; hand-me-downs from charities in the US and Europe. They’d done the trick and ‘civilised’ the natives. No more poor naked savages here, I thought. Just poor clothed ones instead. A tame people, who’d lost their culture and traditions. There wasn’t a spear in sight. There was, however, a large number of satellite dishes, so that even here the locals could tune in to MTV and watch other tribes on Discovery channel. A bizarre thought.

  We weaved our way between the stilted houses.

  ‘At least they’re friendly,’ said Alberto.

  Everyone waved and said hello in Spanish or Embera. On the far side of the village, just before the trees started again, were some green tents and a hut with camouflage netting surrounded by sandbags. Four soldiers stood inside in uniform and one was patrolling the perimeter with a machine gun. The boss came outside, a stocky sergeant called Gutierrez. He didn’t smile.

  ‘These are the foreigners who are crossing to Colombia,’ said Segundo. ‘You should have been notified by Colonel Carrion.’

  The sergeant grunted. ‘Show me your papers.’

  We handed over our passports for inspection and a letter from SENAFRONT that stated we had permission to leave Panama through the jungle.

  ‘You can stay with them tonight,’ he said, cocking a head towards a group of men who were watching proceedings.

  ‘Who are they?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s their chief and his leaders,’ said Segu
ndo.

  We walked over. A short, skinny man in his late forties or fifties, wearing a red T-shirt, offered a hand.

  ‘Ernesto Konde,’ he said. ‘I’m the chief.’

  He didn’t look like a chief. He was wiry and shifty-looking and didn’t seem to have much leadership presence. He looked like a shoplifter.

  ‘You can stay in my spare house,’ he said, motioning for us to follow him.

  It was like the others, six feet off the ground and held together by rusty nails. It was only half built and Ernesto had to move a load of timber so that we could climb up the stepladders onto the platform. Still, it was better than nothing, so we thanked him and strung our hammocks as darkness fell.

  ‘When you’re done, come over for food.’ He pointed to the next hut along, ten metres away.

  ‘What do you think is on the menu?’ said Alberto.

  ‘More fried bananas, I would imagine,’ I replied.

  We were both pleasantly surprised to discover then, when we went over for dinner, that a plate of freshly roasted venison was waiting for us, as well as plenty of fried bananas.

  Ernesto grinned. ‘Jungle deer,’ he said, giving us a thumbs-up. ‘Very tasty.’

  I had visions of Ernesto and his men out in their loincloths and body paint, stalking through the jungle with bows and arrows and blowpipes. I told him so.

  He laughed. ‘No, my grandfather used to do that stuff. And we sometimes watch the Brazilian tribes on National Geographic. But we don’t do that anymore.’

  ‘So how do you hunt?’ asked Alberto, as he chewed on the succulent meat.

  ‘Guns, if we have enough ammunition,’ he said. ‘But usually we send our dogs after the animals and kill them with machetes.’

  It sounded brutal, but then again, so was all life in the Darién.

  After we’d finished eating, Ernesto’s wife came and sat down next to me. She was old and withered, but had a twinkle in her eye that betrayed a lifetime of laughter.

  ‘Do you want to buy something?’ she said in a conspiratorial tone.

  ‘What?’ I asked, expecting to be peddled some tribal beads or needlework, like we’d seen in the markets of Panama City.

  Instead she pulled out of her apron a cloth, which she unwrapped and then pulled out a white thing, the size of a thumb. It was a tooth.

  ‘It’s from a jaguar,’ she said.

  I grimaced. Poor thing, I thought. They’ve probably killed it to sell the teeth.

  ‘No, thanks,’ I said, explaining that I didn’t want to encourage poaching. She thought about it and shrugged her shoulders, wrapping it back up in the cloth.

  ‘OK, I have something else,’ she said with a sigh. ‘I’ve had it a very long time, but I want to sell it.’

  From another pocket came another cloth, this time bigger. Before she unwrapped it, she looked me in the eye and stared.

  ‘These are very rare,’ she said in a whisper.

  ‘Let me see.’

  She placed the object into my hands and I felt the heavy coldness of something old and triangular in shape. In the half light of the room, I couldn’t tell what it was. Two of the sides were razor sharp and serrated. It felt like some sort of Stone Age spearhead made of flint. That must be what it was, evidence of a prehistoric society in Panama, perhaps?

  ‘No, it’s not a spear,’ said Maria. ‘It’s a Uña de Rayo.’

  ‘She says it’s a nail of lightning, like a fingernail. I think she means it’s a thunderbolt,’ said Alberto.

  I laughed out loud. She frowned and grasped it out of my hand. ‘It is, it is, that’s what it is. My grandmother found one. They are only found in the Darién, nowhere else. We sometime find them underneath trees that have been burned by the sky.’

  I supressed my chuckles and felt bad that I had laughed. Maria genuinely thought that it was the tip of some sort of supernatural thunderbolt, presumably petrified upon impact with the earth.

  If it wasn’t a spearhead (it was too big and irregular for that) and it wasn’t a thunderbolt, there was only one thing left that it could be. It was a shark’s tooth. But this wasn’t any old shark’s tooth, it was that of a prehistoric megaladon; a thirty-metre monster ten times bigger than your average Great White, that swam in the oceans over three million years ago. One thing was certain, that this ancient fossil was formed at a time when Central America was nothing but a ridge of underwater volcanoes, but then again, who was I to argue with this wise lady and her dreams of thunderbolts?

  Even if I had a notion to correct her, what is a more likely story: a flash of lightning striking a tree and leaving a piece of stone in the shape of an arrow, or a giant sea-monster leaving its teeth in the middle of a jungle? The old dear had never even seen the sea! So I told Maria that I would love to buy her thunderbolt, even if it was a hundred dollars. I didn’t barter.

  The next morning I woke to the sound of bullfrogs croaking in the reeds and the patter of children’s feet, as they shuffled around the village collecting water from the well.

  ‘Come on, Lev, you’re the last one up, it’s time to go,’ said Alberto.

  I peeled myself out of the hammock and got dressed. Outside on the ground below the hut, Ernesto the chief was waiting and behind him was a crowd of men.

  ‘These will be the porters,’ he said. ‘We will take you over the mountains to Carreto into Kuna Yala.’

  ‘So you’re coming too?’ I asked the chief. This was a surprise.

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘It’ll be an adventure.’

  ‘Do we really need all these men?’ I asked Segundo. ‘There’s a lot of them.’

  ‘The chief plus eight, and me.’

  ‘You as well?’

  ‘I need to supervise the Indians. You remember what the colonel said?’

  ‘That they can’t be trusted?’

  ‘Exactly. We can’t let them rob you and leave you in the jungle.’

  ‘They seem nice enough,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, but the Kuna are troublesome, and we’ll meet them on the other side.’

  In any case, I thought, having an extra pair of hands would be useful, especially ones as big as his. So it would be a rather large band of merry men after all.

  We ate a breakfast of steamed rice and plantain over in the chief’s hut, while the porters made carrying systems from old bits of rope and bicycle inner tubes, which they wrapped round the bags and carried either like rucksacks, or on their heads. Segundo went around tightening straps and tying away loose ends. He’d make a great platoon sergeant, I thought.

  ‘Go and have a blessing from the women,’ said Ernesto. ‘They’re waiting for you.’

  Apparently it was Embera tradition to get a tattoo dyed onto your skin before setting off on a journey, so Alberto and I sat topless as the old women drew a pattern on our arms with some sort of plant extract, which left a black stain on our skin.

  ‘It lasts for a week,’ they said.

  ‘I hope so,’ said Alberto, as the lady slipped with her stick and made a messy smudge across his bicep.

  And with that, we set off out of the village and into the jungle. To begin with, there was a muddy little single track. Ernesto and his chief porter Leo led the way, followed by me and Alberto, then all the Indians with Segundo at the back. We followed the course of the Membrillo river, which after a while became unnavigable, but we were able to hear its gushing current and the noise of the streams and waterfalls that flowed into it, even as the path wound up and over ridges and hills.

  Soon enough, the trail petered out. This was clearly the limit of most Embera explorations. They didn’t need to go far to hunt. Already that morning we’d seen two ‘tigrillos’, which are black cats similar to leopards, as well as a small deer, a wild pig and plenty of huge iguanas and monkeys, all of which got eaten around here.

  ‘Look at that,’ said Ernesto, pointing to something in the branches of a tree not far away.

  It was a hawk eagle with a dead rat in its talons.

&nbs
p; ‘They’re a magical animal,’ he continued. ‘The jungle is full of magic. Some is good and some is bad.’

  We followed our superstitious chief, hacking a new trail through the undergrowth. It began to pour with rain and it wasn’t long before we were soaking wet with sweat, and up to our knees in mud as we splashed and waded our way through the swamps and streams. It was hot and humid and even though we’d travelled through plenty of forests on this journey already, nothing could have prepared us for the sheer brutality of the terrain that we encountered in the Darién.

  At least the porters were cheery. For the Embera, it was a well-paid holiday away from their wives. The older and bolder amongst them had been this way before, five or ten years ago; they couldn’t remember when exactly. Only Leo knew the route, at fifty-seven years he was the oldest of the group. Even the chief hadn’t been this way in over twenty years and couldn’t remember the path. For several of the youngsters it was their first major outing, and if they made it, it would be the first time they had ever seen the ocean. A few of the lads wore old trainers and flip-flops. Only one had boots. The rest were quite content to walk in rubber wellies.

  ‘We’re used to it,’ grinned the chief. ‘But if you want to donate any of your boots at the end, we won’t say no.’ He winked.

  The first day in the Darién we walked for five hours and covered only six miles and by the time we found a suitable place to camp, on the bank of the river, Alberto and I were utterly exhausted. Even the Embera and Segundo looked tired. We cleared a patch with our machetes and strung our hammocks and cooked some rations up to eat. By six o’clock it was pitch black and there was nothing left to do. Each of us slid into our hammocks as the noise of the forest roared in the darkness. Only then did it finally sink in how far away from civilisation we really were. This was true wilderness, and if anything went wrong here, there would be no one coming to find us.