Walking the Amazon: 860 Days. The Impossible Task. The Incredible Journey

by Stafford, Ed

  We found the lake at 5 p.m. and saw a house on the far side. We paddled across and the people allowed us to stay (after a little persuading) in their school. I’m very tired – that was the most unpleasant day of jungle trekking in my life. That’s with about two years of my life spent in the jungle. All jungle is most definitely not the same.

  It’s going to get worse though as the waters rise. I really don’t know what we’ll do. We’ll have to push even further from the river. This varzea is impossible.

  When people mention ‘pela cara’ now they get a standard response: ‘Sorry. I am bored with talking about this. It is only the uneducated that believe such stupid stories.’

  The final paragraph sounds so blunt and rude to me now. I can remember the sentiment completely, though – I was so bored with pretending that the people’s stories were worth listening to. I was so bored with such ignorance. It wasn’t their fault but the more I thought about it the more I thought that it wouldn’t hurt to tell them they were being stupid. But I could have done it more politely on occasions.

  Diary entry from 4 December 2008, Magdalena:

  Today we woke up at 5.30 a.m., packed everything away, and after shoving down some farine and sugar in water we started walking. The skies decided to unleash a huge downpour and so we were soaking wet all day. I was conscious of every cut and wound and every slight rub turning into a sore.

  At the moment I have an open wound on my left heel; sores around my waist from my pack waist belt; and cuts on my hands from falling over. It’s impossible to keep any of them clean or dry.

  After two hours of following Raul through the mud we bumped into a settlement of thatched huts that turned out to be called Elmer Fawcet. It was five kilometres from where it was labelled on our map but a family was gathered in one of the huts sitting round a bubbling pot. They invited us up and we climbed up the thin wooden plank to escape the torrential rain.

  ‘What’s in the pot?’ I asked. ‘Mono,’ replied the mum. Monkey.

  Just pleased to be out of the rain we accepted the family’s invitation to eat and I was pleased not to be given the head. The ‘monkey’ was in fact a kinkajou, a nocturnal arboreal mammal like a racoon. It was boiled seemingly without seasoning and was tough and tasteless. Jorge sucked at the skull and had juices flowing down his fat chins.

  The man and his son agreed to guide us to Magdalena with their shotgun in the rain and we cut back and forth over the tiniest of bridges and walkways through floods and swamps. Without their knowledge we would have been the whole day at least struggling through the maze, but in the end it took only two hours.

  At one point on that two-hour dash through the swamps the man’s son pointed out something I had never seen before. A thick, muscular, brown body was snaking through the shallow water. ‘Puta madre, Cho! Una anaconda!’

  I grabbed my video camera and started filming this mythological serpent. It wasn’t big for an anaconda – perhaps 3 metres long with a girth of 15–20 centimetres but it was the first anaconda I had seen in the wild and I was keen to record it.

  The boy’s father asked me if I’d finished filming and I smiled when I told him that I had. ‘What a sighting!’ I thought. He then stepped smartly forward and cut the anaconda up into pieces with his machete for his dogs to eat.

  Diary entry from 6 December, Requena:

  OK I’m depressed. Quite badly so. I have fleeting moments of happiness but they are all short-lived and basically I’m unhappy.

  We arrived in Requena yesterday, I felt OK but tired, bored of walking, bored of my guides, bored of the expedition. It’s all compounded by having such good access to the Internet. A life of beers and girls and friends and love is just on the other side of the screen and yet I’ve never been so lonely.

  I need to think less about the outside world and focus on the task. I need to take confidence in my own abilities to deal with the jungle. I need to be emotionally independent from everyone.

  What do I need to concentrate on to become happier? Language: I still have three months left in Peru and could be reading Spanish every night. I could be doing Portuguese lessons on my MP3 player too so that I will not have this whole problem again once I enter Brazil.

  I need to be in control. I need to become stronger each day rather than weaker. I need to do press-ups and exercises to ensure I improve. Mentally I need to focus on the positives, what we have achieved so far.

  I need to stop thinking about the women that have been in my life. That is not constructive and is getting me down. I need to accept that not having a relationship is the sacrifice of this journey.

  Keith [photographer] arrives tomorrow. It’s important that he gets a visit with a positive explorer who loves what he’s doing. 11 p.m. Lights out.

  Chapter Nine

  Recovery in Iquitos

  AT ABOUT SEVEN in the morning Cho knocked on my door. ‘Ed, Kid is here!’ (Keith is unpronounceable to South Americans). ‘What? Eh? Thanks, Cho,’ I mumbled through the door and lowered my bare feet on to the cold tiled hotel floor and padded softly out of my room.

  In the corridor I saw a tall Brit with a shaven head, a broad rucksack and a grin to match coming through the door. ‘All right, Ed? How are you?’ beamed Keith, in a London accent. ‘Fancy a fag?’

  I’d never met Keith Ducatel before. He was a friend of a friend who had found out about my expedition and wanted the opportunity to come out to the Amazon and take photographs. I had seen an example of his work and he was very talented indeed, but somehow I’d got the impression he was younger, perhaps because photography was only a passion of his rather than his main job.

  The bloke with the fags now standing before me had an aura of cheerful excitement about where he was and what he was about to embark on. In his late thirties, he was relaxed and unfazed by the complicated journey he’d just undertaken to get here. Immediately I started talking.

  It was like some sort of release. To have someone come in who was my own nationality and approximate age was such a relief. We went and did a few admin tasks about town together and just chatted nonstop. I was so excited to be able to communicate with someone again that I found myself smiling. To be able to express subtleties, to be able to make jokes, to be able to relate to someone. Positivity, energy, humour and life started flooding back into my being.

  The very same morning that Keith arrived we reorganised his pack and started out of Requena. Jorge, Raul, Cho, Keith and I made us a party of five and yet, because none of us was local, we didn’t know the local paths and had to ask for directions at every village. As a result we came to a large tributary that had been bridged but the bridge was down. A big section in the middle was missing and the waters below were strong and fast.

  We couldn’t swim it, that was for sure, but before I’d even contemplated inflating the rafts and ferrying people across, Raul and Jorge, now very relaxed into our journey, started cutting poles from nearby trees. In seconds they had ten long, straight poles and were cutting vines to use as cord for lashings. I watched with the utmost respect as these guys rebuilt the bridge without a second thought and without a nail or a hammer. Keith used the opportunity to get used to the conditions and take photos of men working completely at ease with nothing but their machetes to assist them. In ten minutes the bridge was crossable, not just by us but by anyone else who wanted to cross in the months ahead. Keith was impressed and I was proud of the capable, no-nonsense team I had around me.

  We entered a community called Santa Rosa, where the village children crowded round us and watched fascinated as we pored over the map, planning our route, sipping cheap orangeade. The communities here weren’t pure nativos; they all considered themselves to be colonial and spoke nothing but Spanish. Only a couple of hundred kilometres from the huge city of Iquitos now, they were all pretty relaxed around Westerners and we were treated almost kindly. We bought a kilo and a half of smoked armadillo and continued walking.

  Keith and I chatted a great deal while walki
ng and my sanity just kept on being restored. I found I could now cope with any problems with ease and we would laugh like old friends if one of us fell over. It was emotional for me to go through this return to normality. I felt happier than I could remember; the contrast with the depressed, lonely months was stark and the walking became adventurous and fun again.

  Keith managed well with the weight of his pack, too. He’d done some training in England but he’d had to join a group that had been walking together for months and he never moaned once. He wasn’t acclimatised and he poured with sweat, his T-shirts showing the ridiculous amount of salt he was loosing as he sweated. His back and arms were covered in bites – bites so big and angry and abundant that they would have got the toughest of people down – but he just smiled, looked for the positives and kept snapping away with his camera in a cloud of mosquitoes.

  The one drawback was that he smoked. He didn’t just smoke, though, he clearly loved smoking. As an ex-smoker I could see the absolute pleasure he gained from taking a break, sitting on a log or a rock and inhaling deeply the calming smoke. It didn’t take long for me to crack, and for the next few weeks the whole party, Cho included by the end, would ensure we always had cigarettes when we left a village. The smoking represented a distinct shift from just continuing, to being able to relax and enjoy the journey, as friends who all shared in a simple pleasure.

  Sometimes we would hire a local guide who knew the paths to the next village, perhaps only for a few hours, and so we were fluctuating between a five- and six-man team. This was costing me loads and, despite being very happy that we had a team that worked, I knew that as soon as I could I would have to say goodbye to Jorge and Raul. For the moment, partly due to the comfort of having these older men as part of the team, they stayed and I just took solace in the fact that we weren’t merely going forward, we were advancing well and actually enjoying it, too. I would just have to find the money.

  My confidence started to grow and grow during this period. There is nothing like coming from complete self-pitying brokenness and then rebuilding yourself simply on the strength of knowledge about your capabilities. I could now compare myself to a normal Englishman and in addition I could skip over slippery logs, I could handle a machete and I could lead a team.

  In military training at Sandhurst the first five weeks was an intense period of nervous sleep deprivation. It made many people drop out as they lost focus and lost sight of their reasons for joining in the first place. We watched the platoon slim down as those without the drive to continue left. But those who stayed all had times of feeling broken, low and pathetic. And then, very cleverly, the army training system would take these half-broken men and rebuild them. They would start to become good at military skills such as marching, shooting and navigating and their confidence would grow. The training was designed to create men who were proud and confident in themselves as soldiers, rather than in what they had done in their former lives, and the difference they achieved in a year was remarkable. Young, scruffy students became British Army officers who were confident and capable.

  I could see the parallels in what I was putting myself through. I had been cocky prior to the journey and my confidence had come from others complimenting me or commenting on my abilities. That false confidence had now been stripped from me and I was rebuilding myself based on nothing but my actual abilities. No opinion, no blagging or pretending, no hiding and no bullshitting. I was learning my trade again based on nothing but natural ability and the sense of rejuvenation at coming out of the other side of this was empowering.

  Having Keith to watch over helped me, too. He had little experience of the jungle save a week-long trip with a mad drunken Brazilian. I taught him how to look after his feet, how to tape up sores on his hips where his pack rubbed before they became broken skin, and he became proficient at putting up his hammock and organising his kit.

  I told Raul and Jorge that we could walk together until Nauta, where I would pay them and give them the money to take a boat back home. From there Cho, Keith and I had a few days of walking in the direct sunlight on the highway that stretched south of Iquitos. Jorge had a chest infection and Raul had been coughing, too. Being wet all day long was fine for Cho, Keith and myself in our thirties, but Raul and Jorge were around fifty and they were beginning to show signs of physical deterioration. Jorge was also becoming slightly contrary and less helpful. This was just fatigue, I think; he’d been solid for weeks. Raul had an offer from an American to sell 350 trees from a plot of land that he had claimed, so he had hopes of making his fortune. Had this not been the case he said he would like to have continued further.

  Looking ahead on the map, I was becoming worried about the upcoming flood season. I had always thought I would get across the border into Brazil before the waters rose but now that looked impossible. The outcome meant that the Peruvian (south) side of the river would be completely flooded as it was very low-lying and that I had to consider the option of going through Colombia on the northern bank. The very name ‘Colombia’ filled me with apprehension and I remembered reading about kayaking expeditions that had been shot at from the Colombian side. We wouldn’t be kayaking past at speed, however; we would be walking.

  We were still a week or so’s walk from Nauta, the town at the start of the highway, and we had a lot of jungle to cross. From a camp on a river beach on 15 December 2008 I wrote the following:

  We stupidly pushed north-east away from the river and were fooled by false ‘horizon’ [river] after false horizon. Each time we thought we were arriving at the river the trees opened to reveal a marsh, an old river channel, or a swampy lake. Some were crossable but others required huge detours. The river had changed position recently and we were not sure of the exact location and making estimates based on boats that we could hear through the vegetation kilometres away.

  We crashed through cane and rushes covered in tiny spikes that were almost like hairs that penetrated through our trousers into our knees and shins. At 5.40 p.m. we finally reached the river with only twenty minutes of light left; without saying a word we all cut poles for erecting tarps and mosquito nets on the beach and we had a quick wash in the twilight before a supper of water and farine with sugar.

  I remember the night well because Keith and I shared a mosquito net on the beach and he had an iPod that could play movies. We watched The Deer Hunter with one headphone each until we were both too tired to keep our eyes open.

  I woke about an hour later to see Keith on all fours on the sand outside the net vomiting again and again. Raul showed his caring side and got up and sat by Keith until he’d finished being sick then Keith came back to the net and he too fell asleep.

  In the morning Keith was clearly still feeling ill but there was no option but to walk. We had no food left and needed to reach a community to resupply. Keith summoned all his energy and we walked all day until mid-afternoon when we eventually found a community with a shop and some boats.

  Keith, who had developed malaria on his previous week-long trip to Brazil, had a recurrence of the illness and was in no state to walk. As his Spanish was all but nonexistent, I asked Cho if he would take him in a boat ahead to Nauta. Cho and Keith had struck up a good relationship and Cho was happy to help. I would walk with Jorge and Raul and we’d meet Cho in Nauta. Keith would rest up in a hotel in Iquitos for a few days.

  The change in dynamic was fun again. Walking with the old guys was different and calm and we put in huge distances each day. I was happy that the civilisation of Iquitos was in sight and that we’d be there by Christmas. Somehow Christmas in a town with a bed was a light at the end of a very long, dark tunnel and the break was going to be the most appreciated one I had ever had.

  Sending Cho off with Keith again made me realise how much I trusted him. I still found him annoying at times but he was honest and dependable, and I realised I was grateful that he was still with me.

  Raul, Jorge and I arrived a few days later to find a very refreshed Cho in laundere
d clothes and new jeans waiting for us in a small hotel in Nauta. Cho, like many Peruvians, had the habit of combing his hair across his head like my grandpa used to and he looked very smart in an old-fashioned way with a pressed shirt.

  Jorge, who had become a bit tetchy, now asked to be paid and was very annoyed when I deducted the money that he had wanted to be advanced to him for beers. He sulked like a child and when Raul, Cho and I went out for the last time together for beers he stayed back at the hotel. When we returned later in the night he had gone without saying goodbye to any of us. But times were hard and money was very tight.

  Raul left the following morning, too, but he and I parted firm friends and kept in contact sporadically by email over the following months. Cho and I marched north towards Iquitos. We looked at the 101-kilometre stretch and foolishly told ourselves that we would do it in one straight go; all day and all night just to get it done. In fact we had underestimated our state of exhaustion and the walk on hot asphalt took four whole days.

  On the last day a tall, broad man rode up to us on a motorbike and pulled off his helmet, shouting in American-accented English, ‘Ed Stafford! Is it really you?’

  ‘What the—?’ I thought as this larger-than-life, slicked-back grey-haired character bounded towards us, hand outstretched and a broad smile showing well-kept teeth. His name was Rodolfo, Rudy for short, and he’d read an article in the local paper about our walk. I’d never been recognised before and so was amused at Rudy’s reaction to us. He offered us supper at his house when we arrived in Iquitos and we gratefully accepted.

  In fact Rudy went much further and, although he and his wife, Mati, were travelling to Lima for Christmas, he offered us the keys to his house and the free run of it while we were in town. Rudy reminded me of gangsters out of the old films; he told me that he could leave his motorbike outside his house because the local kids respected him. Rudy loved to impart manly advice: ‘Whenever my football team – Universitario – wins, I buy the whole street drinks, and you know what? No one fucks with me.’ He had lived in America and had very American ideas and had returned to his home country Peru with a high regard for money and status.