Last night the snoring was real bad. Who knew Eric had it in him? I tried watching Netflix (The Break with Michelle Wolfe I downloaded while back in civilization) for a while, but the snoring only got worse. It began to pour around midnight, but Eric’s snoring drowned it out. Even when the crew came up to batten down the hatches, headlights a-blazing, Eric snored through that, too. Uncanny! I don’t remember sleeping at all. Just dreaming of ways to smother Eric… Maybe I was sleeping while dreaming of that?

After breakfast, which included fresh papaya, we set out in our kayaks. I had picked up a flexible tripod that can clip onto anything, like the edge of a kayak. But it broke to pieces in my hands as I tried to clip it on. Luckily my camera wasn’t attached yet! Suffice it to say, no cool kayak POV time lapse videos on this trip. 😢

We explored a side-stream which is everything kayaking in the Amazon should be: narrow, full canopy overhead, not so much light sifting down to the bottom. Ma would love kayaking here, a lot like the mangrove swamps in the Keys where it’s fun to pick your way around and find critters (or ancient vehicle carcasses, which there aren’t a lot of here).

Several dolphins followed us in from the main part of the river to see what we were doing. The dolphins here are curious, playful, and abundant. One even did a full on vertical jump like you’d see at an aquarium show. I didn’t know they pulled stunts like that in the wild!

We had lunch, including a yummy Matricious (sp?) fish, Erikes’ favorite. Super good. Just watch out for those harpoon bones!

After lunch we had some down time.

Then at 2pm we set off for our afternoon adventure, a hike in the rainforest. We collected sneakers, socks, long pants, and long sleeve shirts. All I had with long sleeves was a rain jacket from Budapest (another trip Maurice happened to go on), so I put it on. All the rain would happen on the inside. I was sweating like Pat in The Silver Linings Playbook, jogging with a trash bag on. But we hiked up to the highest point in this region with a great view of the Jatapú valley, and saw some impressive spiders and a dead monkey along the way.

Back down near the river, we tested out a natural sunscreen made from little berries that you squash between your fingers. Moe went overboard, as usual.

Now we’re looking for caimans in the water next to tonight’s camp, a friend’s house, Renaldo’s I think. (Apparently he’s in town collecting his paycheck for providing emergency medical service on the river, but probably also watching World Cup.) If you shine a light out into the water, their retro-reflective eyes beam right back at you. They’re out there! Erikes is trying to catch one as dinner is simultaneously being prepared.

Word on the street is that tomorrow we’ll be setting up camp off the boat, in the rainforest. Wheeee!