AMAZON ADVENTURE
by Andrew Mersmann
I think of Jennifer Lopez as we slowly
motor into an entirely overgrown channel off the river
where floating plants look like a grassy field. Beneath
what seems like solid ground is several feet of deep,
black water. The driver of our small skiff cuts the engine
and we stop, the only sound is the buzz of insects and
an occasional cry of a far off bird. We are hunting anaconda.
This seems a remarkably stupid activity to me—it
was a design flaw putting snakes and me on the same planet,
and now we’re going to try and search some out? Not
just any old snake either, but anaconda—one of the
largest snakes in the world. The soles of our guide’s
shoes squeaking are like screams as he climbs onto the
aluminum prow of the skiff. It isn’t long before
someone spots the black head of a serpent, sticking up
Loch Ness Monster-like from the lily pads, its shiny scales
catching the sun, evil orange eyes watching us (OK, maybe
I exaggerate since it was a good 25 feet away…but
a later look at the digital photos shows me the eyes were
orange—and besides, anaconda can be almost 30 feet
long). Somehow we didn’t capsize and weren’t
all eaten. The snake quietly lowered itself into the water
and disappeared (among what I am certain were hundreds
more just beneath us).
This was early July in the Peruvian
Amazon on a gorgeous boat ripped from the pages of Architectural
Digest and somewhat implausibly plunked down in the
muddy waters of the world’s largest rainforest.
The M/V Aqua is the flagship of Aqua Expeditions
(www.aquaexpeditions.com),
and it is the mighty Amazon’s first truly luxury
expedition vessel. The 130-foot ship has only a dozen
rooms, each decorated with grasscloth walls, fields
of black slate accent walls, panorama windows, dark
wood floors, king-sized bed with luxurious bedding,
and frosted glass and slate bathrooms with a surprisingly
spacious shower. It is also the only boat in the Peruvian
Amazon with the necessary bonus of individual air conditioners
in every room. The passenger experience is quite like
being on a very, very rich friend’s yacht.
This was no horizontal floating apartment
building barely bobbing along on some transatlantic
crossing, nor was it a Mediterranean or Asian port-to-port
cruise through big name cities on the tourist map. There
was no conga line on the Lido Deck, no shuffleboard,
and no heat-lamp warmed 24-hour buffet. This was small,
intimate, and luxurious cruising in the best way, offering
passengers a chance to lose themselves in the experience.
It’s not that the captain and 19
crewmembers ever lost their way, but my partner Bob
and I and the other 19 passengers were able to completely
lose ourselves in the Amazon. Time and miles passed
by unnoticed, and we had no need or responsibility to
do anything but absorb the overwhelming wonders around
us.
An Aqua Expedition begins in Iquitos,
the last port on the Amazon from the Atlantic, 2,300
miles away. Iquitos means “people separated by
water,” and they truly are. The city is completely
isolated and can only be reached by boat or airplane
(but that flight is less than two hours from Lima).
No roads go into or leave Iquitos, except for one that
connects it to another entirely rainforest-bound river
city, Nauta. Seventy-five percent of the population
of these two cities has never been outside the immediate
vicinity.
Iquitos was once the center of the prosperous
rubber industry that eventually crumbled, leaving a
few bits of evidence from the former glory days, like
the metal-clad building on the central plaza, designed
by Gustav Eiffel—once it stood out because it was
so splendid and luxurious, and now it is unique in that
it is so lonely in its stateliness. Iquitos is also
the launch pad for dozens of eco-adventure companies,
and Aqua Expeditions is regarded as the cream of this
crop.
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Guests on the Aqua choose three-, four-,
or combined seven-night itineraries. On our trip, Bob
and I were the only passengers staying for the entire
seven nights, so we had a complete change in the cast
of characters halfway through. Everyone on board for
three days agreed it was too short to really appreciate
the experience, and for my personal taste for high-activity
travel, seven days seemed a day or two too long. Four
is a good bet. The best perk was when the three-day
passengers departed and the four-day folks had yet to
arrive, and Bob and I were taken on a private excursion
at sunset to the exact source of the Amazon River. The
sky first frosted a light pink, like the rare and endangered
pink dolphins that were surfacing all around us in the
open water, blowing mist into the sky. The air felt
heavy as the clouds passed through orange and crimson
on the way to twilight blue when bats replaced birds,
and we meandered back to the boat to meet the new gang.
During the seven days, we traveled 650
miles on the Amazon and her tributaries, based from
the headwaters, the source of the river where the Ucayali
River (“Canoe Breaker”) and Marañon
River (“Cashew Nut”) meet.
The Amazon is the largest river in the
world, bigger than five of the next-largest, the Congo
River, and out-sizing even ten Mississippis. We spent
many of the days within the boundaries of the remote,
five million-acre Pacaya Samiria Reserve, a pristine,
deep Amazon area penetrated by only a privileged few,
where small river tribes live along the shores much
the same way as they have for generations, their raised,
thatch-roof huts seeming too pastoral, like set dressing
on a Disneyland ride.
The Amazon is a “white river,”
while many of its tributaries are “black water,”
and we spend our days exploring both. With a look at
GoogleEarth’s satellite images you’ll see
it—the Amazon, which from close proximity looks
like Willy Wonka’s chocolate river, is so rich
with sediment and silt that it runs light and opaque.
Black water, because of the tannins from decomposing
vegetal matter, is actually black, like overly-brewed
tea.
The Amazon’s water level between
the two seasons, flooded (December–May) and dry
(June–November), can rise and fall as much as 45
feet. The Peruvian state in which Iquitos lies is as
large as California, and more than 80% of the land is
under water at the height of flooded season. We’re
traveling at the tail end of June into July. The Winter
Solstice was June 20, so it is winter (in the Southern
Hemisphere) and it is hot, hot, hot. In the previous
three weeks, the water level has already fallen twelve
feet. The variance is crazy, especially when you consider
that this giant river is responsible for 20% of the
entire world’s flowing fresh water. The Aqua sails
year ‘round. Flooded season voyages have deeper
water access into the estuaries (and rain nearly every
day), while dry season allows for some inland hiking
excursions.
When the boat is underway, the gentle
vibration of the engines and the passing of the view
outside the giant windows has a hypnotic effect. Torpor—it’s
a good word for the feeling of being adrift, not directionless,
but lulled by floating with the current. We found napping
came quite easily. At night we covered lots of ground
getting to the next river locale. At our first evening’s
briefing they told us not to be alarmed if we heard
loud thumps in the night—they would just be floating
trees hitting the hull. The first time you hear it happen,
no matter how forewarned, you can’t help but think
Titanic.
Continued
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