DAY 24. WHAT A BUNCH OF FISHERMEN

Good morning to me! Unfortunately, no fish touched the bait overnight – no one wants a caterpillar, so I do need to look for berries. There are 200 kilometres to go before I get to Iquitos.

I continue to recover, and today I am using hot yerba maté. I have been carrying the pack with me since Argentina, for three months already. I have even given it out as a gift, but I cannot seem to run out of it. The weather stayed too hot to drink it, even as a Paraguayan terere (a type of cold water maté). Well, these are good memories. I remember Misiones, the hottest region of Argentina. Well, cheers! I wish us all good health.

I am passing through another channel. I hope no one will pester me today. It is raining yet again, but I have all my chores completed: my clothes are washed, my household is well-organised, my kitchen is in order, I have plenty of water and I also have some books downloaded, so I can focus on my health and rest. I need to get better. I already feel much better, I have strength in my arms, and I can paddle effectively when I need to. I keep looking for that black berry on the banks. I would not be surprised if it does not grow here at all, as the surroundings are changing all the time. When I come across some fishermen, I will surely ask them about it.

Finding bait is like learning Spanish. You think that you will learn the language and understand everyone, but then you find out that there is Castillano, there is a new Argentinean dialect, where instead of ‘y’ they say ‘sh’ – sho (me), cavacho (horse) and so on.

It is beautiful all around. Big green bushes grow on the banks. I cannot stop marvelling at the local greenery and abundance of life. Literally every square metre has some interesting insect, amphibian or bird. Everything is bursting with life. It is a real delight. Yes, walking through the woods is quite dangerous, but I already learned to walk without boots. I must make noise to avoid stepping on some snake, and the rest of issues are not that scary.

Such prolonged rains bring one thought to my mind: if nothing changes, I will have to tent the front of the boat to be able to paddle and stay dry in the rain. I just need to think about where to put the new support beams so that they are not in the way of my oar, and it would be nice to make them foldable like the fenders. But I do not want to clutter my boat with unnecessary structures.

I have got used to spiders and I am not scared of them anymore. They move freely around the boat. One of them even tried weaving a web right on me! Hey, that is cheeky; it is my house, not yours! Maybe it thinks it can eat me if it waits long enough.

A ship passed that I have been told about many times. It is a big tourist boat called ‘Odin’ that goes all the way to Iquitos and, according to the locals, causes huge waves. What can I say? It was not as bad as they made it out to be. The wave grew enormous right before it hit the bank, but in the mainstream, I felt almost nothing, just some slight rocking.

Now in one of the settlements there were some children who were gesturing, ‘Come to the bank, stop’. I could not find any adults nearby, so I had to refuse the offer, otherwise I might be taken for a maniac who steals children while adults are at work. Many people are suspicious of foreigners here as it is – they believe in flying saucers and human experimentation. Ignorance breeds all sorts of myths and stereotypes.

Relaxing in my comfy chair is growing cosier and cosier, but I cannot stop trying to find that black berry for fishing. I almost lost any confidence that I will find it, but I will not give up, because I know it guarantees me a good catch. I would love to catch something, especially that talking ‘badre’ catfish. I learnt from the locals in the village of Britannia that its sharp fins are poisonous, so the fishermen immediately break them when they catch one. They did not tell me what would happen if a fin scratched my skin, but probably nothing pleasant. And I have got a few scratches already, I think.

It is raining again. No comment. Is this really the dry season? At least now I have unlimited supply of terere. Rainwater pours from the tent straight into my mug.

The rain has picked up, so I cannot see the banks. But the rain also washes the boat properly, I just must remember to scoop out the water. That is an interesting thing: now I am passing by an old channel which resembles a lake; the water is different – it is black, and dolphins are fishing on the borderline. There are lots of birds here, too. If it were not for the bad weather, I would try too, but I have found no bait yet. Caterpillars with hard shells do not interest the fish much.

The wind is getting stronger and stronger. It seems that I cannot go any further now. I must accept the fact that today I do not decide where the water carries me. I am literally thrown into the lake by the strong wind and waves. There is no point in resisting them. The water is so clear that I decided to stay for a while and try to catch some fish after all.

Well, I am not going to travel very far today, but the local lakes are fabulous. Only fishing is lacking… alas. Quite a lot of times someone nibbles at the bait, but it is only some little fish which bite out of curiosity, and if I choose a smaller hook, even these nibbles stop. Where are worms when one needs them so much? Or some bread would do. I also wonder if I could find any crocodiles in these lakes.

The downpour was over, and I still had not caught anything. I tried seemingly everything – even some local flowers and peas and other berries, but they are too hard, so they have no effect. Some dolphins were fishing beside me. They would surface literally 5-10 metres away from me! That is quite a bunch of fishermen. After all, one should devote a whole day to fishing, not a measly half an hour on the way.

It is a shame, of course, when you have been fishing since childhood and consider yourself an experienced fisherman, who went fishing in different parts of the world quite successfully, and then… you just cannot catch anything. I seem to have tried a dozen ways: tacks, wobblers, flies, rubber, different leads, and wiring, I had worms as bait – nothing, I had a fish head as bait – and caught a snake. Okay, it is no big deal. I have only 24 days behind me – and months ahead. I can handle it.

I hope the Grand Amazon does not prove too difficult for my boat, because even here, when the wind picks up, the boat becomes almost unmanageable. It is all right if I get pinned against the bank, but what will I do if I get stuck in the middle of the river? With the reinforced bow and keel, steering the canoe became easier, but it is still not good enough.

I camped in a place where the river consumed part of the bank together with a dozen trees. There are reeds further down, so I am safe. I can survive a stem fall on me, and reeds hold on the ground tighter, they have their whole family nearby. Sometimes I am choosing a spot, but there is a fast-growing tree with maple-like leaves and a whitish trunk nearby These trees fall into the water especially often, which is a sign that they have a weak root system. I try to avoid camping under trees of this species.

I have lit some mosquito repellent coils. The sun is already setting. I will eat my farinha again, since I did not catch any fish. Or maybe I will cook some rice.

On a good note: when I paddled out from the middle of the river today, I felt strength in my arms again. That is great news. I am definitely recovering.

More and more often I think that I should put something on the wooden planks where I sleep to make my bed softer. Either I am so underfed that it is now uncomfortable to sleep on my bones, or my perceived comfort standards are gradually increasing. I do not know. It is bedtime.

I was peacefully getting ready for sleep when suddenly I noticed with my side vision how something ran into the boat. I lifted the mosquito net and there it was. A huge spider eating something. I chased it away. I would not want to sleep with a company like that.

8 May, ~52 (929) km covered.