Brazil Pantanal – 2018

For a few years we had been keen to try and see one of the more elusive large cats on the planet, jaguars.

This desire motivated us to include a trip to a more remote area in Brazil called the Pantanal; it is the world’s largest tropical wetland, covering over 181,300 square kms— right in the centre of South America.

Blue section on map is The Pantanal

Brazil can lay claim to most of the region, but the Pantanal spills into neighbouring Paraguay and Bolivia and though the Amazon rain forest to its north is more well known, the Pantanal quietly boasts the highest concentration of wildlife on the continent.

After the wet season (Dec to early April), the Pantanal becomes a massive wetland filled with lots of wildlife and as the waters drain the bird numbers reduce through migration and the numbers of marsupials and mammals increase, including jaguars.  The Pantanal is also home to the green anaconda… the largest snake in the world.

Our original itinerary was planned in conjunction with a local company Wild Pantanal Safaris had us travelling deeper into the Pantanal along the mainly dirt Transpantaneira Highway.

Start of the Transpantaneira Highway into the Pantanal

We were meant to stay at a more rustic lodge at the end of the highway for 4 days/3 nights, specifically to search for jaguars.

Jaguars are the dominant predator weighing up to 136 kg in weight and whose prey includes caiman, which are similar to but smaller than crocodiles, captured by leaping off the bank into the water, crushing their throat or skulls and dragging them back out onto land.

Unfortunately for us, late and unseasonal heavy rains flooded the rougher and final sections of the road and areas around the lodge and leading to the jaguars moving north and away from this area.

This meant a rapid change of itinerary only a week out from our arrival.  We were naturally disappointed, but the Pantanal had plenty of other wildlife to search for.

We had to reach a city called Cuiabá and after travelling from Rio via Sao Paulo where whilst waiting for the flight to Cuiabá, Rob decided to use the airport toilet, only for its door to fall off its hinges.  She caught and handed it to the attendant as she left, much to that lady’s bemusement.

Flights from Rio to Cuiabá

At 7am next morning we were heading into the Pantanal with Jon our driver and guide Flavio, an indigenous Amazon Brazilian with a lot of stories to share and things to teach us.

The new itinerary had us staying in one lodge for 2 nights and another, deeper into the Pantanal for 1 and over the next 4 days it was non stop wildlife searching, including during our drive along the ‘highway’ to and from lodges.

There was an upside to the late rains… birds, lots and lots of birds and it wasn’t long before we were seeing some familiar ones like the kingfishers but also a mass of new ones.

Kingfisher flying across a river

Spoonbills at sunrise

Snail kite eating a crab

It was both hot and humid in the Pantanal, but that didn’t deter Flavio having us out searching for wildlife within 30 mins of checking into the first lodge and soon found ourselves standing right next to a 2m caiman sunning itself on land.

First caiman we saw

So for our entire time in the Pantanal we were either doing pre-sunrise walks into the forest, day and night drives or boat drives and there was plenty to see as the photos that follow will show.

At both lodges there was also plenty of evidence of the presence of our elusive quarry in the form of very fresh tracks of jaguars, at the first lodge a mother and cubs and at the second lodge a large male.

Fresh jaguar paw prints but alas no sighting of one

Flavio constantly amazed us by both his shared stories and his ability to spot animals either during the day or night, for example during our pre-dawn walk in the jungle and just after the sunrise, he found a porcupine sleeping at the top of a tree!

Tree climbing porcupine... who would have thought

The staff in both lodges were very warm, friendly and despite our lack of Portuguese, made us feel very welcomed indeed. The food was plentiful and good, especially the piranha soup.

We really enjoyed our multiple boat rides where we experienced a few new things like…

...birds

Hyacinth Macaw

Small toucan

...monkeys

Black & gold howler monkey

Brown capuchin

...agouti

Azaria's agouti

...capybaras

Patiently waiting to enter the 'capybara cafe'

...marsh deer

Marsh deer

...caiman

Caiman in the wetlands at sunset

...snakes

...parrots

Click on this link - More photos in the Pantanal

During one boat ride we even went fishing for piranha and yes I did take one off the hook, much to Flavio’s concern, especially when you see their teeth.

Me hanging onto a piranha

The business end of a piranha

A jumping caiman called Lucy who swam up so close to our boat Rob was warned to keep her hands away from the side.  The fish she jumped for was piranha!

Lucy the caiman jumping for a piranha

Another piranha was thrown into the water for a hawk to swoop down and grab, which was another surprise for us.

Hawk making off with its piranha

During 2 night drives Flavio found pygmy owls hiding in trees, crab eating foxes, including 2 young ones following and harassing a caiman walking down the highway, something Flavio had not seen before.

Pygmy owl at night

Crab eating fox

2  young crab eating foxes pestering a caiman on the main highway

We also managed to see 2 giant anteaters that appeared out of the bushes on to the road briefly before again returning.

Giant anteater appears out of the bushes one night

In only 4 days and despite only seeing jaguar tracks, we achieved much during our time in the Pantanal, again due to the skills and attention of both Flavio and Jon.

Map of our route within the Pantanal

Sunset over the Pantanal's wetlands whilst in boat

Thank you Wild Pantanal Safaris for a fabulous time and perhaps one day we will return to the Pantanal to finally see the elusive jaguar.

Brazil - Rio di Janeiro - 2018

We were anxious as we landed in Rio, simply because of its reputation of being very dangerous due to armed robberies on the streets.  So we had decided not to wear trinkets that may attract attention or use our larger cameras whilst sightseeing.

We also beforehand, arranged multiple day tours to see the sights and reduce the risks.

During our stay we travelled around within the city of Rio...

Rio city related day tours

As you will also read within this post, we took a tour outside of Rio to a town called Petropolis...

Rio is a city of almost 7M people and consists of the good, the bad and the ugly.  

The Good…

From a distance you see the beautiful Rio including its long white and famous beaches of Corcovado and Ipanema, usually packed with crowds of people enjoying them and showing off those little bikinis.

The locals and tourists enjoying the famous Copacabana Beach

Then there are the large peaked mountains surrounding Rio’s large natural harbour and 2 of its most famous destinations, the 30m high, Christ the Redeemer statue, atop Corcovado hill...

It is impressive when you get up close

Okay... we know but its the 'stock' pose when you visit this icon of Rio

Sugarloaf Mountain reached via 2 cable car rides… both locations showing amazing views of this city.

The view from Sugarloaf Mountain and cable cars taking you there

Sugarloaf Mountain and plane turning in front on way into land

One of our tours took us about an hour out of the city into the mountains to a city called Petropolis that came into being after Brazil’s 2^nd and last Emperor, Pedro II, built his beautiful summer palace there.  

The summer palace of Pedro II

There were many old colonial style buildings within the city and was home to a very famous early aviation inventor called Santos Dumont.

Some of the architecture around Petropolis

The Brazilians claim Santos invented and flew the first plane in 1906, even though it was 3 years after the Wright brothers, because it took off and landed on wheels.  Wrights plane took off from a rail line.  

He is attributed as the principle driver for the creation and protection of the Iguassu Falls area and indicative of his personality, his house we visited was small, quirky and aimed entirely at being efficient as practical.

Stairs into Santos Dumont's home

The Bad…

During the city tour using Rio’s excellent metro and walking, we saw Rio’s typically weathered face with most buildings, roads and footpaths requiring maintenance and attractions like the Carioca Aqueduct, finished in 1723 and the 141 yr old tram cars taking us higher to Santa Teresa all needing a spruce up.

Carioca Aqueduct with tram crossing it the way we did to
get up to Santa Teresa

Our local guide Juliana informed us whilst climbing the Selaron steps, that Rio is short of funds and she was scathing of Brazil’s new President and the corruption siphoning funds away from its people.  

Section of the Selaron Steps

The lack of funds is also why we saw many very heavily armed military personnel guarding popular parts of Rio, as Rio can’t afford to pay for enough police.

She also described how some of her clients from the previous day who had arrived into Rio that morning had been robbed of passports, cash, phones and cameras whilst out walking!

The Ugly…

Then we saw and heard about some of Rio’s darker sides with a day tour into one of Rio’s famous favelas or slums, in which ~22% of Rio’s population live.  

We had originally booked to visit Rio’s largest favela but our guides would not take us there because it was too dangerous due to shootings and murders occurring after we arrived into Rio.

Immigrant construction workers brought in to develop Rio also built the favelas on the sides of the mountains around Rio because they couldn’t afford housing.  The favelas are located very close to the wealthy areas of the city.  

We started at the top of the favela with a local guide living in it and walked down through it to the bottom.

Standing at the top of the favela looking down it to the wealthy areas below

It was fascinating and very interesting; whilst at the same time a little unnerving when meeting the favelas own armed sentries, employees of that favela’s drug lord.

Our group were sternly warned about not photographing certain things and when some of them forgot, they were soon yelled at.  There were also a number of offers to buy marijuana as we progressed through it.

Inside the favela

Creative building style in favela

As we exited the favela, we walked amongst more very heavily armed police stationed outside it and observed multiple large bullet holes across the walls of the local school.

The other story making the news whilst we were visiting was of the young female activist councilwomen, Marielle Franco who was assassinated whilst in her car, allegedly for speaking out about too many things.

We learned during our tours why most of the motorcycles, of which there are many, have at least 1 antenna reaching above the head of the rider on the handlebars.  

A fun pastime of the children is to play with kites, including rubbing a special resin onto the kites strong strings and impregnating the resin with small bits of glass.

They then do battle with each other, trying to cut each other’s string and claiming the others kite, but unfortunately at times, those tight impregnated strings have dropped low into the path of unsuspecting bike riders, causing some to be badly cut across their throats… or worse.

Would not want to leave you with the wrong impression of this city because it has an energy like few others, most of that energy coming from its people whom we found to be very warm, welcoming and keen to assist if they could.

Colour and vibrancy everywhere

The vibrancy of the city is on show everywhere, including the last afternoon we walked down to Ipenema Beach to watch the sun setting over the water and mountains.

Its all about the beach

A Brazilian band was belting out some great music on the beach whilst being filmed for a music video, surfers behind them and the declining red glow of the sun in the distance.

The rhythm was great to listen to

You do have to be cautious and ever vigilant to the risk of robbery and heed the advice of locals of where not to walk and when BUT we both really enjoyed our time in this intriguing and exciting city.

Our final sunset over Ipenema Beach... great way to end our visit

Next morning it was time to board a plane and head to the centre of Brazil in search of wildlife but until then... go well!

South America – An Introduction - 2018

In 2014 we experienced our first taste of South America after flying into Ushuaia, the southern most city in the world, visiting parts of the incredibly scenic Patagonia before experiencing Santiago and heading home.

This trip whet our desire to see more of the continent of South America, so we developed a plan to return again, this time with the goal to see everything we wanted to see, experience and most likely... not return.

After nearly 18 months of research and drafting an itinerary, we finalised our plans for another visit during 2018.

As an introductory outline, after visiting the UK to enjoy our granddaughter’s 2^ndbirthday with her, we would start this South American experience by flying into Rio de Janerio, Brazil, travel through this country into Argentina, then Uruguay, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia, Peru and finally Chile.

A rough but basic overall route we intend travelling can be seen on the map below and what will follow in subsequent posts are descriptions of what was experienced in each country.

This is one of the longest and most complex travel plans we have attempted with many elements to it and something we're unlikely to repeat.

Wherever possible we found, checked, selected and used local companies where specific tours were involved and in some countries we will be on our own, using day tours to experience what specific locations have to offer.

We hope you enjoy what follows in other posts… go well!