Otherwise

This morning, our horses await us outside the lodge. I am not sure whether I am nervous or apathetic; these are unpredictable animals, and yet the last few times I went horseback riding I nearly keeled over in boredom as we plodded along at the pace of children asked to come in from playing and clean their bedrooms. The horses saunter into the open fields of the Pantanal, and I ready myself for a morning of lethargy and yawning.

Immediately, our horses pick up speed, jauntily galloping as we struggle to stand in the stirrups so that we aren’t bounced around like a shaken baby. I laugh because it truly is a thrill, and somewhat dangerous. I’m galloping! Or rather, my horse is galloping, and I’m riding on top! The tree tops whizz by, and our horses bump each other as they race for the next turn in the trail. My leg grinds between my own horse’s body and the next horse. I fear my horse will run too close to the fence, and my bones will be crunched. But it’s good fun. I laugh as the horses break wind as they gallop, reminding me of a dear elderly woman at our old church whose steps often coincided with bursts of gas.

We have the afternoon off, and spend some time petting and watching Choochooga eat grass. (The guy loves to eat, and has a big round belly to prove it.) The same woman who nursed Choochooga to health brings a baby grey owl out to the dining hall porch on her sleeve. Through broken english, I gather the infant bird fell out of its nest. It is a sweet thing, with downy speckled grey feathers, and eyes like bowls of jet. The woman feeds the little bird small fish, which she gulps down her gullet whole.

After lunch Mario brings a wounded anaconda to the lodge. We watch it from several feet away as it slithers across the grass, and across itself. Mario assures us it won’t strike on land. I feel its skin, which is not slimy, but gummy, the texture of candy worms. I even take a turn holding it, but become nervous as it ropes itself around my hand and begins to tighten. Mario sets it free in the water.

Choochooga worries us by standing on the banks of the river, by the waterborne anaconda. Our group urges the capybara to saunter off, as he is anaconda prey. But Choochooga will not leave; instead he stands proudly at the edge of the water and huffs like a scoffing critic. Several children who live at the camp begin to cry, and Choochooga’s nurse calls to him repeatedly. Choochooga stands blazen still beside the water, a monument to stubbornness, fear or some other mysterious capybara sentiment. The anaconda wraps herself around a cluster of water greens, and eyes the thick bodied creature. Finally, without explanation, Choochooga extends his webbed feet and putters up the hill for a patch of grass to munch upon. There is no explaining the behaviour and odd ways of a Capybara, but we breathe a sigh of relief.

Somehow, on my way to our room, I discover that my hand smells disturbingly wretched; a powerfully ripe, reptilian smell. My hand stinks like something died upon it, only after leaking its body fluids across my palm. I take soap to my hand and scrub, but the stench leaks through the mild Ivory like acid through tissue. I find an old toothbrush, and scour at the lines in my palm, the insides of my nails, but the dense, almost mythical smell fails to scrub away. I scratch at myself with toothbrush and toothpaste until my skin stings. I lift my hand to my nose. The smell lingers, like the scent of cat’s piss in some dank apartment. I consider this an improvement and go about my day smelling like a crazy cat lady.

Towards the evening, Mario takes a long, steel boat out from the shore, and our group piles in. “We can’t all fit!”, the older Australian woman says, but indeed we do. Just under a gigantic wooden trestle bridge, fish begin to fly in the air around us, flop into the water beside us, and send reams of water into our boat. One fish flies straight towards the side of our boat, and Alice, a beautiful well maintained Londoner, squeals as it hits the steel beside her with a loud thud. It must have knocked itself out!

Mario gleefully parks our tin tube beside a myriad of marble-eyed caiman, who glare at us and dip into the water beside our boat. We have disturbed their sleep, and I loathe to think they are resentful of the interruption. The group squishes together, towards the middle of the boat. I feel brave and hang my neck out the side, but Mario tuts at me and giggles, waves his finger back and forth. We also spot: ten capybara, including a family with an deliriously cute baby, another toucan, seven giant river otters, five howler monkeys as they leap through the trees, and one beautiful liquid eyed red tailed deer.

On our way back for supper (probably more feijoada), we turn and watch as the sun sheds her golden skin, sinks down below the horizon, and spreads wings of intense crimson across the sky.