The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Naps and Birds

 

 Blessed are the curious,

for they shall have adventures.

--Unknown

 

 

 

It’s 4:15 and there’s no alarm sounding from the cell phone under my pillow.

 

Now, 5 A.M., time we meet for breakfast.   All is quiet.

 

Then, 5:30, time when Vanderlay backs the boat out of its slip.  My pillow remains quiet.

 

Just before 7 A.M. there’s not a peep from the pillow, but I’m awake anyway and shut the alarm off before it rings.

 

I’m not late for anything.   Today, we got to sleep in because there’s no morning game ride on the river.   At 8 o'clock-ish, we will leave for the next and last lodge of this fabulous trip.

Photo from Araras website

 

The dining room is still open for breakfast, so I’m not hungry when we check out, pay our laundry bills, and load up in our van.  One hundred and forty-seven kilometers of dirt and gravel and 122 wooden bridges on the Transpantaneira highway as it crosses the Pantanal in the state of Mato Grosso to connect Porto Jofre with Poconé.   

 

We aren’t going as far as Poconé today, however.   We’re heading to Araras Eco Lodge, our last lodge, and from where we will make the final drive to catch a plane in Poconé and fly back to Sao Paulo in three days.

 

We stop along the way for a restroom break and Magnum ice cream bars.   As for me, I am still not feeling well so I stretch out across the seats and belt buckles in the back row of the van.

 

And then, we’re there.   We register at a lovely table in the patio and get our room keys.

 

One row of rooms.   Photo from Araras website.

The rooms as basic but have every thing I need, including a frog for a roommate!!!

My room.

 A very short video!!!

Dining room and bar.

Dining room

Our table.

Octavio and his wife Larissa.    They met when Larissa worked at this lodge.   Virginia is at left.

After lunch, I wander around the property and find caimans and birds galore.

 

 

Note all the rocks beyond the dugout.   That's where the birds are that I photograph from the spot where I am standing  to take this photo..   Nice having a 500 mm long lens.   

Note the vegetation in the above photo and then the almost-covered caiman in this photo.   Sneaky little things.

Rufous cachalote

Black-tailed tityra

Yellow-billed cardinal

Rufous cachalote

No caimans in the pool.

A little later, another find.   There’s a water fountain right in front of the dining hall that attracts all kinds of birds and other critters.   I sit on a padded bench under an awning that covers the length of the building and photograph birds to my heart’s content.

Yellow-rumped cacique

Yellow-rumped cacique

A nest box for hyacinth macaws.

This is Lala, a semi-wild blue and yellow macaw.

Her favorite perch is right above the entrance to the dining room.

She does take food from your hand.   This time, it's a banana.

Octavio says there are no big tours planned for this lodge.   It’s meant to be a couple of relaxing days before we head home, and that’s fine with me.    He does take Shelly and Virginia on a walkabout, though, and tomorrow there will be a short tour of the property in a large safari vehicle.

 

In the meanwhile, it’s naps and birds for me.

A UFO

Purplish Jays

Cattle tyrant

Probably a juvenile barred woodpecker.

Barred woodpecker.

And again.

Rufous-bellied thrush-like.   Yes, that's its name.

In the heat of the afternoon, Lala takes a nap on the patio with us.

Snoozing Lala.

The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Nine

(To see photos full screen, click on one and then scroll through them.)

 Chapter Nine

Macaws and Ice Cream

 

 

 

Maybe it’s animalness that will make the world right again: the wisdom of elephants,

the enthusiasm of canines, the grace of snakes, the mildness of anteaters.

Perhaps being human needs some diluting.—Carol Emshwiller

 

 

“CAW!” croaks the huge red and green macaw perched on the bush next to the viewing stand at Buraco das Araras.   Actually, the sound is more of a squawk than a caw, but caw is easier to type and fits my storyline better, so CAW it is.

 

Silence.

 

Then:   caw caw! Caw! CAW! CAW !  CAW!!!!

I counted 16 macaws in this bush.   Not all are visible here.

 

From around the giant sinkhole, the raucous sounds of macaws bounce and echo from the sandstone.    One starts it and the rest follow up and soon the whole arena is a “caw-caphony” of  sound.

 

And there’s always one bird who wants the last CAW!

 

It’s funny to listen to and apply human characteristics to the birds.  

 

Then, they fly….in twos and threes and fives they let loose of the sandstone and spread their immense and colorful wings.   

 

 

"CAW! CAW! CAW!" says  the peanut gallery.  Everyone's a critic.   Seems they all have to squawk their opinions.

 

Around and around they swirl, their huge wings making their flights seem effortless.   Some peel off and perch in the rocks or on limbs and branches.  

Later in the morning as the sun warms the day, they circle the sinkhole, gaining elevation with each revolution until they are high enough to clear the cliffs and the trees, off to greet the sun and another day of making a macaw living.

 

I’m getting a bit better at tracking the birds in flight but I have a long way to go to get the kinds of shots that Octavio is getting.  My friends are absorbed in their own photography so I don’t ask to see their photos.

 

Nonetheless, I am pleased that I am getting more bird head shots than bird butt shots.

We have lunch at a fazenda (ranch/farm) called Rio da Prada Ecolodge.   It's a popular place for people to snorkel and float in the clear waters of a nearby river.

We are greeted by a flock of noisy Guira cuckoos in a tree by the lodge.

The fried chicken (top left) is fantastic!   Crunchy edges and tender meat.   But, like everywhere I've eaten beef in Brazil, it is tough chewy, and always overcooked.

While the girls are feeding the cats that roam the premises, this parrot waited for the right moment, then swooped down to our table, grabbed a chicken bone,  and flew to a nearby roof to enjoy his lunch.

The fazenda is a working ranch, so we visit a cowboy on what must be a prize bull.

We see several burrowing owls along the dirt road into the lodge.

One afternoon, Octavio asks if we want ice cream and stops at a shop in Bonito.    Want ice cream?    

Oh, my, does this place have ice cream.   Rows of freezer chests line the walls and at the far end is a place with "all the fixings."   Incredibly, it's scoop-your-own!

Someone tells me they have passion fruit ice cream and I put a couple small scoops in a cardboard cup.   At the cashier's station, a lady places my cup on the scale and charges accordingly.    I have no idea how much it is because Octavio pays.

These photos are a sample of the ice cream available and don't represent the whole supply.

The toppings.

Later, while looking for giant anteaters, we come upon a large bird that looks like an emu but is actually a Greater Rhea, and we photograph it in the late afternoon golden light.

Backlit Greater Rhea in the Golden Hour of a setting sun.

The largest native birds in South America, they weight 33 to 60 lbs, and can run 40 mph.   Standing between three and five feet tall, these omnivores are usually found in grasslands where they eat broad-leaf plants and clover, but also small vertebrates such as birds, snakes, and lizards.

From Smithsonian National Zoo:

Males develop a dark collar at the base of their neck during the breeding season. They call females with a booming call and court two to 12 females with an impressive wing display. Once mating has occurred, the males build nests, which are shallow depressions in the ground.

Each of the females lay up to five gold- colored eggs in the male's nest over a period of seven to 10 days. They can lay up to 60 eggs total. The male incubates the eggs for about six weeks and cares for the chicks alone. When male rheas are taking care of their young, they will charge at any creature that comes too close to them, including female rheas and humans.

Though they resemble an ostrich, rheas have three toes whereas an ostrich has only two.