Truckin' to Foz

Foz Iguacu, Brazil

We get up early and have the truck packed by 6:00am as it’s another long drive day. It’s amazing to me how 12 or 14 hours in a truck or a bus doesn’t even faze me anymore. On my last trip we covered 24,000 kms or about 18,000 miles. Often when people sign up for these trips, they don’t realize how big South America is and complain about the long days. It never ceases to amaze me how people will book this trip having absolutely no idea what it is. On my first trip through Patagonia I had three girls who honestly thought that the farther South you go in the world, the hotter it gets. They came on a trip through Patagonia with little or no warm clothes and three or four bikinis.

On their first day one of them asked me, `How are the beaches in Ushuaia?’

`Um, cold.’ I replied.

As her face slowly turned white I explained that Ushuaia is the southern most city in the world, which meant if you looked at the world upside-down it would be the northern most city in the world.

It was time for her to do some shopping.

We reach Foz at about 7pm. Foz Iguacu is famous for being the city near the Brazilian side of Iguacu falls. Iguacu falls is in the top 3 natural wonders that I’ve ever seen. Seeing the falls is like being in a Lord of the Rings movie. A geological coincidence, the large Iguacu River curls back upon itself and then disperses over a large granite shelf in about 275 different waterfalls. It’s overwhelming. As the river makes up the border between Argentina and Brazil in that area and so each country enjoys different views.

We pull into one of my favourite campsites in S.A. It’s got a pool, a bar, a hostal, a restaurant and a well groomed football pitch (yes I know that I’m starting to sound English). Tonight’s pretty quiet, but that’ll change tomorrow when a bunch of trucks arrive.

Flashback - Bonito

Bonito, Brazil Though we’re only about 50 yards from the campsite the darkness and humidity form a blanket that we’re slowly pushing through. Eventually our eyes begin to adjust to the blackness and the landscape gradually starts to reveal itself. From the spongy mud and the 3 inches of water that laps our ankles grass grows about waist height. Above us the pinpricks of stars peep down at us and Orion’s belt hangs at a jaunty angle. We’re picking our way down the narrow path that connects the campsite and the river. Our bellies are full from the lamb that was spit roasted by one of the drivers, our heads are abuzz from the rum punch I had brewed up and our blood is laced with the excitement that the wonders of night wandering bring. As we inch closer the low rumble of the river becomes clearer and we pass the small trail that leads down to the first swimming hole or what I like to call the daytime swimming hole. Here the river surges over a small waterfall into a deceivingly deep pool where froth erupts from the crystal center and rocks jut out in a semicircle giving you the perfect place to sit and enjoy the sunshine. But now its nighttime and we bypass this hole for now. Behind me I have about 8 people or so, the majority from my truck, but a few from the other trucks scattered around whom also going into Carnival. We pass small holes that have been dug for small saplings. Some of saplings haven’t taken and when we’re here in the daytime I try to convince people that they’re anaconda holes. English people will believe anything as long as you say it in the authoritative guide voice. Finally we reach our destination. I strip down to my swimsuit and climb over the log that guards the opening to the river. A large tree has fallen here across the river and I slowly make my way down the slippery surface to the water where the tree is submerged by a foot and a half of water. The river is about 20 feet wide here. The water is just cold enough to cool us down and is so crystal clear that in the daytime you can see the fish from the bank. The tree is easily long enough to accommodate everybody and at the far end of it, almost at the other bank of the river, there is a thick branch that forks sideways leaving a nice flat rung from which you can jump into the river. It’s about ten feet deep, easily enough to do dives or back flips safely into the slow current. These are the moments that make me love my job. Here there are no questions, no pressing responsibilities, no accounting, no emails, I’m one of them. I pull a couple of long slow strokes up river and let myself glide back down to the log. Around me there are smiles and splashes. For some reason, in this job these are the times when I feel most meditative. When I’m alone there is always a voice in the back of my head that is chanting the never ending mantras: must do this, gotta do that, but in the glow of laughter and quiet satisfaction of showing people beautiful things my mind clears.

Rain, Go Away

Bonito, Brazil

Unfortunately it rains for most of our two days here. It’s disappointing because Bonito is one of my favourite places and it’s the last time that I’ll be there. For most of the two days I concentrate on getting my work caught up. I’m finally able to catch up on accounting and able to make all my reservations for the next few weeks. Exciting stuff.

Meanwhile, the passengers have the opportunity to do

Picture from a previous tour in the Bonito campsite


some very cool tours. The snorkelling tour in the Rio Plata is basically floating down a river with the clearest river water I’ve ever seen. They have chances to see Caiman, Anaconda (my last group saw one without even knowing it. It was in a picture) and tons of different types of fish of all shapes and sizes. Its good fun and strangely relaxing as you don’t have to do much but float and try to keep yourself from bumping any sharp objects or kicking up murk so others can’t see.

The other tour is ominously dubbed the Abyss. On this tour you repel about 150 feet down into a cave. Once you’re in the cave you get to snorkel or scuba and look at the stalactites, stalagmites and fish throughout the giant cavern. When I did it I felt that it was unlike anything I had ever seen.

So Bonito was kind of a bust. The pax enjoyed their tours, but didn’t really enjoy camping in the rain. The first night Steve and I took them down to the river, but because of heavy rains, the current of the water made the night swimming not as free and easy. Anyway, I’ll include a flashback that should give you some idea of how it usually is.

Truckin' to Bonito

Bonito, Brazil

Today we take off for Bonito, but first we still have the rest of the morning in the Pantanal. After breakfast we get back in their truck and they take us to the jungle lodge. We used to stay here in the jungle lodge in air conditioned beautiful chalets along a nice boardwalk where you could kind of see everything without ever getting you feet wet. I enjoy describing the features to the passengers as they stare longingly at the chalets and try to remember what air conditioning is like. To be honest though, I enjoy the farm much, much more than the lodge as you’re actually out in the wetlands amongst all the animals and whatnot. When we stayed in the lodge, if people weren’t on an excursion they would just bury themselves in cool air in their chalet and never come out, whereas at the farm it’s too bloody hot to stay in your hammock and you’re actually kind of forced to interact. The pax go on a boat ride, which makes me a little nervous as the boat ride is not that good. It’s hot and you usually don’t see much. The boat ride usually is the first thing that they do in the Pantanal and because it’s the first thing they enjoy it, but at the end, they’ve already seen caiman and bird and they’ve already been hot and mosquito bitten and they don’t need to do it again, but it’s paid for, damnit, and they have to have something to do while we wait for our included lunch. I sit inside the air conditioning and read. Hee hee.

Success! They all come back happy as they saw a couple of giant otters. See I know what I’m doing.

After lunch we all pile into Doris. Steve and I have different driving dogmas. I always feel that if there is a safer route to somewhere, we should take it even if it costs us a little extra time. Steve feels that you should just gun it straight through whatever it is to wherever you’re going. My Mom is the same way. There is two ways to Bonito from the Pantanal. The first way is straight through on crappy roads where you have a good chance of getting stuck after the slightest rain and over a bridge that has huge signs around it saying limit 8 tons (we´re about 17 or so). Each time I’ve gone over it, I feel it cracking just a little more. The second way is about 200 kms longer, but in the end I feel is faster because you don’t have to drive so slow and there is no chance of having to pull Doris out of a river bed. After a bit of debate, I acquiesce, bury myself in the back of the truck and try to sleep. I really don’t like that bridge, but we make it over without falling through, though I swear if one more truck tries to go over that bridge they will be making a very awkward phone call.

Unfortunately, after the bridge, the road turns to muck and though we make it without getting stuck, by the time we get to Bonito its past 8 o’clock. We all get hamburgers in town and then drive out to the campsite.

The campsite is about 7 kms outside of the town and it’s probably my favorite campsite in South America because it has a river that runs through it with the most beautiful swimming holes I’ve ever been to. I’ll tell you about them tomorrow.

Jungle Hangover

Pantanal, Brazil

Hoo boy. Hangover day. It turns out that the sangria was a bit stronger than some people were ready for

Leigh and his horse

and there were a couple of very sick people last night. Kristy, after telling me that she’s the kind of girl who is always happy, threw up her happiness all over the floor next to her hammock and then was sick for most of today. After great effort I did resist waking her up at 8 in the morning to ask her if she’s happy.

Kristy does actually seem to be genuinely happy all the time. She’s an Aussie girl and I’ve found that most Aussie girls are either always ready to have a good time or always ready to be miserable. She’s definitely one of the former. She just got married to Damon.

It was kind of fun at breakfast to see everybody stagger out.  Kate and Naomi came out, sat down and then decided to have a beer. They reckoned that they were both still pissed, so why not continue.

So after breakfast, I decided to go piranha fishing with Claire and Neil. Piranha fishing is fishing for the impatient sportsman. It’s great; you have a bamboo pole with a fixed line and usually beef as bait. As soon as you throw the bait in you have to be ready or your bait disappears. I was a bit cocky, as I’ve done it so many times and usually catch 10 or more piranha, but as soon as I patiently explained the proper piranha fishing technique, Claire immediately started kicking my ass. Every time I caught a fish, she had already caught one and already had her line in the water ready to hook another one. The spot that we went to was a new one and though it was much more comfortable as there were fewer mosquitos, there were also less fish. After a couple of hours, we gave up: Claire 6, Mike 5, Neil 5.

In the afternoon we had our soccer game against the Brazilians. In each country I try to arrange one and at the farm they have a nice small grass field with bamboo goals. My last tour, which had a bunch of Irish lads, ended up going all the way through South America undefeated (which is some feat considering we beat the porters on the Inca trail who supposedly hadn’t lost in three years, beat the locals on the stony beach of Puerta Inca, which I had never done and finally the locals on Lake Titicaca which is over 4,000 meters) only to lose here to Max, Paulo and the assorted cooks and horse guys. Surprisingly, as I didn’t think this tour was going to be an athletic one, we kept it close. As in the States we play soccer until we’re old enough to play real football, I played a number of years as a kid and now play quite a bit down here. My style is to stand near the opponent’s goal and just try to kick it in, usually after pushing one of the smaller locals out of the way. None of the work and all the glory. This time we ended up losing 6 to 4, but with 3 goals from yours truly.

The girls, Kate and Naomi go on drinking all day long. They sit out in the hammocks downing beer and Cachasca, the local sugar cane alcohol. There’s a calf that runs around the camp like a large dog. I´ve never seen anything like it. Anyway, it turns out that the calf has developed a taste for beer and licks all the beer cans in the garbage can clean and then figures out that if he knocks over full ones he’ll get more. Smart cow. In fact, it turns out that he’s quite a bit smarter than the girls who kept leaving their full beers around and then acting surprised when they found the cow licking up they’re spilt beer. Eventually, I find out that I’m the dumbest one of them all as the girls had been nicking beer from my stash.

Anyway, except for the girls, the evening was fairly quiet one as we had a big day coming up the next day.

Horseback Riding through the Jungle

Ok so I hate horseback riding. Every time I’ve ever gone horseback riding, it’s been in Central or


Claire, the happy birthday girl


South America on horses that look like they haven’t eaten in weeks and aren’t too happy with the prospect of carrying a giant gringo anywhere. So I end up sitting on top of this horse with my feet scraping the ground trying to kick the damn thing from my awkward position in hopes that I might motivate the horse actually take me somewhere, while the horse indifferently eats grass.

The first time I went horse back riding was while I was working for Club Med in Mexico. I had spent the night before hanging out with a friend that was quitting and we ended up drinking an entire gallon of gin between the two of us. I thought that I had the next morning to sleep in, but it turned out that somebody was sick and I had to fill in on a jungle horseback trek with a bunch of kids. I pretty much just stuck to the back of the group while trying not to be sick all over my horse. Anyway, this pretty much put me off the whole idea of horseback riding. Though, you would think it would have put me off gin.

Anyway, since I’ve been a tour leader I hadn’t gone once. However, this is my last trip after all and my pax always seem to enjoy it, so this time I decide to give it a go.

There are ten of us going and I get a white horse with the optimistic name of Hercules. This time I actually enjoy myself. We walk almost the whole way, enjoying the splendors of the wetlands: the low rumble of distant howler monkeys, the 747 like approach of the Jaiburu stork (a giant bird about 4 feet tall) and the pleasure of going through the Pantanal without getting your feet wet. Usually you end up wading through knee deep water, which is a little distressing when you know there are caiman, piranha and anacondas about. At the end of the trip Max splits us up into two groups, those who want to gallop back to the farm and those who want to walk. Now I promised myself I wasn’t going to gallop, but the horse seemed to be doing fine and its name was Hercules, so I decided to give it a go. At first when I gave him a kick he just started at a very uncomfortable trot, but when I gave a slap on its behind he took off. All of us went flying through splashing water. Hercules, though he looked to be asleep most of the day, now woke up and decided that he wanted to lead the pack. I was going as fast as I thought you could go on a horse until another horse pulled up along side us and Hercules kicked it into another gear. If this horse had tires it would have laid down rubber. After a couple of seconds racing the other horse I decided that was enough for me and my testicles and slowed the horse down and walked the rest of the way.

That afternoon the activities were jungle hike or piranha fishing. I decided that my efforts would be best put to use in the hammock and just had a nice rest of the day doing one of my very favorite things: swaying in the hammock with a nice book and a cold beer.

That night was Australia day commemorating the first time a man named Bruce fought a crocodile with one hand while drinking a beer with the other, all the while in barefeet and short shorts. To top that off, it was Claire’s birthday. After we sang Happy Birthday, Neil sang a remarkable Elvis song. Some of you know that I do a fair imitation myself, but while I pretty much just stick to the easy early stuff Neil blew me out of the water with Suspicious Minds cerca 1975 with shaking hands, pouty lips and everything.

Neil is another character. You know, the kind of people who seem one of a kind. I feel very lucky this trip to have two characters and Neil is the second one after Leigh. He loves singing, especially Elvis and comes out with just random shit all the time.

Since we had a rather lackluster effort on the boat in Paraty, it turned out that we had plenty of sangria mix left, so I threw it all in a bucket, while Max and Paulo made us a towering bon fire. The group definitely redeemed themselves this time and we were dancing and singing around the fire until late in the evening. When Claire went to bed she told me that she her lullaby was Living on a Prayer by Bon Jovi sung at the top of our lungs.

Into the Pantanal

Pantanal, Brazil

After another fairly long day of driving we arrive to the Pantanal at 6 pm or so. The Pantanal is a giant wetlands about the size of Nevada in the eastern part of Brazil. This is the best place in South America to view wildlife because it’s much more open than it’s jungle counterparts. Here you can see pumas, jaguars, ocelots, yellow anacondas, cayman, piranhas and many other species of animals that could probably eat you, as well as 650 kinds of birds.

We park Doris at a jungle lodge where we meet our guides Max and Paulo. We stretch our legs, pack our bags, fill the cooler with beer and ice and hop into a truck with a bunch of seats in the trailer. This truck will take us down the road about an hour and a half to where we’ll be staying for the three nights. The looks on the faces of the pax drop from dubiousness to despair once we get going and the mosquitoes attack. For some reason, there is a small band of about 4 kms where the mosquitoes are as thick as fog. Eventually, the mosquitoes thin out, eagerness replaces despair and we pull into the farm.

The farm is where we stay in the Pantanal and it is from here we base all of our excursions. There is a large room where we all sleep in hammocks, a dining room where our meals are included, a small grass soccer pitch with bamboo goals, a kind of large bamboo pavilion where you can hang a hammock and read or snooze during the day, a fire pit where we have bon fires at night and a stables where the keep the horses for horseback riding.

That night, after dinner I have a few beers and play cards with Andy and Leigh.

Leigh is an absolute character. A self proclaimed Scottish Jew, this guy is one of those people who is hilarious without trying to be. He sounds just like Fat Bastard from Austin Powers (though he gets annoyed when you rub your belly and say ‘ooh I’m sooo sexy. Look et me sexy booooddy’ which makes it even funnier). Good guy to have around.

Truck Day

Pantanal, Brazil

We leave a six am to start our first long drive of the tour (though Steve and I just did it a week ago). It’s about 2200 kilometers (at least like Seattle to San Francisco) and takes two full days. I used to sit up front for all of these drives, but it’s become a bit of a problem because I have a tendency to sleep most of the way and when I’m not sleeping I’m reading. For some reason this seems to annoy Steve (or whichever driver I happen to have), so I’ve taken to hanging out in the house (the pax area). This lets the pax alternate up front where the best views are and gives Steve somebody new to talk to every couple of hours or so.

In the back of Doris we have 34 comfortable-ish seats, with two tables for playing cards or whatever up front and a jack to plug in your Ipod. Each drive day I give a description about what’s happening, where we’re going and usually a small lecture on the history, politics or whatnot of the area. The first long drive day is always kind of a test for the pax as a lot of them are from the UK and have absolutely no idea how big South America is. For many of them a 40 minute drive is something reserved for vacations and in 18 hours they can go from the top of Scotland to the bottom of England (where they keep trying to convince me are some lovely beaches. I don’t believe them). Sometimes I’ll do a trivia game or something to keep them occupied. My last trip I made the mistake of having a truck sangria party on one of the longer days and had to deal with things thrown out the window, congo lines up and down the truck, and an absolutely destroyed house with sticky sangria everywhere which in some flash of insanity I volunteered to clean up. I have a feeling, though; this group is a little more relaxed.

After a long day of driving, we find a hotel at 11 pm.

Samba School

Paraty, Brazil

Today I have planned as a work day, though I get a late start because I need to take Alison to the hospital. Now that the sangria has worn off, she can barely walk a couple of steps. I get a taxi and take her down to the local clinic. Luckily for my dodgy Portuguese, it doesn’t take much explanation. As I feared, there didn’t seem to be much the doctor could do. He decides to clean and pop the biggest blister, but this turns out to be a very unpopular decision. It’s so painful that Alison actually screams at the top of her lungs at one point. So, the doctor prudently just put some soothing cream on the rest and bandaged them up.

Unfortunately, now Alison can’t walk at all, so once I get her in a cab, Steve and I actually carry her out and put her in our room. As all the passengers are camping here, we have the only room. I had planned to spend most of the day in my room doing accounts, but it looks like any computer work I want to do will have to be done at an internet place.

Before I do any of that I take the cook group shopping. On these tours, when we’re camping, all of the shopping, cooking and cleaning is done by the passengers. They have different groups and rotate jobs. The two girls who are cooking tonight are Claire and Kyanne.

After shopping it’s already 2 o’clock. The problem with this job is that you never seem to have enough time in the day and plans constantly change. I’m desperately behind in my accounting, but now I don’t have time or a place to do them. Oh well, I’ll save them for the Pantanal.

That as we’re cooking dinner we hear the pounding rhythms of a practicing samba school who are in the little stadium next door. We can’t see them from where we are, but it sounds like a band of about 120 people.

After dinner we go over to watch. These schools are all over Brazil. They practice almost every day from August until Carnaval in February, all for an hour and a half of entertaining. Though this school sounds much bigger because of the stadium acoustics and of enthusiasm put into their music, I only count about 36 people. Though when they march in parade they march line by line, during practice they situate themselves in kind of a spiral. On the outside are the 5 or 6 women of the group. Usually, women are reserved for dancing, but the drum groups always have a few shaking a kind of a tambourine like instrument. They stand with bored expressions shaking their instruments in perfect time. Because of their apparent indifference, they’re job looks easy at first glance, but if you notice they all have instruments of different pitch and they don’t just shake them through the whole song. There are very specific times when they have to shake their specific instrument. This goes for the drums as well. Even though you might have three or four guys with the same kind of drum, they won’t just be banging them at the same time. They’ll kind of alternate, so if you look at one person it seems pretty easy, but when you take in the whole section you realize it’s actually a very complicated rhythm.

In the middle is the leader. All eyes are on him. He is a flurry of sweat, movement and multitasking. The entire time he is blowing his whistle, signaling changes from different sections, waving his hands and glaring at delinquent drummers, and meanwhile dancing the whole time. All of a sudden on his signal the entire group will stop, he’ll bang out a quick complicated solo, and then group will beat out a reply, he’ll solo again, they’ll reply again, finally with a deft flick of his wrist the whole group will be back into the song again. It’s absolutely impossible to stand still while watching. Among the spectators you see children still in diapers dancing along while forming they’re life long addiction to rhythm and dancing. It’s a community event. In the small town of Paraty there are 6 or 7 samba schools and groups of friends will walk between each one laughing, playing and flirting while watching they’re free entertainment. These schools represent a single minded commitment that this country has to having a good time. I never get tired of watching it.

I'm on a Boat!

Paraty, Brazil

Paraty is a colonial town on the Emerald coast of Brazil. It has cobblestone beaches and colonial architecture. It used to be the port used to export gold and coffee back to Portugal. The one and only tour that we offer here is a day on a yacht out to a couple of beaches and a spot where the pax can swim with a school of fish.

Steve and I make our famous sangria punch. This usually consists of white wine, red wine, apple champagne, vodka, rum, some tropical citrus juiced and sprite. It tastes like punch and inevitably somebody will ask me if there’s any alcohol in it. Unfortunately, it’s kind of a dreary day with intermittent rainfall, but we gamely make our way to the boat and start mixing up sangria.

On the way to the wharf I realize that one of my pax is missing. It turns out that it’s Allison. The day before the tour started she went out to Copacabana without sunscreen for about a half an hour. Now her sunburn is so bad that big blisters are bubbling up on her feet. She’s in a lot of pain. She does make it to the boat, though, and immediately starts downing sangria.

This excursion is one of my favorites. It’s always either at the beginning of a trip or at the end so it’s a great time to either bond as a group or have a final party before the end. This time it’s at the beginning, so I’m hoping that everyone will get to know one another and enjoy themselves.

Usually, the sun is shining and everybody plays on the different beaches that we visit. Today, however, we spent most of the day standing on beaches in the rain and drinking beer. This wasn’t the start that I had envisioned, but by the time the boat had returned to the port almost everybody was feeling good and even had had a ‘bucket scull’. This involves sitting down with Steve and I opening the tap on the Sangria bucket and pouring it straight down your throat.

That night, for some reason, ended up being a very early night.

How to Weazel Out of Paying a Bribe... In Portuguese!

I woke up a bit groggy this morning, the taste of last night’s tequila still burning the back of my throat. I go downstairs, pay for the hotel for the last three days and have breakfast. Then we all pile on to Doris and away we went on the way out of Rio. After giving the troops a brief description of the truck I hop in front with Steve to help figure our way out of the city. Rio is not somewhere you want to get lost in a bright yellow truck full of gringos.

On our way out of town a cop waves at us to pull over at a check point.

‘Sons of bitches,’ I thought. I had dealt with these guys before. The last time I was coming out of Rio it was Carnaval and there were 5 trucks going the same way. They pulled us over, started looking over the truck and eventually found that we weren’t using a tachometer card (a little card that sits behind the tach that records driving info), which at least for South America is a very obscure law. The seedy cop told us that if we didn’t give him $5,000 he would take our truck away. I laughed and tossed him the keys. After about an hour of haggling (with our brand new passengers baking in the truck, we got him down to $300.

“Just give him the money,” my driver said through clenched teeth.

The cop smiled through his mustache and put the money in his pocket.

We heard later that a couple of other trucks ended up paying $500 or more and then in one case $100 and a flash from the female tour leader.

This time I was determined not to pay a cent. The cop started carefully checking through the likely offenses. After checking our fire extinguisher and first aid kit, he pulled back the tachometer with a flourish. His face fell. This time we had a tach card. He decided to go over Steve’s license again, this time corners of his mouth turned up slightly and he asked us to join him in the stuffy office.

Flies buzzed through the stifling air as he sat down at the desk. He shuffled some papers, looked at the license and then shuffled the papers again. I crossed my arms and got ready for a fight. I wished that it was going to be in Spanish. Arguing in Portuguese is not my forte.

“This license is not valid in Brazil,” He said, poking a meaty finger at Steve’s international truck driving license. “It’s not translated to Portuguese.”

‘Wow,’ I thought. ‘He must be really desperate.’ This was the flimsiest shakedown attempt I’d seen.

“What are you talking about? That’s ridiculous.” I pointed at the permit that we had received at the border. “That makes it legal. They gave it to us at the border. If his license wasn’t legal, why would have they let us in?”

He pondered that one for a second. “No… that license is only legal for countries like Bolivia.”

Bolivia, of course, is the South American whipping boy. Brazilians shudder to think that something that could be used legally in Bolivia could also be used in their country.

We went back and forth a bit. The fact that he hadn’t actually given me a figure made me feel fairly confident.

He made a last ditch attempt. He pulled out the English law book and pointed at the offense he considered us to be breaking. I read it. It said something like ‘…you must have a license that is translated into Portuguese, unless you have another official document excusing you.”

I smiled and pointed at the law to Steve. He snatched up his license and Brazilian permit.

“Thanks!” we both said in unison, as we strode out the office.

“Wait, wait, wait,” he said. It wasn’t going to be that easy. He took the permit back, read it, consulted his guide book, looked back at it, scratched his chin and consulted his guidebook.

Sensing victory, let off a litany. “It says it right there!” I stabbed my finger at the permit. “Right there, you know it’s not an offense. Give it back, we’re leaving.”

The fact that this was all in very broken Portuguese reduced the effect somewhat, but eventually he admitted defeat. He gave us our documents back and we were on our way.

I’ve found that usually as long as you remain as confident as possible, to the point of yelling at them and then just make it very clear that you’re ready to stay there as long as possible, they’ll eventually get bored and let you go. Last trip I actually had a cop in Argentina ask me as a last ditch attempt to go on to the truck and collect 10 dollars from each of my passengers.

Sons of bitches.

Once we got to the campsite, Steve went over the truck with the new pax and I went shopping for lunch. Most of the rest of the day was spent basically just orientating everybody to the Budget lifestyle.

That night Steve and I did the cooking to show them how meals should be. Steve cooked a roast on a spit and I fried potatoes with peppers, onions and bacon, as well as made as salad. Afterwards, I took a couple of them down to the pub to watch some good ole American football. Great game (New England vs. Indianapolis), but I have a feeling they didn´t quite appreciate it the way I did.

The First Day

My hotel room Rio - 8:30am

I wake up to a loud knock on my door. I reach from my bed and open it to see a girl standing there looking a little bewildered. For some reason I think that it’s a friend of Steve’s (my driver) so I gesture her in.

“Are you Mike?” she asks, “My name’s Catherine. I’m on your tour.”

Oh shit. I just got rid of the last lot last night and it’s already begun. Questions. Never-ending, over and over, often the exact same ones, all day every day 24 hours a day. As a tour leader you get to hate the sound of your own name. mike, mike, Mike, MIKE . That’s all I hear. When I get home I’m going to change my name to something that cannot be expressed verbally, like Prince. I’ll be the guy formally known as Mike.

Anyway, that’s what going through my head as she comes through the door. Then I see her flinch and I’m flung back into reality. I realize what she’s seeing: a big sunburned lump of an American lying on his bed in his underwear. Clothes, beer cans, papers, more beer cans, all strewn about the room. She asks a couple of quick questions and scurries as soon as she possibly can. Worst first impression ever.

My outgoing crew had a bit of a party down in Ipanema the night before and I didn’t actually get home until 4am or so. But I haul myself out of bed as I have a bit to do today to get ready for the upcoming tour. Also, I would like to catch Catherine before she goes to the nearest phone and inquires about cancellation costs with the Budget Expeditions tour office. Catherine is nowhere in sight, but I see Steve, my driver having breakfast. I chat with him for a bit and have a feed before returning to my room to get my macroing done.

macro v. (mak-row) To do anything on the computer, ie: write up passengers lists, room lists, do accounting, etc. The word was coined by my first driver who found it handy to have a comprehensive word to describe computer work, as anything involving a keyboard was completely beyond him.

I save everything on to my handy dandy little memory stick and take off down the street looking for an internet shop.

Walking down the street in Rio is nothing like walking down the street in the States. Here you don’t just step out on to the sidewalk, you emerge into interactive world. At home you walk from point A to point B as quick as you can with as little interaction as possible. Here people will happily spend 45 minutes talking with you even though you don’t speak their language. They know that their purpose in life is definitely not sitting quietly. All the time they’re ready to smile, ready to talk, ready to dance, ready to fuck. They live life with passion and spontaneity that Americans would find naïve and irreverent. But here they don’t care. On this street it’s all smiles and flesh. It’s not: if you’ve got it flaunt it. Here you flaunt whatever you’ve got. No time for Old and Ugly, everybody’s beautiful.

I print everything I need out for the pre departure meeting tonight and I go back to my room and write this. Right now I’m looking over this email and realizing that I should be on the beach.

Copacabana – 1:00pm

Speaking of smiles and flesh, you´ll never see so much of either than at Copacabana. The sun is strong, the sand is soft and the people are beautiful. Coming out of the subway a few blocks away I was instantly pounded by the heat. Eventually I made my way to the beach and picked my way though row after row of scantily clad beauties, their white smiles from their impossibly bronze skin. I sat for a couple of hours sipping on the beer and the view, occasionally jumping into the freshness of the Atlantic. As started to make my way back to the subway to go back to the hotel, I ran into Andrew, one of the passengers on my next trip. So I changed my my mind and took in another 45 minutes of the beach. I think Andrew will be somebody I get along with. English guy, works in IT and is also an aspiring writer. Likes to go out at night, but doesn´t drink in the day as it knocks him out.


Welcome meeting and night out – 5:00pm

This is it. I always feel tired before these meetings. The last 4 months weigh me down as I prepare to do it again. As I usher the 13 new people into the room, noting their slightly bewildered expressions and nervous smiles, I seem to take on a personality not quite my own. A little too eager and a little too enthusiastic. I´ve done enough of these meetings now that I can put myself on cruise control. This time I almost feel like I´m one of the passengers watching myself give this meeting. Despite this, the meeting goes well and I get a good impression of the crew. After about an hour and a half´s worth of explanation, people´s eyes start to cross and I realize that they´re not going to remember anything else I say, so I end the meeting.

As I´m walking out I spot Catherine. I smiled, and said, “Hey, sorry about this morning. I wasn´t really ready for you.”

She laughed and said, “That´s all right. I was going to tell you earlier that I didn´t recognize you with you clothes on.”

Later that night I take them out to dinner. Spectacular all you can eat buffet with a grill of almost any kind of tasty meat available and a surprisingly good selection of sushi. Afterwards, we go out to Lapa a neighborhood with good street parties and samba. We pretty much just hang out outside a samba club with blasting music, sip our drinks and get to know one another. Kate, one of the newbies, keeps pestering us to order tequila shots from one of the street vendors.

At about 2 or so we head back to the hotel. We have to leave the next morning at 8 am for Paraty, a beach town about 5 hours south. That´s it for today.

Tour Explanation

Rio de Janiero

The tours that I run are done on a giant yellow truck that kind of looks like a big yellow toaster. On the truck there are 34 seats and lockers that hold all of their bags, big crates for food, tents, ovens and everything else needed for camping with that many people. My company is called Budget Expeditions, its part of a larger South American tour company called Tucan travel. Budget focuses on people 18 to 35 years old and are looking for a very budget conscious trip.

This trip starts in Rio de Janeiro with 14 people goes across Brazil down through Argentina all the way to Tierra del Fuego, back up through Patagonia to Santiago. In Santiago 6 people will get off and 23 will join making a group of 31. Then will continue up into Northern Chile cross back over into Northern Argentina and then up through Western Bolivia into Peru. From there we’ll go all the way up through Peru into Ecuador and the tour ends in Quito.

The tour is 4 months long and the highlights of the trip are the Brazilian wetlands of the Pantanal, Iguazu falls, Buenos Aires, Torres del Paine National Park, the Bolivian Salt Flats, Cuzco and Machu Pichu, the sand dunes on the west coast of Peru and El Oriente the Ecuadorian Amazon.

We camp 70% of the time and the rest of the time stay in hotels, hostels and home stays. When we are camping the passengers are responsible for shopping and cooking their food, keeping the truck clean and organized and maintaining their tents.

My job is tour organize all the excursions and hotels, make sure the shopping and duties get done, keep all the accounts, give out all info about cities, countries and tours and make sure all the pax are happy healthy and terrific. I spend a lot of time in hospitals and photocopy places.

I work with one other person, my driver Steve. He’s from Australia and his responsibilities are driving, keeping the truck in working order and occasionally cook a kick ass barbeque.

This is our second 4 month trip in a row. Total time off between tours – about 2 and a half hours.