The Land of the Celestial Jaguar

Setting Off

2010-07-24T15:51:00.001-07:00

Midnight. China's all flooded- latest news. Alang (our Chinese explorer) has emailed that we may not even be able to get through to Gongshan, the start of our trek. Setting off at 6.00 AM tomorrow. Watch this space.In the meantime, this links to the last expeditionhttp://andestoamazon2008.blogspot.com/

Setting Off

2010-07-24T15:47:00.000-07:00

Midnight. China's all flooded- latest news. Alang (our Chinese explorer) has emailed that we may not even be able to get through to Gongshan, the start of our trek. Setting off at 6.00 AM tomorrow. Watch this space.

In the meantime, this links to the last expedition
http://andestoamazon2008.blogspot.com/

The Land of the Celestial Jaguar

2010-02-18T11:26:00.000-08:00

When a lone conquistador appeared out of the jungle claiming to be the sole survivor of an expedition that had found a gold rich civilisation in the plains to the east of the Andes, the Viceroy of Lima despatched two hundred and fifty soldiers lead by the redoubtable Juan Alvarez Maldonado to claim the Land of the Musus in the name of mother Spain. But, there was a problem; another man had already been promised leadership of the venture and he nurtured a grudge. Gomez de Tordoya set off with the sixty men who were still loyal to him, intent on ambushing Maldonado and on reaching the plains first.

The Land of the Celestial Jaguar is the story of how the two groups of conquistadors, having crossed the Andean cordilleras and trekked down the treacherous jungles on its eastern flanks, then met and fought over who would conquer the Musus, and how the tribes, through whose lands they had passed, dealt with them once the battle was over.

Check out the 2010 expedition :

http://trailofthesnowmonkey.blogspot.com/2010/02/so-you-want-to-find-snow-monkey.html

Alto Tuichi: More Pictures

2008-10-12T02:41:00.001-07:00

wolf spider with egg sack ; Abundant on Rio Tuichi

Sandro pulling Ramiro up Serrania 1 using our £2 rope

Me looking desperate and bedragged by the Mal Paso San Pedro rapids

Lost in Taquarilla thickets at the top of Serrania 2: Julian making GPS plot.

Route Map

2008-10-12T02:27:00.000-07:00

Here's a map of our route. Canoe Focus, the magazine of the British Canoe Union are going to publish an article about the trip. There was a map of the expedition route on google maps earlier on in this blog, but on Julian's advice I deleted it- as the area we intended to go into would have been prohibited because of the possibility of uncontacted Toromonas Indians living there.

More than before, I am convinced that there are still Toromonas at the headwaters of the Colorado and Enatahua. If any places are hard to get to, those are. In 5 days of trying we made only half the distance- a measly 10km. And there was still another 2800 metre Serrania to cross. The steepness of the terrain, the gorges, and the almost inpenetrable taquarilla bamboo and elecho 'bracken' on the high ridges make this such a difficult area to access- which is all the better for any Toromonas who might be living there.

Did we come across them? Not sure??? At various times when we were camped in the quebradas (ravines) going up and down the second Serrania, we heard screams/ shouts across the ridges above us. Were these just bird/ animal calls? Probably. But our guides didn't think so. Whatever the cries were, they certainly spooked Sandro and Darwin.

Expedition Pictures

2008-08-28T14:52:00.001-07:00

The Rio Tuichi at the point where we reached it after our failed attempt to cross the serranias

Bagre catfish - I tripped over a nightline that the guide, Sandro, had set up, pulled in the line... and this is what I got... which was just as well as we were on the point of running out of food.

The tapir that swam up to us at the Mal Paso San Pedro

Charged by Peccaries

2008-08-24T12:59:00.000-07:00

Agua Polo stream. This is straight from diary as it happened.

A herd of 500 or so white-lipped peccary. We sat on the riverside shingle while they passed not 6m away. We could see legs, glimpses of snouts and hear low, rhythmic grunting- almost inaudible, and the sound of marching hooves and breaking vegetation. We followed...

Fear- makes you want to go back to your monkey origins and climb a tree. Its the only way you could get away if thye all charged.

(In sight- 10 to 20) These peccaries are much blacker and, according to Sandro, a fiercer variety than the ones we saw near Chalalan.
...sounds like even more are coming our way... tusks clacking... low grunting... a sweaty smell... many more coming.
Theyve scented us. A few ran. Others behind bushes stand their ground. A big porker is lookig at me clacking his tusks (lifts his head, slams it down, his tusks CLACK).There is a partly fallen tree which stands at a diagonal to the ground, 10 metres to my right. This is our escape route.
Loud grunting, clacking. I think Sandro has moved around to outflank them- I can hear the ting of his machete...
more grunting, branches breaking, really bad smell... Julian just dropped his vieo.. and ran up the tree. I follow. Suddenly there are peccaries running past...

The food runs out.

2008-08-24T12:18:00.000-07:00

Once we had arrived at the Agua Cabyvara stream where we had camped 11 years before, we knew the river would be fairly safe from here on. Now it was just a question of how long it wold take to get to the jungle town of Rurrenabaque on the River Beni, from where we could get a bus back to La Paz. There was also the problem of our dwindling rations. The original idea had been to get to the Rio Enateahua and send the porters back while Julin, Sandro and I would carry on by boat. But, after our failed attempt to cross the high serranias, when we got back to the Tuichi there was nowhere where we could have sent Darwin and Ramiro back from. So they stayed with us. And they ate. Sandro seemed to give little consideration to conserving food and it was often a case of eating up anything as soon as it came out of the food sack, rather than letting it get scoffed by the porters. By the time we had passed the Mal Paso San Pedro we were down to one days rice and all the remaining sugar was soaking. We put in a long day on the raft to get down to the Tacana village of San Jose de Uchupiamonas, which we nearly missed entirely. I remembered the village was inland from the river but not exactly where the trail to get there started. San Jose was marked on our map and we had our GPS but it still gave us no idea where to stop. We saw ( were swept past) some people by the river just before sunset, we rounded a meander and came to a river beach with cows. Sandro reckoned there had to be a trail back to the vilage somewhere near so with Darwin and me in tow, he set off into the dusk upa jungle trail. We got back around 2 hours later with part of a venado (small deer) half a paca (big rat) two plantains, dry biscuits and stacks of oranges and grapefruits. That was all there was to sell us. We really wanted rice, yucca or some other staple. Sandro promised we would make the meat last 3 days, which meant of course that it was eaten in one. Next stop; the tourist lodge at Chalalan- to be some rice.
It took a day and a half. The river slowed down and, bored senseless in the heat, we hit a rock at a minor rapid, popped all but one of the inflatables, and sank. We got ashore, made a camp and stated drying ut everything- again. There were still two hours of light left so I persuaded Darwin to swim aross the river me to a huge pile of driftwood where we would be sure to find some balsa logs to build a new raft. Sandro was against this (as it wasnt his idea) but we went anyway (I nearly got washed away by the current- which seriously scared me) and found what we needed as well as some really huge jaguar tracks (we were pretty sure that it was making some of the noises we could hear too). Sandro was eventually shamed into swimming across and by nightfall we had enough lightweight logs to make a good raft. The people at Chalalan werent particularly friendly but they sold us some rice, oil... and CAKE!- and two days later gave us a lift downriver a few bends on their lancha (dugout canoe with big outboard at the back). Thye also took a messge to Leo Janco in Rurrenabaque saying that we were fine and cold he send us a sack of food whenever the boat came back upriver.

Back from the Jungle- Part 2

2008-08-22T14:21:00.000-07:00

(Brought to you from Hostal Austria. La Paz)

Julian and I had no idea whether the Mal Pao San Pedro was one rapid or a series of rapids. We did know that the Mal Paso was notoriously danerous. It was was where in 1985? Israeli traveller Yossi Ghinsberg had jumped from his raft, become separated from his group (2 of the 4 never came back) and spent 30 days lost in the jungle- which is described in his book, Back from Tuichi. As the rapids on the Tuich became worse- and the inflatable dinghies started getting more punctures, we decided to walk the riverside where our map showedsteep contours either sie and narrows. On the first set of narrows this wasnt really necessary so we entered the second canyon part without breaking up the raft, deflating and carrying it.

The first couple of rapids were thrilling but soon the white water was continuous. We went down a steep slope of water staight into a stopper (wave) which lifted the front high, the rough edges of the poles (which were just narrow tree trunks) but have dug into the inflatables, because suddenly two popped and we were sinkng. I tried to sit up from where I had slid back but couldnt. The string from my compass had tied itself around another cord. The raft whirled around a bit, but luckily we hit clear water, I disentangled myself and we got to the side. At that point, Julian and I opted to walk the large rocks at the riverside whilst our guides manhandled the boat around. I was quite shaken up. It was difficult traversing the rocks. We slipped and fell a few times- and we saw a tapir- it swam to within 4 metres of us and started getting out of the water until it must have heard my camera clicking.

Shortly after that Sandro decided that the rapids were too hard even for manhandling. We deflated everything, packed up and started carrying, which we found so hard. Julian and I thought his choice of route was lousy. Our guide would lead us vertically up, only to bring us straight down again so that we were edging the cliffs that hung over the river. We ended up using the rope- again. There were other machete cuts and in places we thought we could have kept the height we had gained and gone over the cliffs rather than up, down and traversing; but I think Sandros pride was at stake. By late afternoon he gave up. We headed back to he riverside boulders and hastily made camp before dark opposite a twin pair of water spounts that cascaded over the rocks opposite.

We woke up next morning to heavy rain. The river was rising. It had gone brown with silt. I was keen on getting going as soon as possible but Sandro favoured waiting so we waited all morning while the river rose a bit and we all got cold nd miserable. I felt ill. Sandro said it was my nerves. Quite possibly, but the waiting which seemed just veacuse Sandro didnt like getting wet really got to me. Finally, by about One, I told him how annoyed I was and we got some action. We built the raft up, launched straiht into a rapid and- got through easily. In fact that turned out t be the last of the rough ones. We knew we still had to pass the Puerto del Sol, which I had been told was a waterfall or another canyon. It never materialised and we rafted throuh into lovely virgin forest where we saw toucans and capped herons- possibly the presence of more herons and kingfishers here indicated that the river was slower and easier to fish in.

(Time up on computer. NEXT. Being charged by peccaries)

Back from the jungle Part 1

2008-08-20T12:58:00.000-07:00

The Serranias we crossed were twice the height of the one we crossed to get to the Madidi 11 years ago. They were covered in a dry montane forest with lots of thin bamboo that needed machete cutting the whole way (LOTS of marimonos- spider monkeys - though) and in places there was a type of wiry bracken which was really hard to push through- the ground was spongy like mattress and we´d often sink up to ur thighs in ´compost´- which is the bets way I can describe it. BUT, there was often no water, so we had to descend to make camp and when we did descend we would end up in ravines with cliffs everywhere. We would clamber up near vertical slopes avoiding the rock faces only to find more of the same beyond the next ridge. We had to usethe rope I bought in La Paz for about $4 lots of times. We had about 35Kg each and the porters had more (though they sure ate their way through their loads quickly- with no thought for conserving food for later). By day 4 it was clear that though we could continue to the Enatahua River, it would take at least another week and then we would start to run out of time and food. I think Sandro our guide wanted to carry on but we reined him in, going for the safe(r) option of getting out by the river Tuichi. We got there in the second week and at first it was great fun with small rapids, fantastic scenery and lots of wildlife. We knew there was a dangerous set of rapids, the ´Mal Paso San Pedro´, so as the raft was taking a hammering, Julian and I opted to walk around rapids, though as some of the way was in canyons, this was by no means easy. At one pass a tapir swam right up to us... and just an hour earlier one had just about gone right under the raft. Soon after we decided to deflate the dinghies and hike around the rapids but we kept getting boxed by cliffs. We came down to the river and inflated them again. It rained and we had to wait half a day until the level had gone down a bit. As luck had it, we had got past the worst bit and we were soon out, reaching the point on the river where we had started the Madidi trip 11 years before- that´s where I caught an enormous Bagre catfish (actually, I tripped over a night line) we had left out and just pulled it in to see why it had gone tight). From there onwards everything was much safer but we wished we had the canoe as we were limited to travelling at the speed of the current.

This is brought to you from the river port of Rurrenabaque- out of the open door I have a view of the rainforest-covered ´Susi´ridge.

.. more next time about how we actually got out of the Mal Paso and how were were charged by a herd of peccaries.

PLAN "B"

2008-07-31T13:44:00.000-07:00

After phoning us at 7.30AM to say the canoe had arrived in La Paz (giving me hope that the expedition would happen more or less as planned), American Airlines delivered Julians rucksack late this morning. The canoe skin is still lost. We have checked on their lost baggage tracker website and it says "unlocated". Tomorrow the jeep with Leo and the guides will turn up and we will go up to the airport and hassle one last time for the canoe, then set off for Apolo.

Julian and I have (after much tramping around) found a hunting/ fishing shop that sells inflatable dinghys. If the canoe does not arrive we will go back to town buy two or three of these with the plan of tying them together with a framework of bamboo. We could of course find balsa logs once we get to the river but I remember that at the Madidi in 1997 there were none to be found at the top end. Besides we think a lengthways raft arrangement will be faster than a balsa raft.

I dont think we will be able to do the full route to the Rio Heath. I think it might be too hard. There is a shorter return route via the Alto Madidi ranger station. Leos brother, Wilmar, is a park guard and has explored upriver from there. There is a trail we can use to get to Alto Madidi then a very good path back to Ixiamas, from where there are buses and jeeps to Rurrenabaque. The porters intend to do this loop rather than return back over the mountains to Asariamas- Leo and his brothers seem to have fully checked this out as an easy "get out". We probably will make a base camp just before this "get out" and explore around from there unless we make very good progress and we reckon we have enough time to go onto the Rio Heath and head up the Peruvian border.

Im still really hoping that the canoe will turn up tomorrow, but I think Plan B will work (its shorter and easier tahn plan A)- and getting that map yesterday has ironed out the doubts about the route. Now at least we wont just be heading through blank parts of the large scale map.

In Bolivia-- minus half the boat though!

2008-07-30T13:13:00.000-07:00

In Bolivia but still not got going. Julians two bags (his rucksack and the canoe skin did not turned up with our flight). Its been two days now and for all the high tech tracking system American Airlines say they have got, it does not work. Miami airport was chaotic. The stuff is there.

Otherwis, everything is ready to go. We made contct with Leo Janco yesterday and today he told us that the guide (Sandro); 2 porters (Darwin and Reynaldo) anda jeep turned up this morning. Also, Julian and I managed through a bit of bribery- cash in hand del to get hold of a map for the trouble blank section at the start of the expedition. We can now work ot a route that gets us right to the Enatahua river, which looks big enough to canoe on, though we recko well be dragging around a lot of rapids early on (big contour drops then relatively flat areas). The next portage towards the Rio Heath looks easy enough as its on gently sloping tierra firma forest. It also looks like we should be able to get permits at the town of Apolo on the way, alhough the jeep drive down to the set-off point at Asariamas could be problematical as the villagers along the way have gota grievance about not getting tourist revenue from Madidi National park and have apparently been setting up road-blocks.

Anyway, we will deal with that when we come to it- when we have the canoe and Julians stuff. This wasting time waiting around is getting tedious.

Final Preparations?

2008-07-14T13:42:00.000-07:00

Two weeks to go. Bolivian contact has finally got back in touch and it looks like it's 'all systems go'. It looks like we'll be met by a guide 'Chico', two porters and a jeep which will get us to Asariamas from where the trek into the rainforest will start. Equipment and medical kit nearly sorted. The final thing to do is to sort out money for the trip.

Ian drops out, Julian's back in.

2008-06-24T13:20:00.000-07:00

Madidi Rainforest : River view. Rio Yariapo. Julian on the Rio Mamore: Bolivia 2005

I've not felt like writing for a while until I was sure everything was alright. For a while it looked like no guides, no team, no expedition.

Leo, my contact in Bolivia, didn't email for a month or so. Previously, he had expressed doubts about being able to get permits to do our route. Also, he didn't seem to be able to find anyone who wanted to do such an arduous trip (trekking from the mountains then building up a canoe to float off downriver). Nor could he find porters.

Meanwhile, Julian (who had dropped out in January) was able to come on the trip. It would have meant overloading the canoe (quite a bit) but it partially solved the problem of hiring porters, in that Julian, Ian, I and as-yet-unspecified guide could do all the carrying on the overland sections.

Not long after, Ian decided he'd rather do mountain stuff up in the Cordillera Apolobamba, higher up than the start of the planned trek. His loss was a pity as he had done a lot of preparation for the trip, some fun canoeing- and he had also found out some useful stuff like the fact we could get permits for much of our intended route- which I the emailed Leo about.

Leo finally got back to me. Yes; the route was possible. Yes; he had a guide- a choice of 3 in fact! Yes: he could get porters. He would bring them up from Rurrenabaque to meet us when we arrive at La Paz on July 29th. Since then, he's been ominously out of contact again- I'm telling myself not to worry. Julian has the canoe, and video (on loan from Knowsley). My posh new jungle hammock (yes another one) arrived. Everything is sorted. Almost.

http://www.simonsjungle.co.uk/

Canoe Practise 2

2008-05-19T12:07:00.001-07:00

There's around ten weeks to go and we're starting to get kit together like maps and hammocks with mosquito nets sewn in (I'm not convinced that mine is going to take the strain)- and hoping that Leo in Bolivia gets back to us with more up to date information about guides, permits etc.

Ian came up to Lancaster for the weekend and we had another epic canoe trip, this time down the River Wenning, then the Lune which leads back into Lancaster- 6 hours worth of dragging the canoe down the all-too-shallow Wenning, then a long slog, including a few nice rapids at Halton Weir. We also did a bit of repair work on the canoe. Alv Elvestad, the boss of pakboats (http://www.pakboats.com/) gave me some advice on what to do- using a hot air gun to make the skin slightly molten/ tacky then heat-welding a patch over a rip that's developed on the top edge. My first attempt failed, so I've redone it, but I must admit I'm rather scared that I'm going to melt a hole right through my precious canoe, so the job is proably a bit 'half-cooked'.

It now looks that Julian Singleton might be able to come on the trip after all. This could meanoverloading the canoe like I did on the 2005 Bolivia trip (4 people plus gear, but it was on flat water), but this is weighed against the fact that with three of us plus guide, we might be able to do away with the need for porters on the overland sections. As it's looking like we might be alternating between trekking and taking to the river several times, this might not be such a bad thing.

Carbon footprints and a Canoe Grant

2008-05-05T14:08:00.000-07:00

Expedition Planning update…

Ian’s been working out our carbon footprint for the trip. Reckoning on the two stages of our journey to Bolivia ; London- Miami, then Miami -La Paz , one way clocks up 11984 km which by the reckoning of http://www.carbonneutral.com/ works out as 2636 Kg of carbon; which doesn’t make me feel too great about my ‘green’ credentials.

We got lucky with Ian’s grant application to the British Canoe Union; the BCU will be providing us with some funding for equipment etc. in return for trip reports/ an article about the rivers explored.

As for sorting out the ‘nitty-gritty’ of the expedition; there’s been a lot of e-traffic between me and Leo in Bolivia. He seems to have found a young guide who’s keen to come. Now we’re onto negotiating a ‘do-able’ route.
And this jaguar picture- taken on the Rio Heath by some friends of mine who took their kids to a jungle lodge there about a month ago.

Spider Monkey Video

2008-04-20T08:59:00.000-07:00

I've been tring to covert some of my old analogue video footage of spider monkeys, taken on my original 1997 Madidi expedition, into digital format. Here's the result- very shaky, but it shows more than all the pictures I took which are just silhouettes against a dark leafy background. (The monkey noises in the background- I think are either from me or Julian Singleton, trying to coax the monkeys into showing themselves as we saw various guides do many times).

Lost down a ditch in deepest Cambridgeshire.

2008-03-18T14:44:00.000-07:00

Canoe Practice. The River Granta- from Abington down to Cambridge. A six hour epic; for the first half it was little more than a drainage ditch, in places overhung with brambles, which would drag us to a halt while we tried to unhook ourselves before the current pulled us further into the tangle. I like to think that in the real jungle we will machete our way through- and be more willing to wade deep into the water to free the boat. In Cambridgeshire in early March the water is too cold, and, wimp that I am, I didn’t want the water to overflow my wellies and soak my socks.

Still, In the open sections where the stream wasn’t too shallow or bramble strewn, it was almost jungle heaven. The current swept us through a tunnel of vegetation with kingfishers swooping ever ahead. And, as we approached Cambridge, with night already falling and bats flitting above us it was no great leap of the imagination to mentally transport myself to the wilderness of Northern Bolivia.
Ian: stuck on a weir.

This is where we went...http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=100421031802273567517.000447b0d808fe4368a5d&ll=52.181827,0.163422&spn=0.165883,0.307617&t=h&z=12

Spirit of the Spider Monkey

2008-03-01T12:26:00.000-08:00

I've been talking with Knowsley (near Liverpool) City Learning Centres about working with school pupils in their summer schools, as I did on the 2005 transbeni trip http://www.spiritofthejaguar.org.uk/ ( go to the 'lost city' link) and the 2003 Siberian Tigers trip http://www.dersu.org/. I'm hoping to take a sat phone/ lap top and web-cam with the intention of emailing diary pieces, keeping a video diary and talking to their students from the jungle. The focus will be on spider monkeys, which are unusuallycommon in Madidi national park (this is a good sign of how pristine theforest there still is).

This is one of diary pages from one of my previous trips to Madidi >>>

Getting there!

2008-02-21T06:50:00.000-08:00

The expedition is well and truly up and running now. Air tickets bought and guides hopefully sorted. I’ve known Leo Janco and his brothers since 1991- my first short tour into the Amazon rainforest, which was one of their first trips guiding tourists. In the years since, like everyone else, they have become internet-savvy, which means that organising a jungle trip is now just a few emails away. It looks like Leo’s older brother Irgen will be guiding us. This is the best option for me. He was the lead guide for me and Julian Singleton on our descent of the Madidi River in 1997 and when we crossed the Beni savanna pampa in 2005. He’s strong and resourceful- about the best there is- I reckon.

Leo has just emailed me to say he can get us to the village of Asariamas by jeep. We had reckoned on starting in the Andean town of Apolo then spending two days walking down to Asariamas, which is in a wide dry-forest valley on the Rio Tuichi. Its from Asariamas that the jungle trek, leading onto the canoeing part of the trip will start.

I’ve roughly mapped out the intended route on http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ptab=2&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=102854119341002527828.0004437466836ecae9c77 , but I expect the real journey will be very different. It’s easy to plan jungle treks on maps, but in reality I know that the terrain can be incredibly difficult and I’m sure there’ll be some on the ground re-planning.

Irgen with stingray: Rio Madidi

http://www.simonsjungle.co.uk/

Canoe Practise

2008-01-31T12:44:00.000-08:00

Ian and I (and Ian's daughter) put the canoe together and went for a paddle up the Lancaster canal, then back down into town on the river Lune- not exactly a major expedition but it was a relief to find that the pak-canoe poles and skin still built up so easily. The great thing about this sort of canoe is that its can pack down into one big or two smaller rucksack loads. It can be carried over the a river's headwaters and constructed in about half an hour. This lets you explore rivers that few other boats can get to. You can find out more about these canoes at www.pakboats.com. One of my trip reports is at http://www.pakboats.com/exper18.html .

New expedition member

2008-01-14T14:29:00.000-08:00

A lot has happened since the last post.

AndestoAmazon2008 has a new team member, Ian Grant from Cambridge; This is him on expedition down the Cauvery river in India.

Leo Janco, a Bolivian jungle guide has been in touch too; everythings fine at that end then.

Also, it looks like we may have the possibility of working with Knowsley Education Authority summer schools again. On my previous trips, I've taken a satellite phone and talked to their school pupils from Brazil and Bolivia, and video conferenced from Siberia. (More about this on http://dersu.org.uk and http://www.knowsleydreamteam.org.uk/jaguar/progress.htm)

Juan Alvarez Maldonado's Expedition

2008-01-02T08:55:00.000-08:00

The story behind the expedition comes from a document I obtained from the Royal Geographical Society. Published in Spanish in 1899, its a translation? of the report from Maldonado's original expedition. I'm trying to translate it but its hard going as many of the words have antiquated spellings and the sentences last half a page or more. Maldonado set off across the Andes with a force of armoured cavalry and arquebusiers (an arquebus is like an early musket). From a base camp at the end of a set of river rapids he sent out his second in command, Manuel Descobar, downriver to seek out Tarana, the great chief of the Toromonas to ask him permission to build a settlement with a church and raise a cross. Tarana agreed, showing off his power by despatching hundreds of canoes laden with warriors, and an alliance was made (Descobar had been told to treat the Indians especially nicely and not to start any fight). Meanwhile, Maldonado back at the edge of the mountains, heard word that his rival, Gomez deTordoya, was on his way with a force of Hostile Chuncho Indians....

The Land of the Celestial Jaguar

2007-12-27T13:24:00.000-08:00

1567 Upper Peru: Two rival groups of Spanish conquistadors set off in search of the lost civilisation of the Musu, in what is now the lowland plains of Bolivia. Both groups made it to the foot of the Andes, but then they met each other- and they fought. It was said the battle lasted three days, and when it was over, the Chunchu Indians of the forest set upon the survivors; those that were left taking to the river, evading arrows and poison darts as they desperately tried to make their way back to Peru.

Puma at The Rio Madidi: Simon Chapman 1997

The plan; Go to where the action took place; chase up the story.

In July 2008, I'll be taking my pak canoe on another expediton to the Bolivian Amazon. I'll be travelling with Julian Singleton, another jungle-mad Brit who's canoed and trekked with me on three other expeditions in Bolivia, and for guides, we're hoping to take one of the Janco brothers from Rurrenabaque as on the earlier trips to the Rio Madidi/ Tuichi and their tributaries http://www.pakboats.com/exper18.html and crossing the Pampa between the Beni and Mamore.

Julian Singleton, Simon Chapman: Rio Irayanez (Mamore tributary) 2005

As for the route; that's still very much in the planning stage at present, but hopefuly we'll be starting at the town of Apolo in the Andes, trekking downhill, crossing a couple of rivers, then build up the pak-canoe and padlle it down one of the rivers that roughly follows the Perivian border. The planned 'get out' is Puerto Heath... but that may change.