November 12, Call it a stupid guy thing, if you will. But when the two young guides for our "day tour" of the Amazon Jungle challenged me to join them in the swirling, piranha-infested waters of the Amazon River, I dove right in. Part of it was silly male pride, no doubt.
Here were two young Brazilian men, Joao and Aldo, splashing and slithering in the water like the pink freshwater dolphins we were to glimpse later in the day, taunting me to "be courageous. But another impulse had something to do with the discrepancy between expectations and reality that we often encounter in places we've heard and dreamed about.
The truth is, the day trip the Monitor photographer and I took out of Manaus had, to that point, offered little of the exoticism and thrilling chill I had imagined. So jumping into those waters - where in reality the biggest danger I faced was probably the mix of urban pollution and diesel motor fluids engulfing me - afforded some of the excitement I expected from the Amazon.
What I learned that Sunday as we plied the waters and a few earthen jungle trails from morning until after dark is simple. While there's plenty to see in a one-day "jungle tour" out of Manaus, a city of more than 1 million people, much of it is a glimpse of how human presence has altered this once impenetrable environment.
But that's something most tourists are not prepared for. He had taken the same kind of one-day tour we had. To avoid disappointment, it's probably best to leave at home the expectations of loads of squawking birds and giant snakes slinking through vine-tangled trees we did cross a diminutive but apparently deadly Surucucu snake and realize that the virgin jungle lies at least a day's boat travel outside Manaus.
