The Pantanal

We arrived at the Pantanal and were soon off on a boat to go Piranah fishing. As you can imagine we were all quite keen to stay on the boat with Piranahs, Caimen (Crocidiles), and Anacodas in the water. Following 2 days on the Truck it had become quite clear that the New Zealand men were all very good fishermen and regularly reel in huge fish back home- in fact it had become crucial that to demonstrate your manliness you must reel in several huge Piranahs!

As I was handed my piece of bamboo with a hook on the end I was poised for action and convinced that I had what it took. Over the following hour many fish came, ate the bait off my hook and went again, I even managed to get one out of the water before it laughed at me, gestured, and jumped off again- that´s right I caught nothing! Even worse they, including most of the ladies, caught several! I was crushed! (however have discovered none of them play cricket so off to buy and bat and ball!)

Next we were off to feed the Caimen with the Piranahs that we caught- see photos, even more amazing was feeding the hawks who swooped down and collected fish from the river. We aslo saw monkeys, Capivara and hundreds of different birds- a great trip.

The Pantanal is full of animals and birds and we went on several safaris both during the day and night which were brialliant, we also learnt about the farm and conservation, a couple of facts...

1. We could not believe that 10 years ago hunting of Jaguars, Caimen etc was rife- this is now illegal.
2. The Capivara is the worlds biggest rodent (giant guinea pig- see photos)
2. 1 Hectair (100 meters) produces 7500 tons of rice
4. The Pantanal is the main drugs route through Brazil