Amazon. The Other one

I am just reading the book by David Grann entitled "The Lost City of Z".

He tells the story of the English explorer Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett and his obsessive quest to find evidence of an ancient lost civilisation in the deepest regions of the Amazon jungle up until 1925 when he simply vanished into that part of South America.

Harrison first came to my attention only a few months ago when he was cited as a potential influence on Steven Spielberg for the fictional character of Indiana Jones.

This was down to his legendary fitness, stamina and resistance to the sickness and injury that afflicted and caused the demise of many of his exploration colleagues. In stetson hat and neckerchief he often stood up to arrow and physical attacks by native tribesmen to make a show of courage and friendship. At great personal risk he befriended many of the natives who viewed travellers with suspicion based on exploitation of their number by those seeking the black gold of tree rubber or kidnap for slavery or ransom.  

Amongst the Native Amazonia tribes were the Pacaguara, Parintinin and Kanichana.

The latter was feared in the knowledge that they were cannibalistic. Those enemies or trespassers caught would feel fortunate if bonded into slavery as the other option was to be roasted or boiled and eaten. Human meat and its consumption was more symbolic than a staple of a diet. Everything would be used up and as a special treat the womenfolk would  enjoy sucking out the marrow from the bleached cooked bones.

The endurance of Harrison is to be much admired and contemporaries attributed this to a super human metabolism linked to a complete lack of fear in difficult circumstances.

In his own words he would lecture those brave or foolhardy enough to sign up to one of his expeditions to just Don't fall sick or get injured. This would slow down the rest of the party ,drain resources and leave everyone exposed to attack or privation.

I always thought that the Amazon basin would be a veritable larder of foodstuffs from plentiful fish in the rivers to edible plants and animals under the broad jungle canopy. In reality nothing could be farther than the truth and Harrison found this out the hard way by being starved, dry and delirious on many occasions when an exploration was delayed or got lost long after running out of supplies.

The natives seemed healthy and immune from most of the things that killed the europeans and other exploration parties and also had massive stockpiles of food in the knowledge that little could be harvested in an emergency situation.

In being accepted by many of the tribes Harrison was able to see first hand the clever use by the native tribes of natural medicinal herbs as well as using traditional methods and skills to hunt down otherwise invisible and elusive wild pigs, monkeys and tasty fowl.

Many other dangers and problems were faced by those penetrating the rain forests. Progress up rivers and tributaries on rafts or in canoes was a bit easier but many regions remained unmapped and a bend in a river could disguise perilous white water rapids or the fast approaching precipice of a waterfall.

On foot it was necessary to hack away the thick vegetation with a hand machete whilst hip deep or worse in sticky and pungent mud. In a full, sweaty day only a few hundred yards may have been possible by way of progress.

The climate also played a huge part in any exploration with humid and stagnant air, torrential rainstorms, flash floods and intermittent baking heat.

Perhaps the greatest threat however was from the fauna and flora.

The following is a list I have compiled from a few chapters of Grann's Book.

Finger and limb eating Piranhas, electric eels emitting 650 volts causing paralysis and drowning , monstrous anaconda, wild pigs, poison frog with toxins on their skin capable of killing 100 people, coral snake,  scuba ants, ticks acting like leeches, flesh eating red hairy chiggers , cyanide squirting centipedes, parasitic worms causing blindness, berne flies who could probe through layers of clothes to lay eggs under the skin, piums,  biting flies which if untreated caused blood seeping lesions, kissing bugs which bite the lips leaving a protozoan in the bloodstream that 20 years later can cause death by heart or brain swelling.

There were of course  mosquitoes promoting bone crusher fever to elephantiasis, polvorina  flies like powder on the skin causing madness through the need to scratch incessantly, gnat bites , yellow fever, a risk of stingrays, sand flies carrying parasites which destroy flesh around mouth, nose and limbs giving a  leprous appearance, poisonous plants, maggots laying eggs  inside the skin and able to resist attempts to remove using nicotine, corrosive material or squeezing flesh.

A standard expedition medical kit would seem to most of us to be heavyweight with gauze bandages,iodine for bites, permanganate of potash for cleaning vegetables and arrow wounds, a pencil knife to cut out flesh from snakebites or gangrene, and opium.

In most instances of use it was feeble and ineffective.

I have every admiration for Fawcett and his Amazonian exploits. His disappearance in the jungle along with his son in 1925 has only served to compound the Fawcett legend. Many have embarked on expeditions subsequently to try to find out what happened to the intrepid explorer and few have returned alive not physically or mentally scarred by the experience.