We are walking in the rainforest, together with Mark and Glubert. Glubert is the Research Coordinator of a mammal project running by Fauna Forever; he is a quiet Peruvian scientist, consistently focused on something. Mark is a wildlife photographer, the pretty remarkable person.
We are going to a clay lake known as El Capo, where mammals come for mud-bathing. It is far away from Venado station, so we have to walk quickly.
Yesterday we had a delivery from Puerto Maldonado: we bought several bottles of beer and 5-litre canister with rum. Since the inhabitants of the station are mostly interns and workers, eight people in total – and the students are not the richest people in the world – the rum was the cheapest that might be found.
When I left the station yesterday evening, the beer was finished, and the rest of rum was not so big – and I was not the last person who went to sleep. That’s why we started our work at 7 a.m. instead of 5 a.m., as it was planned before, and the sun was already beginning to burn.
During the successive subdual of the log, my camera is clutching at the branch and the cover is falling – together with CPL filter. The attempts to find it are useless – the mire swallowed it in a moment. I recall that the previous cover ended its life under similar circumstances - in the crocodile river on my way from Baco National Park, Borneo.
Abruptly both my companions turned off the trail at once – barely I’m keeping up with them. We are crossing the river by a log bridge, crawling through the bushes for about half a kilometer.
- It seems we went astray! - Mark is informing us gaily. - I'm not pretty sure where we are now... But El Calpo has to be somewhere nearby – definitely!
Glubert is getting the GPS, and the guys start to deliberate what to do. After a minute of talking, we are turning back and going back on the same way through the bogs, gullies and little log bridges. Suddenly Mark makes a very strange dash and in the next moment we can see him holding a big snake coiling in his hands!
Lost in admiration, Mark declared that it is Yellow Couper and that we have to take him to the station to weight and measure and, after, to get him back to the same place. Just in case: we are about 3 km from the station now…
Obediently, Glubert recording GPS coordinates of this place and exempting his backpack from everything he had – cameras, GPS and other staff – to prepare a place for the Couper.
We decided (or rather, Mark decided) to try one more direction and, in case we fail, we will go back to the station. To our luck, after half an hour walking at a pace described above we are finding ourselves near a huge clay pool. Happy Mark is jumping into this pool informing that there is that right El Calpo, in the heart of which he put his camera trap about a week ago.
- ‘Come here!’ - calling he. – ‘We will find it soon!’
‘Glubert is going down. I'm trying to put my leg but feel that it is coming down so deeply that if I make a step I won’t be able to get it back. Or maybe I would, but without the boot; sorry, but I don’t like the idea to walk 5 km barefoot in the jungle...’
- ‘I'd better wait for you here, guys’ – I said and eager to hear the Hound of the Baskervilles’ howl. I’m aware that it must be somewhere nearby.
Those two are moving around this, if I may say, lake, taking out their legs with visible effort. Finally, they are coming back triumphal, holding the camera that untiring Mark placed there a week ago.
Suddenly, something brought them up short. They started to sniff. Soon we could hear grunting and crackle somewhere not far away. “Here is the Hound” - floating in my mind, but the reality comes even more exciting. The boys are telling that it is a flock of peccary coming in our direction. We held our breath… But it seems that the pigs were not after the mud-spa today and busy with their swinish affairs. Glubert is starting to clap his cheek making his mouth in O-shape; as I know, this strange sound is sexually attractive for the peccary.
My careful sub-personality is waking up and reminding that, in case of wild boars attack, it is advised to hide behind the tree - so one has a chance not to be noticed by them. This time I'm deciding to listen to her advice, and I’m trying to look for a proper tree.
But peccaries are either far away or too busy with other things – they don’t react to Glubert’s sexual appeals. My companions are not happy with this, so they decided to use some tricks. They start to hold their hands in some special way in front of their mouths, and make an eerie screech. The sound is so shrilly, and this sight is so funny that I am damning my GoPro for not switching on not for anything.
We did not wait for long. It was like a herd of elephants are forcing their way through the jungle with terrible, threatening grunting.
- ‘Fuck!’ – Mark is whispering with excitement. – ‘Quickly, guys, hide behind the trees!’
Surely, I was behind the tree already a couple of minutes ago. My GoPro, in fright, is switching on right away to continuous shooting mode.
I can’t say if we were lucky or not, but peccary mixed the directions. I think that we were – Glubert, based on the sounds he heard, told that it must be about 50-60 pigs in this flock.
- ‘But what kind of sound did you produce for such impressive effect?’ – I asked.
- ‘Oh, this sound is usually produced by a baby peccary if a leopard catches him’ – explained Mark. – ‘In this case, all the flock is rushing to rescue him’.
On the way back Glubert picked up other cameras, so today we are going to see the movie about wildlife in the rainforest. Later on Mark was thirsty and started to drink water from the closest stream.
- He is crazy – said Glubert with the mixture of horror and admiration. – He is like peccary himself.
My careful sub-personality fainted. Yellow Couper is welcomed in the station as a special guest – everyone is coming to see him. But I am going to swim in the lake – after such a trip the slightly-dripping shower won’t be enough.
Today I was going to Wasai Lodge, and the majority of the guys were returning to Puerto Maldonado. The farewell was short but warm. I glanced at the lake with light sorrow.
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