In which The Author, having been confined to The House since His Glorious Arrival, and being Exceedingly Antsy to sojourn forth into Parts Unknown, and having been Lured into a False Sense Of Security with his Portuguese-language Skills, beguiles Himself into sojourning forth into Said Parts Unknown, namely Chapada National Park, with Two Non-English Speakers who, despite their most Valiant Efforts, can’t understand why the Colossal, Abnormal Swelling on The Author’s neck could be Capable of causing serious Medical Problems, but He still has fun anyway, despite nearly Becoming Unintentionally Intimate with a Renault, thanks to Brazil’s generally-accepted Method of Driving, which was most likely the inspiration for that of The Bad Guy In The Chariot Race Scene In Ben-Hur.

Today was the perfect opportunity for me to get out and about and actually experience a little bit of the natural world for which Brazil is so famous. Not only was the port side of my neck suddenly and mystifyingly swollen –nay, bloated—to worrisome proportions, but ‘twas raining buckets for as far as the eye could see, which was about half of a city block.

And so, after binding and gagging the little angel on my shoulder, we set off with great aplomb for Parque Nacional Chapada. The aplomb consisted of cutting arm and head holes into several large plastic bags and fashioning them into something approximating ponchos. Being confident in my tried-and-true Akubra, I smugly declined the “capa” that was offered me and studiously avoided the somewhat-concerned gazes that were subsequently directed at me. After all, it’s just rain, right? Right?

Our first stop was Cachoeira Martinha (kah-sho-ay-rrah mah-tee-nyah [Martina Waterfall]). She was the first of about 10 different cachoeiras at which we stopped throughout the course of the day, several of which can be seen on the video at the end of this entry.

But I wasn’t necessarily there for the waterfalls. I was there for the birds. And lo and behold, I accomplished one of my life goals today.

I got to see a toucan.

And then I nearly died. Allow me to rephrase that… over the course of the 57 kilometers back to Cuiabá, I teetered continuously on the precipice of Sudden, Instant, And Even Immediate Death. The best description that I can give of standards of driving in Brazil is as follows: a rigorously-enforced, mandatory boycott of sanity.

I’ll try to get some video of it.

Anyway, for those of you who are following along with the geography of the whole thing (Dad!), I’m right in the very center of the continent right now. On Thursday we’re going south to Campo Grande by plane and then headed toward the Bolivian border by bus. If you like to use Google Earth, the city on the Bolivian side of the border is Puerto Suarez; the Brazilian side is called “Corumbá.”
I don’t know if we’ll have internet there, so this update and tomorrow’s could be my last until we reach Santa Cruz.

Unless I venture out onto the streets again, in which case it’ll probably be my last ever.