Stillness

Serenity.  That's all I can think of when I see this photo, everything seems still.  We reached this lake in the Peruvian Amazon by canoe.  The jungle had been dense either side of the river, giving a sense of being boxed in by walls made of plants.  Casting shadows on the dark water, the morning sun stretched to touch the far side of the watercourse.  As we steered into the lake the world seemed to open up, leaving me with the conflicted feelings of being liberated from the confines of the jungle while also being very aware of how exposed I was.

We had made the trip to the lake in the hope of seeing some wildlife.  Sadly, no one was home.  While there was a far-off sloth, he didn't seem very enthusiastic about seeing us.  We paddled further around the edge of the lake, following its banks.  A loud holler erupted from our guide, shattering the silence and stillness of the lake.  He was calling out to the monkeys that were often around the lake.  They answered him, a distant call ringing back through the trees.  He offered to lure them down to the bank for us, coaxing them with offers of bread or some other treats.  We barely considered this before declining it: we were in the Amazon, not a petting zoo.  Bribing wild animals would sap all of the magic out of a place so unknown and so mystical.  Better to leave the place with some of its power.

River Shanty

The Belén is a district of the Amazonian city Iquítos, Peru; the city being accessible only by boat or plane.  There, everything is built to float.  I visited in the southern hemisphere summer, when the rivers were low.  When the waters run high, the banks extend a few hundred metres up to a market.  The market was undoubtably the worst smelling place I have ever been, which gave me very little confidence to try the food.  But it was strangely fascinating, chickens were cut open in strange ways and left so that you could see eggs forming inside of them.  All kinds of meat were available: fish (also cut strangely), caiman, turtles and some that I either didn't know or couldn't recognise.  My favourite was the natural therapies/magic section .

When the river levels are up, everything is afloat, even the market, all of the Belén is on the river, and the only way to get around for the shanty town's thousands of occupants is in boats.

Huts At Dusk

On a four-day trip into the Peruvian Amazon, I took this picture.  We (the guide, a Colombian guy and myself) were heading back to camp for dinner at dusk in the long, rustic wooden boat.  It was just starting to rain as we were coming up to these huts.  I found the lighting and the reflection striking, but the darkness does hide perhaps the most quirky aspect of the huts visible in the daylight: they had satellite dishes on their roofs.  Technology: it seems you can't escape it.