Piranha Fishing in the Pantanal
The Pantanal, Brazil
By Cullen Ryan Keller
For our next adventure, my girlfriend Laura and I left behind the easy-going life of wonderful beaches for the rougher life of the Pantanal. The Pantanal is a region in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul in Western Brazil. It is a giant swampland over half the size of France, containing over 600 species of animals, birds and reptiles.
We decided on a 4-day excursion that was different from the get-go. We started off easily enough, leaving from Campo Grande, a decent-sized and forgettable city on the outskirts of the Pantanal. We left with 15 others on a minibus and drove about four hours out to a deserted town. There, we were to switch into a jeep safari vehicle with all our luggage. When we disembarked for our air-conditioned minibus, we were instantly mugged by the tremendous heat. It was close to a stifling 100 degrees, with a humidity index of ridiculous.
We got into our safari vehicles and winded down dirt roads for the next 2 hours. On our way into the swamp, we saw a toucan, which was a welcome reminder that Guinness is never too far away. We saw blue and green macaws. It was a weird feeling to see these different types of birds outside of a zoo setting. We saw alligators, deer and other land animals.
From our next stop, we were told to get out and load our stuff into yet another similar vehicle, which didn’t seem to make much sense to me. Our guides just kind of laughed when we asked them why the vehicle we were just in couldn’t take us to our camp sites.
Now is the Pantanal’s rainy season. This isn’t the best for viewing animals but is great for fish, reptiles and birds, as the water rises and becomes prime feeding ground, a swamp rather, for the aforementioned species, as we were about to find out.
Before we got started, however, our way was blocked by a giant anaconda. That is what I thought, at least. Turns out, he was just a little guy, about 8 or 10 feet, when they actually can get up to 20 feet in the region. This was amazing. Here was a snake, seen in very few countries all over the world, and only witnessed on the Discovery channel for the most part. What amazed me more was how our guides grabbed the thing by the tail, then grabbed ahold of its neck.
Everyone was able to get close and rub its skin, which was shedding now and produced the foulest smell I have ever experienced in my entire life. It gave off a yellowish-green slime, which could only be analogized to the mutant goo that transforms the Ninja Turtles in the original movie. The pungent smell would be with those of us who touched it for the rest of the trip. All of us gringos posed for pictures with the newest member of our group. Anacondas don’t bite, as most people know. Instead, they strangle their victims and swallow them whole. The entire length of the snake is one large and extremely strong muscle.
Seeing the anaconda was fantastic because apparently this is not a common occurrence, although this might have been a ploy on the part of our guides, already garnering for a good tip at the end of our expedition.
We drove away as it started to get dark. The scenery was amazing. We were in the middle of nowhere and had been there for hours. I thought if I got lost in a place like this, I could literally walk or scream for miles and miles without seeing or hearing anyone. The landscape is very different from the extremely dense Amazon. There are still jungles in the Pantanal, but then there are also huge open fields and vast swamplands.
As we clicked along at a brisk pace now, our lights on, flying through narrow trails, constantly ducking from invading branches and trees, I was wondering how in God’s name we had any idea where we were going since any sense of a road, dirt or anything, had disappeared miles ago. Well, my questions were somewhat answered when we got stuck in a huge swamp after our driver tried going through about three feet of water.
I thought this was utter stupidity on his part. After flooring the gas pedal for a couple minutes, we were told to jump in the water and help push. So, all the guys jumped into the water, which was a little weird, after we had just seen loads of alligators on the way in. The water was like a hot tub, about 85 degrees. This was great, after shocking everyone with the news that we were not required by the US to get yellow fever vaccinations, and hearing that the stagnant waters of the Pantanal were prime territory for yellow fever. I quickly learned that the driver was not as stupid as I thought, as the lights from the car made me realize that for miles the land was just as flooded as where we were standing. Of course, this process of getting out and pushing was repeated several times and I quickly realized that we weren’t in Kansas anymore. All this was emphasized by the fact that our driver and guide were up front, pounding Cachasa, the strong tequila-like firewater that goes into Brazil’s caipirinhas. They were trading swigs of the stuff and topping it off with beer. It is said that this kind of behavior is a common act of machismo and practiced quite often in rural parts of S. America.
All this became part of the experience, and I have to laugh now in hindsight at what a fragile traveler I was, seeing as though we experienced much of the same on the way back, and we were the first one in the water, ready to push.
At the camp, we slept in hammocks in an enclosed area of futile mosquito nets and bamboo ceilings. Of course, there was a bar in the middle of the camp, and cold beer never tasted so good. You can have a bar tab over your stay, which was quite scary. We ended up paying a hefty one at the end, just trying to stay cool in the heat. That was my excuse anyway.
After not really getting much sleep in the extreme heat and mosquitoes buzzing, we woke up at six and went on a nature hike. You have to go on hike early on because it gets so hot by midday that all the animals are hidden away, and so were we. We saw a snake in the anaconda family and our guide caught it for us to hold around our necks. We saw monkeys, the ugliest armadillos I have ever seen, wild boars, some red macaws and deer. I was really hoping to see a jaguar or a puma, but our guide has lived in the Pantanal his entire life and only seen 15 or so.
The next day, we were told that we were headed out to fish for piranhas. Hands down, this was the most exciting and best part of the expedition. We were driven out to a lake an hour away on a trailer pulled by a tractor. Our guide gave us each a bamboo stick with a string and a hook on the end and told us, “Now, go fish.” We laughed, thinking he was joking, but joking he was not. All my life, I have thought of the piranha as a flesh-eating manfish that would rip apart the first human that dare enter its water. I would like all of you, of course, to believe that, but it was not the case.
Our guide did not give us much helpful information, only using his broken English to tell us, “Is OK, go fish,” so we thought we would learn through trial and error, since he seemed to think it was OK. We waded through the water, about 95 degrees and scalding hot. It was like stepping into a jacuzzi with a really bad sunburn; only I didn’t have a sunburn. We got used to it and started through the weeds and watched as the water started past our waists and up to our chests. This was awesome!
No joke, this was the scariest and coolest moment in my entire life. I told my girlfriend not to come in because the water would have been up to her face. It would have been almost impossible for her to even cast a line. Despite my warnings, she still managed to make it in to throw out a few casts.
I got in and tentatively attached the pungent bait before casting out my line of 6 feet. I would never have believed it but wouldn’t you know? I felt a tug on my makeshift pole, and presto, I had caught dinner. After pulling it in, I glanced inside its mouth. The teeth were razor sharp, as expected, and I took my first and only piranha in. A Bavarian kid we were with caught everyone else’s dinner, bringing in six on his own. I stayed out there the rest of the afternoon in the blazing hot sun, getting lots of bait snagged, but not catching anything else. It didn’t really matter. It was already one of the greatest experiences of my trip.
We deep-fried the piranhas at night and had them for dinner. They are much smaller in size than I expected, and the meat on them was scarce, but damn good. You have to cut off their heads and de-bone them while eating, but I quickly got the hang of it. Some other groups grilled theirs and even ate some raw, with lemon, which I think would have been fun to try.
The rest of our time there wast spent on other nature hikes and a fabulous horseback ride. We rode out into the flatlands and watched the sunset. I had only been riding a couple of times, and both times was just a leisurely trail ride. This time, we were away from lawsuits and liability statements, probably a good and bad thing, and so we were free to gallop. It was a cool experience. The sunset was beautiful, and I witnessed the Southern Cross for the first time.
We had a great group of diverse peoples. We stayed up each night, downing caipiranhas and trading stories of travels. Eventually, I got quite accustomed to the lifestyle, and it was hard to leave. Alas, having returned and showered I definitely won’t be complaining much about hostel life for the time being.
