Andrew Griswold, Director of EcoTravel
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Copyright 2006 All Rights Reserved to Connecticut Audubon Society

Brazil’s Pantanal - Out in the Open Superlatives! 

                by Charles Avenengo, Past Traveler with CAS

When you want to get to the big leagues in nature, it's either Africa or Brazil.  Well all right,  Africa is where the animals have captured our imaginations since our childhoods, but in the new world, for a pure wildlife spectacle, nothing tops the Pantanal. I went to this Mecca with Connecticut Audubon EcoTravel in October 2004. 

 I've been a naturalist for over thirty-years. My travels in pursuit of wildlife have taken me to many remote and exotic places throughout this globe, and I can say, never have I been as influenced by nature as I was during this trip. The Pantanal is a place of superlatives. To begin with, it is the world's largest freshwater swamp- twice the size of France.  They built a ribbon of a road down its middle, but they couldn't finish it- the forces of nature proved to be too overwhelming, so then they created the wildlife lodges. And it is from the lodges and the slightly raised road and its bridges that the nature observations are done.  Unlike the Amazon, where everything lurks behind a dark veil of thick rainforest, in the Pantanal everything is out in the open.  The wildlife spectacle stretches out as far as the eye can see and at any moment hundreds of creatures may be seen. By the time our altogether brief stay was completed, we had seen over 200-species of birds, including the world's largest parrot- the Hyacinth Macaw, a dozen raptor species, and Greater Rheas- giant flightless birds similar to ostriches.  Of the over dozen mammal species observed, we had seen the world's largest otters, three type's of new world primates including marmosets, and heard a jaguar at a lodge that boasted six-species of wild cats, tapirs, giant armadillos, and giant anteaters. In the reptile department, after seeing thousands of caimans, many different lizards, a gopher tortoise, and a false water cobra, on our last day- we saw an a "smallish" 11-foot anaconda, the world's largest snake. So with all this excitement, what about the bad stuff, i.e. the bugs? Well, its true one morning, after leaving my sneakers outside my lodge's room to air out, I shook out a small Petri dish sized tarantula from one shoe. Surprisingly, throughout the trip, we found there to be very few, if any, pesky mosquitoes . What about food and lodging in such a remote setting you may ask? The answer in one word...perfect! Where else can you eat the piranha you just caught? And when it comes to beef, the Brazilians have taken their "carnecerias" to a higher level. By the end of the day, when we were so tired that when even a hammock would have sufficed, fortunately all the lodges were so comfortable that we all fell asleep instantly, nestled in our fine linens.  Brazil furthermore is a very service-orientated nation and we found that our guides, bus drivers, and lodge staffs all bent over backwards to help us with even our smallest whims.   

Now that I've experienced the Pantanal, my thirst to return to this wonderland has grown considerably. Connecticut Audubon EcoTravel is mounting up another expedition to go this fall. If you love nature and want to experience the big leagues, this is your trip. Go! I know I will!