Camp 41 - The Hammock Camp

Camp 41, not to be confused with Stalag 17 which had better accommodations, is located 41 km from Manaus and a million miles away from the comforts of my tempurpedic mattress in Austin, Texas.  After reading the itinerary for this trip I was a tiny bit concerned that sleeping in the middle of the jungle in a hammock strung over a concrete pad and under a tin roof might make for some sleepless nights.  I should not have been concerned at all.  Turns out if you slog aimlessly through the jungle sweating all day in 100 degree heat and 98% humidity craning your neck to the treetops or standing for an hour waiting for a tiny glimpse of a nondescript brown bird you will fall into a very pleasant slumber as twilight approaches.

The largest detriment to sleep was not the hammocks, which turned out to be pretty comfortable, but the melodious snoring of more than one of my sleeping companions.  Snorers in the night can make me a bit murdery so I came well supplied with good earplugs and ambien.  Mornings here looked a bit like a night after a drunken cirque de soleil performance.

Wheeled luggage has a different meaning here

This was Fred at the beginning of our Camp stay.  He and I both were completely sweat soaked for the next three days.  Since I am also especially chiggerlicious I was covered with over 100 chigger bites.  Surprisingly, though they were not very itchy and disappeared after a week unlike the ones I got in Trinidad which were evil beyond description.

A general word here about the insects in this part of Brazil, for the entire trip I saw two, yes two, mosquitos.  Notwithstanding the chigger bites and a few miscellaneous red bumps it was very tolerable.  In fact, if you walk into my backyard at home on any given day it is 100 times worse for mosquitos.

Don't misunderstand, there are plenty of bugs to delight you in their complete weirdness and evolutionary badassness.

Nice pincers on this wood borer

Assassin bug assassinating a smaller bug

Cicada condo

Nice little lizard checking out my pajamas

Why include this photo of weedy grass?  Well, because it's razor grass and if your hand grazes it like one of the guys on our trip, it will slice that hand like a razor and you will bleed like a paper cut.  Don't touch anything here, it is likely to sting, poison, burn, rip, poke or stab you.

If the snakes, insects, jaguars, grass, or chiggers don't get you, the humidity most certainly will.  On our first hike, one of our group from frosty Michigan was walking in front of me and looked decidedly pale and was sweating buckets.  Minutes later he collapsed from heat exhaustion.  He recovered just fine but it did make me wonder what the hell I was doing hiking around out here for "fun".

At the end of each day some of us would gather like chigger bitten nymphs at this lovely pool of cool water and try to get our core temperatures back to normal.  

Out of this minimally stocked kitchen in the middle of nowhere this woman cooked us up some amazing meals every evening, including a chocolate birthday cake for our guide Marcelo.

The routine each day here went pretty much like this:

Wake pre-dawn

Head to the bathroom (check for frogs in the toilet)

Slam a quick coffee/breakfast

Begin birding

Sweat

Bird some more

Sweat a lot more

Lunch/Nap

More birding

More sweating

Cold shower

Dinner

Gloat about all the amazing things you saw that most people will never see

Repeat

These tree frogs were everywhere including the hammocks and you know what's really interesting is that they sing at night, all night.  

There were lots of birds here but the bird we all wanted to see was the capuchinbird.  By the third day the thought of hiking all the way to where there was a small chance they would be seen just wasn't happening for me.  Fred on the other hand was all in.  I wish I had the photograph of what he looked like after that hike.  But, guess what?  Yep, he saw it and heard it calling.  Here is what it looks and sounds like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hamag7njUt0

I know, right?

That's one happy but exhausted birder in the back of that pickup.

We spent three days and nights at Camp 41, and while I have no burning desire to go back, it was pretty cozy considering it's primarily there to cater to researchers who require the bare minimum in terms of sleeping and eating and toilet facilities.  We were relatively spoiled with porters, cooks, mosquito nets and soft hammocks.  We met a PhD student later on who had spent 71 days there so far and wouldn't be returning to the states till summer 2016.  He had no complaints.  Ah, youth.

Off to the boat portion of our itinerary and most importantly.......aiiirrr coonndddiittionning!