“Within the dazzling mild, below the sensible blue sky, each element of the magnificent forest was vivid to the attention: the good timber, the community of bush ropes, the caverns of greenery, the place thick-leaved vines coated all issues else.”
-Theodore Roosevelt, By the Brazilian Wilderness (1914)
A cocoi heron sails off into the magnificent forest.
Two weeks in the past, I led a bunch of Individuals into a bit of the Amazon Rainforest inside the nation of Guyana that I’ve had the nice fortune to discover during the last a number of years. I’ve developed friendships with the Amerindian guides, discovered their fishing methods, and listened to their ghost tales. What follows are my notes and images from this expedition 100 miles up the Rewa River from its eponymous village.
Day 0, Feb. 13
Mac and Dave arrived in Georgetown, Guyana, final night time and are headed to Ogle Airport en path to Lethem. Sam and Elizabeth will arrive within the capital tonight. I’ll be attending the premiere of “Shadow People at the Falls,” the F3T-selection movie I produced final yr with April Vokey and Jesse Males of Backwater Productions. About 30 hours after seeing it for the primary time on the massive display, I’ll be again in that very same unusual nook of South America for a 3rd try at comprehension.
Day 1, Feb. 14
I left my Valentine at 1:00 am to drive to Billings to fly to Dallas to Miami to Georgetown. Our driver and capital connection, Eon, bemoans dropping fishing spots to the huge Exxon terminals arising alongside the Demerara River as he drives me from the worldwide airport to the resort after 1:00 am. I’m asleep instantly.
Day 2, Feb. 15
Arising too quickly, I lastly meet Sam and Elizabeth on the buffet for breakfast. Eon excursions us by means of town to the regional airport. Test-in and safety supply the standard mixture of consideration and intransigence, and earlier than lengthy we’re crawling into the twin-prop for an hour-long hop to Lethem.
The Nation of Guyana is roughly the dimensions of Utah. Stars point out Georgetown, Lethem, Rewa Village, and Corona Falls.
The outpost of Chinese language wholesalers and open-air eating places on the Brazilian border surrounded by ranchland and savanna is 2 hours of tough gravel from The Oasis Restaurant and Annai, then you definately’re into two-track. Our shiny younger driver, Yousef Abraham, tells us that the cattle ranching stops round right here, someplace close to the place the jaguar territory begins. He’s labored in conservation and sustainable agriculture with the native communities round right here most of his grownup life—but additionally side-hustles exhausting together with his lifted, kitted Toyota Hilux. You want large knobby tires to get down the otter slide that’s the “street” to Rewa proper now.
The savanna ranchland nation from Lethem to Annai is rarely in need of fascinating sights and modes of transport.
Two extra hours of 4-low crawling by means of the mud and there’s mild forward on the touchdown. Yousef honks a number of occasions, hailing my good friend and Barefoot Adventures head information Terry who rips down from his residence simply up the Rupununi. He deposits us and our gear simply up from the confluence on the Rewa Ecolodge, the place we slurp chilly Itaipava and Banks beers earlier than pumpkin soup and fried arowana. Tiny bats roost in the primary lodge cabana rafters instantly above the octogenarian British girl on her jungle safari. I seek the advice of with artist and Indifly director Johann du Preez on completely off-the-wall fly patterns and esoteric fish species conduct earlier than retiring to mattress. The portray of a fiery crimson pacu in my cabin can solely be an excellent omen.
A painted pacu on the Rewa Ecolodge.
Day 3, Feb. 16
I load a fried egg and sliced sausages into to my puffy “bake,” an area specialty someplace between Native American frybread and Greek pita. We reload the bass boat and Terry blasts off upriver, relishing the rising waters. This journey took 5 hours two weeks in the past; now we’re taking a look at two because the sandbars fade from view. Jabiru storks elevate closely from an inside bend earlier than a rookery of nice egrets, then a congregation of spectacled caimans. Capybara scatter into the greenery, after which Terry eases to the financial institution to drop me off.
Jabiru storks alight on a sandbar.
I comply with the jungle path outlined by perpendicular log rollers for boat dragging. Rising on the small lake, my eye first catches the massive, recent wildcat prints among the many younger shoreline grass. A ship eases from round a nook. I discover a shady gap within the timber from whence to shoot pictures, rig a rod, and take a nap whereas Mac and Dave try to promote craft-fiber peacock bass to sunning arapaima.
Fly fishing for arapaima is a problem on par with tarpon or allow. Casts should be fast and correct; strip-sets should be sturdy and decisive.
Ultimately we rendezvous, hike out, and run upriver, slapping flies and lures into creek mouths and lagoons. Payara and black piranha are as playful as I bear in mind. Dave and Mac have already got these below their belts, in addition to arowana, peacock, a 100-pound-class redtail cat, and three smaller arapaima. I catch a pair of redtail catfish that night time whereas washing within the river and bullshitting with the guides.
Payara or “vampire fish” have holes of their skulls that match their huge fangs. They’re among the many most fun sportfish you’re more likely to encounter.
Day 4, Feb. 17
It’s good to be again in camp. The boys have clearly been exhausting at work increase the tarp construction and milling boards for a model new hammock home/cabin. They even carved an indication welcoming guests to Anteater Pool. After breakfast we head upriver, stopping briefly for a standoff with a gang of large river otters.
Anteater Basecamp is an ever-evolving wooden body and tarp construction some 40 miles upriver from the village.
Large river otters typically run in massive packs. They’re very curious and may be drawn shut by mimicking their calls.
Again to the lagoon and Mac locks into a pleasant butterfly peacock on a popper. His 9-weight promptly folds simply above the cork and it’s a handline rodeo. I hand him my Winston, and we push by means of the neck and into the lake, angering extra inexperienced, yellow, and orange cichlids alongside the best way. Because the solar rises to scorching ranges we tuck into the shade to work on offering dinner. Blue-and-yellow macaws go screeching overhead.
Brilliantly coloured butterfly peacock bass don’t typically tolerate a popper passing over their lie.
A tiger catfish every involves Dave and me, after which Mac is all of a sudden tied to an arapaima. It’s a manageable one—perhaps 40 kilos—”the enjoyable variety,” I say. Bugs wrangles it shortly after a number of runs and tailwalks, an easier process once you’ve skilled on fashions ten occasions that dimension. Too quickly we now have to return to camp to see Mac off downriver for the African half of his journey.
Even a “small” arapaima typically takes two individuals to regulate.
Weeks in the past, Bugs and I had bartered a cellphone for a hand-carved fishing bow. We exit on the rocks throughout the river after dinner to coach me in its methods. I whiffed a number of good alternatives earlier than starting to correctly accommodate the sunshine refraction. It’s good to spend a while within the bullpen earlier than the ballfield.
Tiger catfish or surubi are plentiful and a staple of native delicacies.
Day 5, Feb. 18
Camp packs up early and heads upriver in three boats, stopping at rocks and rapids alongside the best way to fly fish. Barely two hours’ journey time places us on the riverburst the place we’ve usually camped to entry the falls at decrease water. We eat lunch and push on, the river narrowing previous its confluence with the Kwitaro. An enormous tapir wades the shoreline vegetation as we start to enter the tailrace and terraced drops the place the river recovers from the violent Corona Waterfall.
Tapirs or bush cow are distant kin of rhinoceros that may develop to 500 kilos.
Captains pilot deftly up sluices and boulders to make land just under the primary actual vertical pour-overs. All boats offload and anglers transfer off to seek for dinner, the cooks towards arranging a spot to prepare dinner it, and the crew hoisting tarps in opposition to the inevitable monsoon. We ascend river-right by means of the forest to a flat-rock apron opening to the broad wash of falls and adjoining lagoon. Dave lands a payara and I miss a bicuda, however the chunk feels off within the rising water and baking solar.
Corona Falls is the primary in a sequence of cataracts about 100 miles up the Rewa River from its mouth.
We adjourn to shadier locations to get critical about that dinner. With out refrigeration, the cooks didn’t carry any meat—so we’d higher discover some if we would like some. Elizabeth locks into a number of payara earlier than Stephanu involves ferry the couple again to camp at nightfall. I inform him to go away me there; we don’t have dinner but. A 35-pound tiger cat half an hour later solves that downside, and I hail a journey.
Payara, bicuda, and pacu thrive round quick water on this system.
Day 6, Feb. 19
The crew spent a lot of yesterday night portaging two of the river canoes round Corona Falls. I’m ecstatic. We ran as much as the following two units of falls—Powis and Cataback—on my first journey down right here and encountered numerous pacu. I couldn’t catch one on that journey, or the following one, and I’m out for blood this time.
Jungle camp at Corona Falls: arrange in a number of hours, damaged down in a number of extra.
Blue-and-yellow macaws make a screech that’s as ugly as their plumage is gorgeous.
Myleus pacu is one among many species identified by that widespread identify, a big herbivorous cousin of the piranhas. This Guyanese model usually runs a fiery crimson or orange exterior made all of the stranger by its human-like tooth used for aquatic vegetation, berries, fruits, and flowers. The moniker “jungle allow” is evocative of extra than simply its dinner-plate profile. They’re extraordinarily shy, spooky, selective, enigmatic, and highly effective as soon as hooked. I’m carrying a number of grassy, fruity, flowery flies made largely from Michael’s craft retailer discoveries and guided by imprecise intel, hoping to lastly crack the code. The native guides have a specific curiosity in seeing us land a pacu past its distinction as a sportfish: they firmly imagine it’s additionally the tastiest fish within the river.
We hike the path from camp to the touchdown above the falls, load boats, and run a mile or two upriver to Powis Falls, extra of a chute actually—named with the native phrase for black curassow or bush turkey. No pacu noticed. Sam hooks a number of payara and piranha. Terry and Stephanu expertly pilot their craft up the torrent and we reload. It’s one other 3 or 4 miles to Cataback Falls, a jumble of house-sized rocks dropping the river perhaps 50 toes in elevation earlier than washing into a large bay.
Cataback Falls, residence of petroglyphs and pacu.
There’s much less water than final time I visited and no circulate within the channel that was filled with pacu two years in the past. Sneaking up on the outflow, nevertheless, we spot three pumpkins holding tight to an inside bend. The group doesn’t present them ample stealth and so they vanish. Whereas the purchasers fortunately strip streamers for extra predatory fishes, the guides ferry me throughout and we ascend the falls. Terry is carrying my spinning rod with the small gold Mepps spinner, a identified pacu hack, so I do know he means enterprise. He factors me to a deep trough simply above the cataract, and I start to work by means of it with my craft-store concoctions. Then, on a protracted forged with a floating fuzz, a shiny orange dinnerplate seems and rushes downstream after the fly. It grabs simply with its lips and I pause, ready for it to inhale. Head turns and I elevate again into the air, groaning loudly. A number of casts later, the identical factor occurs—however this pacu inhales immediately. I sweep exhausting and the jungle allow burns out my slack line upriver, turns, then shoots down towards the falls, taking me round a boulder. I virtually fly out to the snag, get well pressure, and lock the drag. Trevor comes up behind me and I swing the beating fish to his arms. All of us begin war-whooping: me for checking off the one highest merchandise on my fish want listing; the guides as a result of they’re notably thrilled concerning the coming lunch.
The creator with a long-time purpose achieved: pacu on fly.
Again on the seaside beneath, the blokes spatchcock the pacu, sandwich it a fish grate, construct a fireplace, and sizzle. Laid out on a broad palm leaf subsequent to coconut crackers and the ever-present Mambo Sauce, I’ve to agree that that is the perfect fish flesh within the river—possible in no small half as a result of it took me three years to catch it. After a soak and closing session at Cataback we start to descend, working the logs and rocks unsuccessfully for aimara, the enormous wolf fish, the species now on the high of my listing.
Bugs with a short-term purpose achieved: pacu for lunch.
Everyone seems to be weary and hungry once more by the point we trudge again to camp, and the cooks serve an acceptable surubi feast whereas I carve everybody’s cocktail ice with a hatchet. Tireless as at all times, after dinner the boys ask if we’d wish to go catfishing. The plunge pool across the nook from Corona is thought to host jau or gilded catfish of staggering proportions. As we stroll from the prepare dinner tent to the boats, a big, wide-headed serpent slithers into our path. “Unhealthy snake, get again!” Bugs yells. Because the snake goes for the undergrowth towards the information’s hammock space, Stephanu comes up from behind and saws its head off with the 12-gauge. Labaria, they name it—lancehead or fer-de-lance, my later analysis yields—a violently venomous pit viper. Pleasure piqued, we run the massive boat up and throughout and hike the path, encountering a tapir within the falling rain. Dave lands perhaps a 45-pound redtail, however the chunk feels sluggish.
Redtail catfish emit a sequence of croaks and grunts audible from far away.
We stroll the rocks again to the boat an hour later and Demas spots a pacu. Everybody switches off their lights and the guides inch me ahead brandishing my fishing bow. Correctly located, Bugs tells me to attract then flicks on his highlight. I see the massive orange orb, purpose down then upcurrent and launch. The arrow shaft detaches then jumps and we’re on the handline, reefing the skewered dinnerplate away from the chute beneath. Everybody falls to items when Trevor lastly grabs it, proving that they don’t actually give a shit about dry flies past what makes Individuals blissful—killing a pacu with bow and arrow is the true achievement for these Macushi/Wapishana tribesmen. We return to camp simply forward of a cacophonous, deluging rainstorm. I dream we’re sleeping below tarps instantly below the waterfall upstream.
Avert your fly fisherman’s gaze: that is what it means to go native down right here. And it’s manner more durable than you assume.
Day 7, Feb. 20
It’s time to start our 100-mile descent towards the village, and the boys have one other large day deliberate. They just lately found a dependable spot for Hoplias aimara, often known as hymara, traíra, or large wolf fish. No matter you name it, the demonic visage of this black-and-indigo ambush predator is as more likely to seem in your nightmares as your jungle hit listing. We attain the nondescript riverbank and start mountaineering, arriving some time later at a tiny trickle operating by means of rocks. Everybody slides down a steep financial institution to the water. We work flies and jigs across the fractured rock formations to no avail.
Small-stream wolfishing deep within the jungle.
The group disperses to work adjoining pockets, however the guides insist they’re right here. Stephanu sits proper on high of the rock in query, dipping Dave’s jig right into a crevice that appears barely capable of maintain an eel. Instantly, an enormous aimara blows out of the construction, tightens the road, and straightens the hook. I proffer a stronger metal and the scene performs out, this time with Stephanu tailing a 18-plus-pound wolf fish.
Ugly or ornate? The aimara or large wolf fish calls to thoughts lingcod and different spooky ambush predators.
Lastly I’ve my probability to see and {photograph} one among these actually terrifying fish within the flesh. We’ve caught traírao, a smaller cousin, and I can personally attest to the bitch of their chunk, however there’s nothing like the true factor. Ghoulish facial pores and skin wraps downward onto the few however fearsome tooth. Massive, reflective, darkish purple-and-blue scales taper again to spherical tail match for a a lot greater fish. The Halloween countenance and rock-pile congregation calls to thoughts the saltwater lingcod I grew up catching in Washington.
Dip your fly in the fitting crevice and it could be consumed.
I catch one casting to that individual island, then Sam and Elizabeth each land their specimens dipping flies into the fissures. We poke round some extra earlier than clambering again to the boats for rum and lemonade on ice and fried paca, the 30-pound fawn-spotted rodent Bugs and Terry harvested the night time earlier than. Each hit the spot.
Day 8, Feb. 21
We made it again to basecamp final night time and celebrated our upstream adventures. Morning strikes slower, however earlier than lengthy we’re mountaineering into an arapaima pond, one among my favorites. Sam and Elizabeth pole round with Jules, Dan, and Trevor, sight-casting to the mighty fish as they arrive as much as breathe, whereas Dave, myself, and the remainder of the crew forged from a creek mouth. Everybody bought grabbed or hooked to one among these swimming freight trains; nobody bought to carry one. That’s all I need to say on the matter.
After dinner, Bugs presents to point out me the brand new catfish spot he discovered. He, Dave, and I run up there with out mild and tie up. I lose an enormous fish straight away, then keep tied to a different. We hoist the 70-pound redtail aboard then search a shallower spot for footage. One other coveted achievement. The day’s failings are tempered.
The creator with a big redtail catfish caught simply above camp.
Day 9, Feb. 22
We return to the lake again within the jungle the place we left the boat yesterday and set about the identical sport plan. Not lengthy into our session, Dave ties into one thing monumental. The fish refuses to come back close to and refuses to tailwalk, an anticipated step in any arapaima dance quantity. After a sequence of runs and jarring headshakes, the fish comes shut sufficient to Stephanu that he can contact the chief and pat the tail to encourage one other run. Dave hauls it shut as soon as once more, and our bronc rider saddles up, gripping the bony pectoral fin handles to glide with the fish. Then it decides to leap—straight into Dave, knocking him off his toes. We clear the road from deadfall and the conflict of tug is again on. Ultimately Stephanu will get an excellent grip and we now have it: Arapaima gigas, some 350 kilos or extra. There’s sufficient room alongside its flank for 4 of us to elevate it.
Arapaima are the biggest species of freshwater fishes on Earth that possess conventional scales. Solely sure sturgeons and rays develop bigger. This one was effectively north of 300 kilos.
Jules poles the boat with Sam and Elizabeth to look at the spectacle. It’s about lunchtime, in order that they be part of us within the shade whereas Bugs grills a tiger cat we caught final night time—the final of that candy, fatty flesh I’ll get to eat for a while. Earlier than lengthy, line peels and we now have Elizabeth tied into one. She lands it deftly and with out a lot trouble, definitely saying one thing with a fish practically twice her dimension. Sam fights, lands, and releases one other grownup arapaima not lengthy after, reaching some imaginary purpose of catching and releasing 1,000 kilos of fish in a morning. Too quickly we hear Terry owl-hoot from the touchdown and we should depart. I bid farewell to my new buddies Sam and Elizabeth, who’re taking the extra stress-free route residence, whereas Dave and I start our extra fast retreat.
Because the skiff slides round a large bend on the blessedly increased water, I spot an oddly symmetrical lump on a excessive financial institution within the daylight. “Jaguar,” I gasp, pointing. The massive cat, second I’ve seen in three journeys right here, regards us for a number of minutes earlier than hissing and taking go away to the jungle. We arrive on the ecolodge completely content material.
A jaguar surveys its area from a sunny shoreline perch.
Day 10, Feb. 23
Terry ferries us early from the lodge to the touchdown the place Yousef is ready to bounce us again to Lethem. Some Brazilian beef kills time whereas we wait to verify into our flight together with his uncle, after which we’re crusing into the sundown towards the Caribbean. Eon is out on a fishing journey, so his spouse Corinne taxis us from one airport to the following. Safety employees make me query my want to return to this nation, however the bartender shortly restores it. Nigh on midnight we’re within the air to New York, then I’m onward to Dallas whereas Dave splits for Amsterdam en path to Africa. By 3:00 pm and with the assistance of a pleasant seatmate, I’m at residence in Bozeman. Reduce, contaminated, bruised, bitten, and nonetheless watery from the malaria meds, I sit down, breathe deeply, and add one other merchandise to my packlist for next year’s journey up the Rewa River.
Sam Lungren is a author, producer, photographer, and MidCurrent’s Director of Manufacturing. Ship a observe to [email protected] in the event you’d wish to be taught extra concerning the 2026 Guyana expedition.
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