Afterthoughts and Aftermess in the Amazon by Stuart R. West

Click for the third Zach and Zora comic mystery

Well, all good things must come to an end, I suppose. Even if there were times I didn't think I'd survive the Amazon jungle. Not due to life-threatening situations, mind you, but rather the strenuous activities of hiking through a sauna-like environment in long pants, shirts, and those torturous boots.

Goodbye Peru...

But I made it. Even though the plane trips back were trying--eight days in the jungle and no ailments, but everyone on the plane was hacking and wheezing, sure to be my downfall; also, we had an encounter with an ugly American teenage girl who tried to cut in line (but my wife put a stop to that!)--we began the long, dull process of settling back into routine.

Fun in a germ-ridden flying tin can!

Upon return, Kansas seemed rather...lifeless. Sure, it felt safer and was definitely cleaner, but it lacked the energy, the vibrancy of Iquitos and the unfettered nature of the jungle. Everything about the Midwest appeared so ho-hum.

BO-RING!

Except, of course, for my week-long bout with diarrhea. Yay, TMI! (At least I didn't suffer while in the jungle; I can't even begin to imagine...wait, yes I can).

Wake me when we leave Kansas...

I learned a lot on my adventures. While I'm not quite ready to bunker down in a tent (too many serial killers lurking in the woods), or go backpacking in the Himalayas (too many yetis), or cannonball into a hot tub with Buddha (not enough room for both of us), I've decided to embrace nature as my friend. Finally. Call me ridiculous, but the other day there was a grotesque, hard-carapaced bug skittering down the hallway. I managed to scoop him up and put him outside. In the past, he would've been instant floor-kill.

The incredible power of the Amazon--nature at its wildest, most untainted state--proved awe-inspiring, not only in its beauty and yin and yang of terror, but also in the potential it has as a natural state of energy. If people would learn to coexist peacefully with the river, harness it without doing damage, it has the potential to power a good chunk of the world. It is to be respected.

So are people. After my trip, I've vowed to try and be nicer. A tough chore, but I'm committed. Our visit to Iquitos made me realize just how "rich" we are, comparatively speaking. We saw squalor, miserable living conditions, and even worse health care issues. But the locals' living conditions didn't get them down. On the contrary, they carried on with life, making our trials and tribulations appear petty. We could all learn something from the people of Peru.

I also came out the other side with the pleasure of bonding with new friends and reacquainting with old ones. You can't go through a boot camp of that type, storming the gates of hell, without growing close to those experiencing the trip next to you. And seeing as I write full-time from home, it was the most socializing I'd done in years. Big ol' honkin' baby steps!

New friends/family!

Best of all, I love the fact that "jungle pants" has become a nonchalantly dropped word in our everyday lexicon.

And the stories I heard, the things I saw and experienced, will shape and fill at least one future novel percolating on the back-burner, a paranormal mystery.

Onward and upward, the world's a great big, ol' beautiful and wondrous and scary place, much more than my previously staked-out back yard of Kansas City. I can't wait to explore more. (But, um, just with air conditioning this time).

Peace.

Final Day in the Amazon: Day Drinking with a Shaman! by Stuart R. West

Even more peculiar than the Amazon Rain Forest...

Sniff. The last day of our adventures along the Amazon River...

During our final meal at the lodge, one of the teens in our group mesmerized Antonio, our shaman in tow, with excellent sleight-of-hand coin tricks. Pretty amazing, something I thought I'd never witness: old magic meeting new.

Our new family.

Even more astounding is what transpired on our last day in the jungle, something I never thought I'd do in my lifetime, something that I'd never even considered: day-drinking with a shaman!

Cheers! ("Tink.")

We were told we were visiting the rum "factory." Yay! Something finally more my speed. Still, to get there we had to go via boat, so I blundered into my usual seat (the anchor position), and off we went. Across from our destination, I witnessed entropy in action as a tree toppled into the river with a gargantuan splash. Just another amazing sight, one of many. But the best was yet to come.

Shaman at work in the rum factory.

Calling the rum joint a "factory" was pure embellishment. Our tour consisted of standing around a hot shed, where an old-fashioned press was operated by a horse to squeeze sugar from cane. Antonio passed around the resultant sugar for us to sip from. I figured if I hadn't caught a rare disease by now, sharing germs with my fellow travelers wasn't gonna kill me. 

Victor explaining rum to a thirsty crowd.

Our shaman then dumped the resultant sugar into a fermenting barrel. Once he set the bowl back on the ground, a friendly pig lapped up the rest (I still don't know if he was a family pet or breakfast). Hey, alcohol kills germs! Apparently the pig had too much to drink and then sat on my wife's feet.

Rum-guzzling pig.

We hurried through the rest of the "tour": there's the fermenting barrel, over there's the oven to boil it, bla, bla, bla, let's drink!

All creatures, great and small, love them some rum.

Gathered around a table, three bottles were plopped down in front of us. Again, we shared a shot glass, all of us practically family now. After the first several shots, germs began to not matter so much.

Na zda-ró-vye! 

Ay caramba, dios mio!

The first bottle was straight up "aguardiente," aka "firewater." Akin to grain alcohol, it could strip paint off a wall and melt a clown's face. My chest nicely warmed, we moved onto the next bottle of booze, a ginger-infused alcohol.

To your health!

Antonio nudged my wife, pointed at the bottle, then wound a finger around his ear: muy loco! Didn't stop him from enjoying his rum, though. What's good for a shaman's good for me. 

Here's mud in your eye!

Ay, yi, yiiii, Viagra!

Next came "Siete Raices," which Antonio described as Viagra. For some reason, the factory owner kept pushing it on me. Did he know something I didn't? Hey, who was I to stand in the way of medicine?

Down the hatch!

Soon, our guide Victor filled up his cup by mixing two of the rums. He claimed it was Antonio's fault since he said he needed his Viagra. We weren't about to let him drink by himself, so the men joined him. 

Education can be fun!

Salute! 

Not to be outdone, the women had their turn at the bottles. Again and again. 

Gettin' some good learnin' done about nature!

Cin-cin!

A perfect way to end our jungle adventures, this went on for a while...

Incredibly, my boat balance appeared to have improved by the time we left.

Prost!

All in all, a very peculiar day. Which leads me into an extremely awkward and shameless segue: Have you read Peculiar County yet? Here's what critic "The Cellophane Queen" had to say about it: "Amazingly good. Brilliant. Pitch perfect characterizations and intriguing use of language remind me of the master writer, Stephen King. Dibby is a heroine of the first order taking charge in a very Peculiar County in Kansas." Visit alluring and strange Peculiar County now.

 

Piranha Fishing on the Amazon River by Stuart R. West

One click away from mystery, murder and humor.

Continuing our further (mis)adventures in the Amazon Rain Forest...

After another night of sleeplessness, we... Oh. Wait. Did I not tell you the unfortunate sleeping circumstances of our lodgings?

You see, the Heliconia Lodge is very nice, offers great food, and the staff is top-notch. 

But seeing as we're in the jungle, of course, air conditioning is unheard of. Electricity, too, for the most part, which is why the lodge runs off a generator. Naturally it wouldn't make much sense to run it full time, so they turn it off three times a day, usually when I wanted to shower.

(Side note on showering: Our first day at the Heliconia, we kept going out on excursions and each time I'd soak through my clothes. Not by rain, mind you, but sweat. So I kept showering and changing clothes. Six wardrobe changes in one day, I felt like Cher in Vegas. By the next day, I pretty much just gave up on hygiene. Sure, you didn't want to sit downwind of me, but everyone in our group was in the same boat. Literally.).

Anyway, I could live without electricity during the days. We were never in our room anyway. But then they'd power down the generator every night at midnight. The room fans would stop as the entire compound ground down with a dying, monstrous groan: pretty much an alarm clock to jolt me awake. I usually clocked in a solid 45 minutes before the generator stopped.

In bed. NEVER asleep!

Then nature's sound machine took over, keeping me up most of the night. (And the endless sweat, natch. In fact, I've come up with the perfect slogan for the Heliconia Lodge: "At Heliconia, we sweat the hell outta you!")

What does nature's sound machine sound like, you ask? Kinda like this (ahem)...

"OOOH, OOOH, AHHH, EEEK, EEEK, EEEK, OOT, OOT, AHHH, OOOT, HOOO, HOOOO, OOOOOO, EEEK, EEEEK, AIEEEEE..."

You get the drift. Some kind of unidentified bug/animal/monster took to haunting me right outside our room: it sounded like a blacksmith pounding out metal. Also, I was too busy wondering what sort of varmints were scampering around in our dark room to sleep. The horror stories about scorpions, tarantulas, and snakes didn't help.

So. Sleep deprived, missing the wonders of air conditioning and quiet, we wandered once again into the jungle on a medicinal plant trail, great for pharmacists, exhausting for we mere authors. 

Our guide, Antonio, using his version of G.P.S.: "Great Product of Survival"

However, we did something very cool. We planted mango trees in the Amazon jungle in honor of Earth Day. I'll gladly brave the sleepless nights, nocturnal monsters, and near death experiences by visiting again in five years to eat a mango from our tree.

Cool was the order of the day as later we went piranha fishing. Danger's my middle name (not really, not even close).

Time and time again on our trip, we'd been told piranha were good to eat. I'd never realized piranha was an edible fish, just sort of thought of it as an eating fish (remember: movies are my education). I kinda think it might just be practical on the Peruvians' behalf to eat what they have plenty of (otherwise I'm completely baffled by the choice of monkey's head soup). Oddly enough, though, piranha was never offered to us at the lodge. But we were prepared to catch dinner for everyone.

Off we went on our fishing expedition! I warned everyone I was prepared to fall. They all agreed, hardly a shocker. 

Before the fishing trip with happy and high expectations!

Hooks were baited, lines were sunk, and we waited. And waited. And waited, just merrily bob-bob-bobbing along. The blasted piranha kept nibbling at our bait, just eating it. Our buddy fed the piranha a lot (next fisherman: "Man, that's one fat fish.").

Only one of us snagged a piranha (teacher's pet, teacher's pet, teacher's pet!), a small one at that. 

Expectations dashed!

Still, all in all, how very awesome it is to snootily drop into conversation, pinky finger raised, "The other day we were on the Amazon River, fishing for piranha..."

While we're on the subject of sharp toothed critters, check out the second in the Zach and Zora comic mystery series, Murder by Massage. My hapless heroes face all sorts of shark-toothed, crocodile-teared types such as
dancing cops, ex-radical hippy militants, pompous pastors, and a creepy set of "Furries." What're you waiting for? The party's started and it's a blast!

Beware the Most Dangerous Animal in the Jungle...by Stuart R. West

Of course I'm talking about the great lumbering beast: the American Ox. Otherwise known as myself.

Click for comic mystery antics.

 I don't camp. Never have, never will. Nature and I don't get along. If I so much as glance at poison ivy, I turn into a giant blister bubble. On the other hand, my wife loves camping and nature. Everything that is nature except for...the unspeakable eight-legged critters. She suffers from a truly bad case of arachnophobia. 

My wife (kinda, sorta) avoiding arachnids in the jungle (what she doesn't know won't kill her.)

Over the course of our trip, several people thought they could cure my wife's fears easy-peasy with some Dr. Phil nonsense: "Oh, the best way to conquer your fear is to face it." Someone else tried the routine of "no, no, spiders are good! They bla, bla, bla..." While their intentions were good, they've never witnessed my wife jump out of a moving car once she spotted a spider. While she was driving. Twice.

So, for obvious reasons, people thought we were crazy for going to the jungle.

My wife, um, enjoying the floor.

Me, I possess the grace of a big, clumsy meth-head trying to thread a needle. Getting in and out of the boat proved extremely problematic. Our guide, Victor--an amiable sort, fluent in English and bird-song--grew weary of my (literally) rocking the boat. Constantly, he told me to "slow down, slow down." But he didn't understand speed was the only way I kept from falling, sheer momentum my only ally. Amazingly, I didn't capsize the boat, but I capsized myself a couple of times. 

Victor standing at ease and defying gravity in our boat.

Once, Victor wanted to redistribute weight throughout the boat so he instructed me to move back a bench. I'd successfully moved myself back before by just using my arms and swinging my body backward, so I thought I could do it again. Methinks I'd forgotten the 50 pound backpack attached to my body. I fell between the benches, legs up in the air like half-price day at the old-West brothel. A particularly poor day to wear white pants (and what was I thinking wearing white pants into the jungle anyway? Terrible fashion choice.). 

A good larf was had by all (except for me and my wounded pride. Not to mention my wounded posterior).

Falling isn't anything new for me. Gravity and balance are not my friends. While escorting us across wooden planks to the local jungle health clinic, Victor remarked on one of our cohorts' very good balance. I said, "I think she has better balance than me." 

Victor readily agreed. "Much better," he said. "Much, much better."

Of COURSE nature just loves Victor.

So there I am, floundering around in the jungle, trying my damnedest not to fall on snakes or worse, planting my feet ploddingly, arms out like a new-born tyke learning to walk. Hardly jungle material.

Back to that health clinic... The Yanamano Clinic--a small, humid building just off the river--is run by a doctor from Wisconsin and services the locals (or at least those who've embraced Western medicine). The doctor, understandably frustrated by the government's lack of aid, caring and health care, ripped through a list of her recent patients and their alarming ailments. Needless to say, machete wounds topped the list. A sobering (and sweltering) visit, it truly made me grateful for what we take for granted in the States.

Solar-powered (and without air conditioning, natch), the small operating room was a sparsely lit hot-box where the doctor sweats over her patients while sewing them up. Recently, a fan had been installed (a huge deal) and a bright light bulb had been donated (again, victory). Doctors Without Borders swung by one day with good intentions and big ideas, but little could truly be done. It's a very bleak situation for both the locals and the doctors because help doesn't come from many places. And the locals are uneducated about their own ailments and what modern medicine can do for them. 

Later, I was told this was one of the better clinics. At least there weren't holes in the ceiling.

On the way out of the clinic, I made a big mistake, a huge one.

As we left the clinic, I held the door open for everyone because Mom taught me to be a gentleman. Our boat driver, Walker, glared menacingly at me as he slowly walked through my proffered opened door. Victor, our guide, actually stopped dead in his tracks, stared at me. He opened his mouth to say something, then shook his head and hurried through the door. Hands flailing, they chatted animatedly and angrily back to our boat. Clearly I'd done something to offend them.

Only later did I realize my whoopsie moment. 

The culture of Peru is muy machismo. Men are men and the very mention of a "metrosexual" will get you beat up. Men drive motokars and women work in the kitchen, end of story. However, the men are fooling themselves, for women truly rule the roost. It's a very sexist culture, but only superficially so. Regardless, men take their manly manliness very manfully.

Things weren't right between Victor and myself until the end of the trip.

Friendsies again! (L to R: My wife, Victor, me, Jungle Momma Connie)

On the bright side, my wife had only one minor spider incident. In the boat, she reflexively kicked our friend's butt to get rid of a small, menacing arachnid. (I purposefully didn't tell my love about the lodge's four pet tarantulas until we'd left). Not bad odds for the jungle!

Speaking of odds, what're the odds Wendell Worthy can race against time to save his brother's life by running through downtown Kansas City in his underwear? Not very good! Find out in my comic thriller, Chili Run.

Laughs and thrills just a click away!

Welcome to...Monkey Island! by Stuart R. West

Despite the banana in the title, this has nothing to do with Monkey Island except a whole lotta monkey business.

 "For you see, Mr. Bond, Monkey Island is a training ground for my personal army of monkeys where I shall eventually unleash them on an unwitting world to conquer...Disneyland! Mwah-hah-hah!"

Marvel at the cute, wacky antics of lovable monkeys!

Yes, Monkey Island sounds like a James Bond villain compound, a perfect setting for a future secret agent novel, one that has the creative juices flowing. And, yes, Monkey Island actually exists. Come with me now, intrepid explorers, as I recount more adventures in the Amazon ans we visit...MONKEY ISLAND!

Tuesday morning we set out by boat on the Nanay River, an Amazon River tributary. Where the tributary meets the Amazon River, a visually distinctive color change differentiates the two rivers from "black (that's what it's called, although it's not really. Hey, I don't make up the rules.)" to light creamy brown. Shifting sediment causes color change. 

Thrill at the incredible changing water color!

Which is just one of the many amazing things about the Amazon: the landscape changes constantly. (I saw a huge tree actually topple into the river as we traveled. And there are "walking trees!" They uproot themselves and move toward sunlight. Sure, they're slow, but they'd probably beat sloths in a foot race any day.)

See the incredible, uncanny tree that walks like a man!

Soon, we neared MONKEY ISLAND ("ka-blammo!"). My spidey senses tingled (or maybe that was water sickness). As we disembarked, I was quickly reminded of my lousy sense of balance and lack of grace. Pay heed, folks, for we'll be revisiting this theme many times.

Excitement swelled in our group as we walked the planks up to...Monkey Island! ("Bum, bum, bummmm...") 

Duck and cover from flying feces!

Another habitat (brought to you by the fine folks of the previous manatee habitat), Monkey Island personnel rescues rare monkeys and nurses them to health. Unlike the manatee habitat, though, the monkeys roam their island freely to mess with unsuspecting visitors.

Our host warned us to wash off all bug spray and sunscreen since there'd been an earlier incident where several monkeys died by licking toxic bug lotion. We were also told, "monkeys are curious. So watch your jewelry." Understatement.

Our group washed up, stripped down, and prepared to enter...MONKEY ISLAND ("Dun, dun, dunnnnnn...").

Three minutes into our tour, a woolly monkey approached my wife, crawled up her body, and tossed its arms around her. For twenty minutes, they were inseparable as the monkey licked and kissed her and tugged playfully at her necklace.

Get jealous as my wife finds comfort in the arms of a furry stranger!

One of our traveling companions wasn't so lucky. Sara's monkey started off all cutesy, innocent and sweet, but within seconds "cute" morphed into stark-raving TERROR! The monkey climbed atop Sara's head, yanked at her hair, entangled its limbs throughout Sara's tresses, and held on tight. Like a victim in the film The Birds, Sara ineffectively tried to disengage her primate pal, plucking at it to no avail. That monkey wasn't going anywhere.

Elsewhere on MONKEY ISLAND ("Zinnnnnngggg!"), another fellow traveler, Liz, welcomed a monkey into her arms. But this monkey had a hidden agenda, an evil one. Feigning sweetness, it jabbed out, snatched Liz's glasses, and tore off into the bushes. Miraculously, one of the guides was able to retrieve the glasses.

Don't dare trust these little buggers!

Yet another monkey dragged one of our pals, Kelly, by the hand. We all thought it the cutest thing. Until the demonic beast's true intentions became apparent. The creature stopped Kelly by a small tree, positioned her oh-so-carefully, then used her as a ladder to climb into the tree's limbs.

Hold onto your wallets and purses!

Even the sloth appeared less than trustworthy, evil gleaming in its eyes. (But I wasn't too worried; even I could outrun a sloth should it come to it.)

Me? My only contact was with a parrot. Oh, sure, it was friendly enough as it roosted on the teens in our group, but when I approached, it pecked at me.

Beware the feathered face of evil!

Maybe these surface-cuddly beasts truly were a secret, evil army in training after all. 

Speaking of nefarious goings-on lurking beneath the facade of innocence, check into the mysteries surrounding the citizens of Peculiar County.

Visit enchanting Peculiar County today, just one click away.