Campo Grande to Baia das Pedras

June 28, 2023

Before we started this trip, we were given an itinerary with all the cities, lodges, hotels, events, and trips we would be participating in. And as I am unusually prone to make sure everything that I can control and understand, I control and understand. This is NOT to say that I enjoy the planning process for trips like this. I do not. (as my long suffering wife can clearly attest)

So I started by getting Google Maps to show me the route from Campo Grande to Bonito. No problem. (we took one route out, and one route back. The one back was prettier)

But then I searched for the route from Campo Grande to Baia das Pedras and I got this:

With this note:

I thought I was in a Bob Dylan song, with no direction home.

So when we were picked up by Luiz Pavia (the Best Guide in the Pantanal, by all accounts) and our driver, Vivi, I was curious as to what would happen.

And what happened was we drove to the end of the road. And then we drove off of it.

We left the hotel at 6:30 as promised, and drove on the road for probably three hours, then we drove on dirt tracks for about four hours.

But we saw amazing things.

When you pass into the actual Pantanal, it gets really, really flat. After all, the Pantanal is the world's largest wetland.

And you notice something else as well. The soil turns from really, really red (see below)

To much more brown:

Something else we will never, ever forget is that the Pink Ipe (Handroanthus impetiginosus) were in bloom throughout this area.

We must have a hundred photos of these trees - they are just stunning. Every time we saw one, we wanted to take another photo.

And the other think is the extensive amount of water. There are baias (bays), rivers, floodplains, lakes, marshes, swamps, and well, just about any water feature sort of a white water river or a waterfall that you can imagine.

You can see a young Caiman in the image below. They were everywhere.

But we finally got to the Fazenda. It was a nice thing to see

We were not done for the day, though.

We arrived just in time for lunch. There were a couple of other guests who had arrived before us, and a young team of film makers (Bruna Luchese and Cesar Leite) who were there to film the capture and release of tapirs by Patricia and her team.

So we all headed over to the building that was being used as a lab by the Lowland Tapir Conservation Initiative (LTCI).

I would not characterize the facilities as "luxurious". Maybe more "utilitarian" (in the original, not Peter Singer sense of the word) meaning that the money they raise is very well spent.

If this sort of thing doesn't make you want to become a field biologist, I don't know what will.

I told both Arnaud and Patricia that they are living every young naturalist's dream of being in the field and doing work on large, charismatic animals and their work will make a difference in the world. Of course, what I meant is that they are living my dream of when I was young and still thought that I would end up in the natural sciences somewhere instead of in engineering, and ultimately technology. Now, I am not complaining, I have had a good life, but I am truly envious of what they are doing here.