We're back!

We are back from the Pantanal, where we spent the last four days! If you are able, you should look it up on the web; the Pantanal is one fantastic place. We drove from Cuiaba through Pocone, and if it weren't for Fernando's incredible sense of direction, we'd probably STILL be looking for Pocone! It was NOT that easy on those highways. A really good road map would have helped immensely. It's amazing, really, that Fernando was able to find his way relying on the maps we had.
Shortly after Pocone, the paved road ended and the next 140 kilometers were on a dusty dirt road. Our first little pousada (place we stayed) was at kilometer 40. We stayed there for 2 nights; the next day, we drove all the way to kilometer 140 or so, which is Porto Jofre at the end of the road. The next two days we stayed at kilometer 32. The drive on the road is very dusty. It didn't happen that much, but every time a car passed us, we had to roll up all our windows, which would make it hot in the car. Then we'd have to wait at least 3 minutes for the dust cloud to be gone before we would roll down the windows again. The scenery was straight out of a National Geographic special. The closer we got to the end of the road, the wilder everything looked. There was one part where it almost seemed unreal, scenery unlike anything we had ever seen before. All around us the lands were flooded or had flowing streams. They were simply beautiful and full of wildlife!
We saw over 100 different beautiful birds and more than 10 different mammals, including the giant anteater, an ocelot, a tayra, tons of capybaras, fox, tamandua, rabbit, red brockett deer, marsh deer, capuchin monkeys, howler monkeys, and marmosets. Every morning we would wake up to screeches, calls, whistles, cries, etc. from many different birds including hyacinth macaws, toucans, chachalacas and a variety of parrots.

We are heading closer to the equator tomorrow, so it is going to be getting hotter. It had been fairly cool until about 3 days ago. Now it is quite warm. We will fly to Alta Floresta where we will spend the next three nights, so it is quite likely there won't be anything posted here again until we get back!