After getting wild in Brazil’s Pantanal, Mum and I were more than ready to explore more of the countries rugged nature.

Next stop – The Amazon.

Named after female warriors of Greek mythology, the Amazon is itself a place of nearly mythical status. With towering trees and an awesome river it is not as wild as you may imagine On this legendary river it’s actually the little things that make it special.

In the very heart of Brazil this magnificent broad-leafed rainforest covers an impressive area of 7 million square kilometres (or 1.7 billion acres). It has an astonishing value in the natural world in terms of the Oxygen that it provides, the Carbon Dioxide that it consumes and the splendid array of exquisite plant- and animal species to which it is home. In fact, it is home to the most diverse and numerous arrays of species in the world.

Although my poor Mum was absolutely terrified of the idea that we might see a giant spider (she has a fear that is very similar to Harry Potters’ Ron Weasley) we were very excited to make our way into the jungle for another natural (spiderless) adventure.

We were picked up in Manaus with a handful of other tourists and we were driven down to the small harbour where we jumped (literally) into a small speed boat to cross the river to Careiro village, passing by the meeting of the waters.

‘The Meeting of the Waters’ is the point where two of Amazon River’s largest tributaries – a smaller river that flows into a bigger ‘parent’ river – converge but never mix. The place where the Negro and Solimões Rivers join is a pretty cool sight and our crazy speed boat driver (who had a slightly manic laugh) had a lot of fun circling the area.

We then hoped into a van on the other side of the river for around 60 minutes until you reach a place called Paraná do Mamori. The day was wet and the drive was terrifying as we slid around the road helplessly – but we did stop to admire some of the Amazon’s iconic giant lilypads which was slightly relaxing…

We then took a second speed boat to go to the Amazon Jungle Lodge which would be our little jungle home for the next few days. We lugged our backpacks up what seemed like endless stairs and were relieved to find a cozy looking private cabin with a small private bathroom (talk about jungle luxury).

Soon we enjoyed our first jungle lunch which was a delicious little buffet where we met our (very short) guide for the next few days and the fluffy jungle puppy Schnapps. Soon we were off for an afternoon of fishing… Piranha fishing to be precise…

I had never been fishing in my life. Not once. I had cried as a child when I found my goldfish had made a suicidal jump out of the tank. I didn’t even eat fish and I had no idea how I would cope with the whole murdering fish situation…

It was a boring start. The piranha’s were clever – they ere eating the bait and then heading on their way… No one could actually catch one. One of our fellow Amazonian explorers Aviel – the coolest Israeli I have ever met – decided to make the situation more fun.

First person to catch one gets a Caipirinha

It was on.

Veganism forgotten I was keen for a drink. And guess what. I got a bite…

I had a minor panic attack but pulled myself together and pulled the fishy straight out.

Guess who got a Caipirinha?

We caught a total of 3 fish… Not the most successful fishing trip but hey at least none of the piranhas had bitten us so we were ahead.

We headed back to the lodge for dinner before heading out on a night Cayman-spotting boat trip (with little Schnapps on board). We had been Cayman searching in the Pantanal but in the Amazon we had the chance to hold the little crocs and see them up close and personal… And yes for reasons that I can no longer recall I did get a photo smooching one of them.

The next day we were up early for some jungle tracking… Where my Mum became super nervous about the whole giant amazonian spider situation. We admired the gorgeous wilderness and our guide taught us about the natural remedies that many of the plants could be used for.

We also tried some Brazil nuts straight from the tree and Aviel ate a worm.

It wasn’t until over half way through our little walk that our guide decided to calm my poor mums nerves about the spider situation. It wasn’t going to be a repeat scene of the spider encounter in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets at all – apparently there weren’t any spiders around this time of the year.

The Chamber of Secrets had not been opened. Enemies of the Heir beware Mum calm down.

After a spider free morning we headed to our jungle lodge home for lunch – spotting some funky pink dolphins on the boat ride home – and started preparing ourselves for a night camping in the Amazon.

We headed out, hung up our hammocks and mosquito nets, started a fire and cooked a jungle feast. Some of the group went our for an evenings swim but I decided to stay at the campsite and watch the monkeys and giant lizards while the sun set over the magnificent river.

I had never slept in a hammock before and I can’t say it was the most comfortable experience but it wasn’t too bad.

The next day we headed out to meet a visit a local family home in a Caboclo Village where we watched the indigenous people making manioc flour and admired their tiny jungle gift shop.

We headed to the lodge for lunch where we enjoyed our final lunch with the newcomers – a bunch of young US tourists who really shouldn’t have been in the jungle. Apart from being afraid of sunburn and annoyed by the bugs they refused to sleep in the jungle. One of the boys was wearing a long sleeved top and I had to laugh out loud when Aviel decided to confront him about it…

“Take off your top! You are making me sweaty just from looking at you!!”

Soon we were heading back to Manaus – with the same smooth boat-bus-boat-bus routine. Everything went incredibly smoothly and it wasn’t long before we were back in the big jungle city where I drank acai until my heart was content my stomach almost burst.

We booked our Amazon trip (as well as our Pantanal trip) with Bamba who were wonderful to deal with and organised everything for us before we left Australia. I would highly recommend them for South American tours.