I’ve been nominated by some fellow bloggers, Tony and Margie with Back Roads and Other Stories as well as Jyothi with Travel Explore Enjoy, to post one favorite travel picture a day for ten days without explanation, then to nominate someone else to participate. That’s 10 days, 10 travel pictures, and 10 nominations. It is my understanding that the idea behind the challenge is to expose audiences to new bloggers and vice versa. I’m always up for helping fellow bloggers, so I have accepted the challenge.
That said, my rule following self is going to follow Tony and Margie’s lead and break a handful of them. First, while a picture paints a 1,000 words, I’m incapable of posting a photo without some explanation. Sometimes the story makes the image that much more special. Second, though not specified, I think the intent is to post 10 days in a row. I’ll be lucky if I post 10 weeks in a row. I also may post more than one photo at times.
Game Drives in the Pantanal
This photo was taken on our first evening game drive in Brazil’s Pantanal. While the most of the wildlife was lacking that night, the sunset at Pousada Piuval was absolutely lovely. The yellow, orange, pink and purple in the sky coupled with the green grass and blue tinge on the lone dead tree created a rainbow of colors. It was just so peaceful and beautiful.
As our game drives continued over the next few days and nights, however, we spotted several birds, hundreds of caimans, monkeys, foxes, anteaters and even an inland crab! While our nighttime anteater encounter was amazing, unfortunately, the terrain was still too flooded to spot the elusive jaguar.
Piranha Fishing
We made up for that disappointment with piranha fishing. Piranha fishing is not anything like any other kind of fishing. Instead of sneaking up on fish and being quiet, we slapped the tip of the cane pole on the surface of the water has hard and as fast as possible. This simulates thrashing and attracts the piranhas that bite the raw meat on the hook. For every fish we caught, we lost our bait twice, but between the three of us, we caught 37 fish in about as many minutes. It was so much fun! My friend who wasn’t enthusiastic about going fishing thanked me for my insistence.
In addition to fishing and taking game drives, we hiked to a waterfall, rode horses across the plains, floated down an aqua river, and explored a cave. We really enjoyed our visit and hope to return one day to explore the Amazon.
Nomination
Today I am nominating Lynne and Brian who write To the Airport…and Beyond for the travel photo challenge. In a way, we have similar stories. We both quit our jobs and started a blog to document our journeys. That said, they moved to a foreign country and write mostly about Asia, while I stayed in the USA with my dogs and traveled my home country.
I since settled down, but after a ten year hiatus from my road trip in VANilla, in one month VANgo will be ready to go. Anyway, I haven’t done as much Asia travel as I would like, and To the Airport…and Beyond is a great resource. Check it out! ETB
Shop
Check out the photographic note cards and key chains at my shop. Each card has a travel story associated with it. 20% of proceeds are donated to charity.
Awesome captures!
Most appreciated!