Through Jaguar Eyes: Crossing the Amazon Basin - Softcover

Allen, Benedict

3.96

24 ratings by Goodreads

9780006548546: Through Jaguar Eyes: Crossing the Amazon Basin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006548547 ISBN 13: 9780006548546

Publisher: Flamingo, 1995

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An account of the perilous 3600-mile journey - without compass or map - across the vast Amazonian Basin, from the Andes of north-west South America through the tropical jungles of the lowlands to the dense forests of the Mato Grosso in Brazil. In February 1993 Benedict Allen became the first Westener to make the crossing at its widest point. Benedict Allen's plan in setting out to cross the Amazon Basin was to place his life in the hands of the remote Matses, the "jaguar people" - Indians who aspired to all the grace and strength of the powerful cat, tatooing their faces with jaguar stripes and placing bamboo spikes in their no0ses to resemble whiskers. From the foothills of the Ecuadorian volcano Cotopaxi he descended into Columbia and "forbidden" cocaine traffikers' country. Eluding a hitman from a drug gang, he entered Peru and made contact with the Matses. For two months he was taught how to make hunting traps and learnt the properties of plants. Then Benedict, jokingly dubbed "The Man Without fear" by the Indians, had to put his newly acquired knowledge knowledgr to the test.

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From the Back Cover:

Benedict Allen's enthralling account of his 3600-mile journey from the Andes of Ecuador and Peru to the dense forests of the Mato Grosso confirms him as one of our most intrepid explorers. By placing his life in the hands of a remote tribe and learning the intimate ways of the rain forest, he acquires the skills to pass the supreme survival test.

'Benedict Allen's adventurous travelogue records his attempt to become the first white man to cross the Amazon at its widest point. Travelling by canoe and on foot, living on his wits and a fistful of dollars, he takes up the trail of explorer Colonel Fawcett who set off in 1925 and has not been seen since. En route, Allen encounters the Mats�s – the jaguar people – and experiences enlightenment under the influence of a hallucinogenic drug administered nasally by his shaman ... Allen reveals himself to be a true descendant of Fawcett, he's an Englishman abroad, espousing the virtue of standing on your own two feet.'
TIME OUT

'For hotter reading, top travel book is Benedict Allen's 'Through Jaguar Eyes' ... Is the man a nutcase? Probably, but for wimps like me ... he's a hero. Poisonous snakes, electric eels, drug traffickers – Allen encounters them all. Hats off to him.'
VAL HENNESSY, 'Daily Mail'

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