Family Photos

The Amazon River (Near Manaus, Brazil)

The Amazon River. I think it was around age 11 or 12 that I decided that I would go there one day. When I was a kid the big plan was to catch the largest anaconda ever. They are much more difficult to find than I thought back then. We didn't even see one. I did see other types of snakes though. That's ok, I plan on going back to the Amazon River but on the Peru side. I'll get another chance at the giant snake then.




I'm not a big bird lover but I have always loved parrots.




















Here is the boat that we went up the main part of the river on. I did a flip off the top of this and didn't quite make it all the way around. My back was sore for a few hours.





My first alligator that I caught. Alligators are much harder to catch than I had once thought. I tried running them down, crawling on my belly up to them, etc. Everytime I would reach out to grab them they would haul ass into the water. I even stepped it up a notch and would run and jump in the water after them but I ended up catching this one by spotlight. I waded in water about thigh high while another person shined a light at him to distract him. Next time I will get a much bigger one. Give me a break, you got to crawl before you can walk.
























A church along the river. There was only about eight families in this village.

A sloth that we got out of a tree along the river banks

























I want a monkey as a pet. One day!





















Pirahna that I caught.













I was reeling in a parahna past this alligator and it grabbed it off my hook and got the hook caught in the side of his mouth. That was the first time I had a alligator on the line.

Bonito, Brazil

Bonito, Brazil was a beautiful place. There is a river there that is crystal clear. We rented a underwater digital camera and some wetsuits. This is where I was able to come face to face with a six foot aligator. He was sumerged under the water about three feet down near the shore line. I was able to swim right up to him. I started to reach down to touch him but decided that he had a much better advantage being that we were both in the water. We saw tons of fish and were able to swim among them without it even bothering them. A very cool place to go. Here are some pics that we took as we floated down the river.

Rio De Janerio, Brazil

The Statue of Christ overlooking Rio De Janeiro. As you can see it was a cloudy day.

Copacabana Beach in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil
Me standing just a few meters from where I was robbed by three guys armed with knives, nice place.

The guy in the middle is Darrin the Australian guy that we shared our room with in Rio. Don is on the right. This was myself and Don's first day in Brazil.

The Pantanal (Wetlands in middle western Brazil)

Jumping in the same water where we were catching pirahna and hunting for alligators.






















We look relaxed but we were worried about what was going to take a bite out of us first.






















































































































We saw hundreds of these.















One of many monkeys we saw on our trip






















Riding thru the wetlands of the Pantanal













Heading up river spoting all diffrent kinds of wildlife

Our sleeping quarters while in the Pantanal.