Journey to the Amazon

The Amazon rain forest. Those simple words conjure up a variety of pictures in the mind. When I hear those words, I envision tall trees, animals everywhere, lush green foliage and a world far away from the one I experience everyday in west central Ohio. I see a place that is still an unexplored frontier. It’s a place where humans can visit, but never truly own. With all of these visions in my mind, I did not hesitate to seize an opportunity to visit this vast wonderland. Going to the Amazon rain forest would be my chance to experience a corner of the world not often traveled by the masses. It is a place that most people only dream of visiting.

            This Amazon opportunity presented itself in the form of a program called Earth Expeditions. Earth Expeditions is part of a larger program called Project Dragonfly, run by Miami University in conjunction with the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens. It offers educators the chance to travel to a natural habitat in remote corners of the world. Those locations include ones in Asia, Africa, Central and South America. Other aspects of the program include learning about conservation, community-based collaboration, and inquiry-based learning. More than just a trip, this program is an actual college course. There was work to be completed both before and after the trip. The final culminating project was an inquiry-based project that educators conducted in their own learning environments. The participants communicate with each other via a web-based learning community where all coursework is posted and discussed. While the group I was part of was comprised of Americans, the program is open to educators from around the world.

            My departure for the Amazon was in June 2010. I flew into Lima, Peru, and from there I headed to the eastern side of the country. My group, 19 other educators with whom I’d interacted on-line but never met, congregated in a small town called Puerto Maldonado, on the edge of the rain forest. The participants in this Amazon group came from Ohio, New York, California, Washington, Hawaii, and Idaho. We spanned a variety of ages, the youngest being 26 and the oldest being 55. Some of us were classroom teachers, while others worked at the university level.

Before leaving, I have to admit that I was nervous. I was getting ready to head into the rain forest with 19 other people that I didn't know. Traveling across the globe to meet up with complete strangers and then trek into the wild is a situation that's fairly unusual. I certainly felt it would test my ability to adapt and make friends quickly. Would I have the mettle? Fortunately, as I realized later, most of the people in the group were in the same exact situation. We all needed to make friends quickly. We all had to adapt. We all had to step out of our comfort zones. It helped that we were all educators, so we had that in common. Once I got to know my group members, I realized that these fears were all baseless.

As my plane circled Puerto Maldonado, I looked out the window. All I could see was a blanket of green…the rain forest. It was stretching out beneath me like a green carpet, just waiting to be explored. The excitement on the plane from the foreigners was palpable. We couldn’t wait to get out there.

The airport in Puerto Maldonado on the edge of the rain forest.

My first new sensation when I stepped off the plane was the humidity. It was like a smack in the face with a wet blanket. I was instantly sweating. Right away I was glad that I’d made an effort to pack clothes that were moisture-wicking. I knew I was going to need them. And, even though I thought convertible pants with zip off legs looked ridiculous, I could see that they were going to be very practical on this trip.

I quickly found out that air conditioning in this part of the world was a rare and exceptional treat. The airport was not air conditioned. In fact, it was fairly open-air. Inside the airport we already saw a few tropical birds flying around. The airport offered few creature comforts, but there was a place to buy a cold drink. Coca-Cola was my choice since I knew it might awhile before I consumed anything cold and caffeinated.

My group members were starting to assemble in the airport, and while we were waiting for everyone to arrive, I had the realization that I was on the threshold of the most unusual and unique experience I was likely to ever have in my life. It would be a week of new encounters, high adventure, and a journey into a place that most people will never see. It's the Amazon rain forest, and this was surely going to be my most thrilling experience yet.