Nights Out in Club Amazonia

During the week most of us are in bed by 9pm to rise early in the morning for the next day of surveying. However my favourite times are when a small group of us get to go ‘off camp’ and into the forest for ‘nights out’.

Frog and Insect DJ’s spin their tunes whilst DJ Thunder controls the beats and the duo ‘Moon’ and ‘Lightening’ take care of lighting and strobes illuminating the otherwise dark and damp understorey / basement of the jungle dance floor. We catch the occasional eye shine of the shy, secretive mammals watching from the sidelines and a glimpse of a bird perched on it’s podium as we stroll across the dancefloor. As we clumsily happen upon a group of bamboo rats dancing around the DJ booth they scatter in all directions squawking and squealing their abuse at us.

Occasionally we stop our own dance to take a look around, wipe the sweat from our brow and take a sip of our beverage, ‘Agua cloro’. We observe other clubbers in bright fluorescent attire whilst keeping an eye out for the occasional solitary, slippery snake character giving us the eye.

The terrain is misleading at times, extremely undulating and slippery, dependant on the influence of Mr Vegetation, the lighting duo and how many drinks have been previously shed from their vessels. It is particularly bad in the primary forest where few have been before, although we favour these spots as they are less ‘chavvy’ and we get to roll with the specialists, the old time clubbers who really know how to rock!

As we party the ants of course are busily working the doors and the bar, keeping things in order, quick to give you a ‘telling off’ should you be in a restricted area / doing something you shouldn’t be doing.......only their rules apply!!!!

So as you can see, ‘Club Amazonia’ has a lot to offer even the urbanites among us in this dance of life!

Sherry Robinson - GVI Amazon volunteer, Oct-Nov 2010

Nights Out in Club Amazonia