📸 Photo

I’m lost.” The current was strong, and I couldn’t make it out of the river. To my great relief, they heard me. They gestured, “Downriver. Go farther downriver,” and I could see a small beach downstream. I let go of the log and swam to shore.

‘I waited there for almost an hour, wondering what was taking them so long. Maybe they had no intention of coming after me. Maybe they had meant to tell me that there were other people farther downriver. Then I saw them coming on a balsa raft and knew that I was saved.

‘I told them what had happened and asked if they had seen any sign of you or the raft, but they hadn’t seen a thing. They were hunters and had been deep in the jungle for five days. “You’re a lucky guy,” they told me. They only came hunting that far upriver twice a year, so I really had been incredibly lucky. Somehow, deep inside, I was sure that it had been more than simple luck or circumstance.

‘Four hours later we arrived on the outskirts of San José, where Fausto, the hunter, and his son lived. They brought me to their ranch on the riverbank and lay me down under a thatched roof. They promised that the next day they would send someone on horseback to take me up to the village, which was still nearly an hour and a half away up the river.

‘Late the next morning a guy named Pablo turned up and took me to San José on horseback. I asked him how I could get to Rurrenabaque,