July 02, 2006
Day 270
We tried to get up at dawn today, but the mosquitoes were still really bad, so we stayed put in the tents. Half an hour later, they were gone for the day and it was safe to come out. We left expecting to pass the others soon, but that didn't happen. Either we had gotten bad information as to their whereabouts, or the message we tried to give them to wait for us wasn't delivered and they had already left. Eventually, we saw a canoe in the distance, but we weren't sure if it was them. I took a picture and zoomed in to get a better look, and I thought I saw a large jewfro in the back, which would match Ax's description. We kept paddling, hoping to catch up with them eventually.
At lunchtime, the other canoe stopped on a beach and we discovered that it was indeed that of our lost cohorts. They didn't get our message and thought they were behind us, so they left early this morning in hopes of catching us. At least we were finally all together so the group's mood was brighter. We all ate lunch together and continued on our way.
We found a campsite with wind blowing in toward the forest so the mosquito situation wasn't so bad. Craig and I did a little fishing tonight, and at one point he caught something big. It didn't move like a fish or a stingray, so he thought he might have had a turtle or some other exotic river-dweller. He was using 100-pound-test line, so it was unlikely to break away, whatever it was. Eventually it got off the hook, but a few hours later, Craig caught the same thing again! This time, it looked like he might actually be able to pull it in, but all of a sudden, the hook came free and shot back at the canoe with lightning-quick speed. It sounded like a gunshot when the sinker hit the side of the boat. Luckily, nobody got hurt in the incident, but Craig never found out what type of creature he had caught. He was hoping it wasn't a turtle; that would have been a sad sight to see. Whatever it was, it must have been huge.
