Going on an Amazon Adventure with Gil Sirique is kind of like going to Catholic mass. It is a multi-sensory experience that, at sometime during the event, engages each and all your senses. Of course it’s different from the mass, for a start, Gil is a member of Brazil’s long standing Sephardic Jewish community. That adds to his trove of stories about his ancestors, relatives, friends, and experiences. But, like the church, Gil understands his visitors’ need for full engagement. The need to make what, for many, is a once in a lifetime experience, into a occasion.

We are fortunate enough to have Gil more than once in this life. Ten years ago, we went on an adventure with him. We have wanted more ever since.

Gil has lived his 60 years in the Amazon, Erick Mota, a young man in his twenties assists him. Erick is preparing to take over the business when Gil retires to write the several books he has in him. (He has written at least one on Amazonian wildlife.) Gil’s ancestors have lived their lives on the river and his tours are a running narrative of the history and people who make up the region, stories punctuated by a cry of delight as he points out a bird or an animal.

If you read the acknowledgements in any number of books, I am a compulsive reader of acknowledgements, you’ll see Gil thanked in books about Henry Ford’s failed rubber plantation, Fordlandia, Teddy Roosevelt’s expedition into the River of Doubt and Henry Wickham, who smuggled rubber seeds out of the Amazon to Kew Gardens kick start the rubber industry in Malaya. That’s how I discovered Gil. I read acknowledgements and wrote to him more than a decade ago.

His work with authors has broadened his knowledge of the region. They tell him what they learned in their research. So, his narrative is informed by their books and private conversations as well as his personal and family history. Gil’s grandfather, an Amazonian merchant, secured the rubber seeds Henry Wickham smuggled back to Kew Gardens.

Gil tells stories about the Confederados, southern soldiers and planters who moved to the Amazon after the American Civil war to start plantations and “preserve their heritage” based on slavery. He knows the families. And he has stories about his own Sephardic community on the Amazon.

But, of course, the main event is his guiding us through the backwaters and lakes that line the Amazon’s shores where the Rio Tapajos’ clear waters meet the Amazon’s brown waters and run side by side.

The tour in Santarėm starts with a stop in the market where he talks about the produce, nuts, and fish on offer.

He pulls out one fish with teeth amazingly like human teeth. This fish eats nuts that fall from trees into the water and has evolved very un-fishlike choppers. Later we will get a chance to taste this fresh food on his boat.

Then we look for pink dolphins swimming off the fish market, looking for scraps.

After that it’s to the boat for stories and wildlife sightings.

The tour continues when we transfer to a smaller boat for a run through the backwaters and a closer look, and feel of the rainforest, including the smell of the forest after a spattering of rain that fell when we were protected by the forest’s canopy.

Finally, back to the bigger boat and a run out to the meeting of the waters (see separate post,)

After we got back to the ship Gil sent us a video of our experience. He also left us with a copy of his book on Amazonian wildlife. We leave knowing we will see him again in 5 days when we visit Alter do Chão.