After a long day of traveling to the Amazon and a few earlier activities, it was time for our group to go out on the water once again, only this time the sun was already down, and we would be looking for alligators.
There were two boats full of us including our guides. The water was fairly calm and there was only the noise of the boat engines intermingled with the sounds of numerous frogs calling out to each other. Our guides were using their powerful flashlights to scan the water by the shore. The nearest guide told us that they do this in order to spot the eyes of any alligators on the surface of the water. Suddenly, the guide on the front of the boat I was on made the driver shut off the engine, at which point they took out paddles and brought us in closer to the shore. We were instructed to remain quiet, but that did little to still the lips of those in the other boat, in particularly Jeff, who called out "Are we going to see an alligator?" When the other boat finally quieted down, our guide left our boat and walked along the shore with his flashlight, in search of what we presumed he had seen: an alligator. For a few minutes, his flashlight scanned the shore, going ever further away from us. Then, without warning, the light went out, and we lost sight of our guide. Joe, who sat next to me, joked that "we may end up seeing a light coming through the water toward us," insinuating that an alligator had eaten our guide. For a few minutes, there was nothing that we could see of our guide to show that this was not the case. But to our relief, our guide turned his flashlight back on and made his way back to our boat, holding something in his hand. As he got closer, we could see what looked like a little alligator hanging from his left hand.
And so our guide entered out boat, with what he instructed us was about a 2-year old caiman, which is a type of smaller alligator.
Some of the students on the boat thought that he oddly reminded them of one of our tour guides for the trip, Tauan, so they gave the caiman the nickname "T.J." for "Tauan Jr." Our guide for the tour allowed us to take turns holding "T.J." and take pictures with him. Surprisingly, he was very soft and did not even attempt to move out of my hands while it was my turn to hold him. Our boat loved getting the opportunity to hold "T.J." and get a lot of pictures, and the other boat was quite similar but with one exception: our other tour guide, Yani. She did not like the idea of holding "T.J." at all, and originally even shrank away from him. However, she finally gave in and ended up holding "T.J." for a picture, maintaining a very firm grip the entire time while repeatedly saying "Take the picture, take the picture!" Eventually, everyone was finished taking pictures with him, so our guide for the night took "T.J." back into his hands and explained that if he were much bigger, "T.J." would not have been able to be held, as caimans much bigger than him get very strong very fast. At long last, our guide let "T.J." go back into the water, with out group calling out good-bye's to him as he swam away. At that point, we were driven back into the water, with our guides once again using their flashlights to search for any more alligators on the surface of the water, but with no such luck, so we returned to the lodge to finish off the night.
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