Stephen Kirkpatrick - Lost in the Amazon: The True Story of Five Men and Their Desperate Battle for Survival

LOST
IN THE AMAZON

STEPHEN KIRKPATRICK
as told to Marlo Carter Kirkpatrick

LOST IN THE AMAZON
Copyright 2005 Stephen and Marlo Carter Kirkpatrick

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published by W Publishing Group, a Division of Thomas Nelson, Inc., P.O. Box 141000, Nashville, Tennessee 37214.

W Publishing Group books may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please email SpecialMarkets@ThomasNelson.com.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The New King James Version (NKJV), copyright 1979, 1980, 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc., Publishers.

Editorial Staff: Lori Jones, Ramona Richards, Beth Ann Patton, Deborah Wiseman,
Sue Ann Jones, Holly Halverson
Page Design: Lori Lynch, Book & Graphic Design

Published in association with Maura Kye at the Denise Marcil Literary Agency, Inc.,
New York, New York.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kirkpatrick, Stephen, 1954
Lost in the Amazon / Stephen Kirkpatrick as told to Marlo Carter Kirkpatrick.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-8499-0015-8
1. Kirkpatrick, Stephen, 1954TravelAmazon River Region. 2. Wildlife photographersUnited StatesBiography. 3. Amazon River RegionDescription and travel. I. Kirkpatrick, Marlo Carter. II. Title.
TR140.K535A3 2005
918.5'4404643'092dc22

2004029446

Printed in the United States of America

05 06 07 08 09 QW 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Ryan Kirkpatrick
April 5, 1986October 3, 2003
Gone, but not lost

CONTENTS

Many thanks go to our friends and colleagues Heidi Allen, Laurie Asmus, Jordana Finnegan, Elizabeth Lyon, Melanie Toler, Kenny Weaver, and Sissy Yerger, who invested their time, talents, support, and insight in this book. Each of them traveled to the heart of the Amazon with us in its pages, and we are grateful to have had them along on the journey.

Thanks to Bill Lamar of Green Tracks and Paul Wright of Amazon Tours for introducing us to the Amazon. We fell in love on Pauls boat, the Delfn, proving that some adventures in the Amazon really do have a happy ending.

Were also deeply indebted to our talented agent, Maura Kye, who made sure Lost in the Amazon found its way into the right hands; to our gifted and supportive editor, Kate Etue, who recognized something special in our story and helped us share it with others; and to the talented, hard-working, and warm staff at W Publishing Group.

Finally, a special thanks to Sean and Ian. You are not only the best sons a father could ask for, but the best stepsons a woman could be lucky enough to inherit.

November 12, 1995

The dense canopy and violent thunderstorm had killed any hint of daylight. I peered into the dark deluge, searching for any sign of my guide or the others.

Ashuco! I screamed into the rain. Ashuco! Where are you?

I saw only the jungle, thick, wet, and hostile. It surrounded me, pressed against my skin, threatened to suffocate me in its malevolent greenness.

Ashuco! Darcy! Esteban!

I stood motionless in the downpour, straining for a reply. The only response was the pounding of the rain, falling so hard and so heavy I wondered if I might actually drown while walking in it.

Ashuco!

My hoarse voice was weak and pitiful, barely audible to my own ears. How was it possible for rain falling on leaves to be so loud?

I scanned the foliage around me for machete marks, a footprint, any hint of human life.

Nothing.

I stumbled ahead into the choking, dripping brush, weighed down by my sodden boots and clothes, bent beneath the dead weight of the backpack that held my crippled cameras and the crushing burden of my disappointment.

This was supposed to have been my golden opportunity, the solution to all my problems, my shot at the big time. A better life not only for me but for my boys.

Poor Sean, Ryan, and Ian. Id convinced myself I was doing this largely for them, that a successful expedition would somehow result in more time together, new adventures for the four of us to share.

Instead, I was leaving them fatherless.

My own words haunted me.

Dont worry, sweetie. Ill be okay. Gods going to take care of me.

Poor kids. They would probably never believe in anything again.

A deafening clap of thunder rattled my teeth.

Unbelievably, the rain fell harder.

A hanging vine clawed my face. I reached up to yank it down and caught a pungent whiff of my own sweat.

God, I was so tired. So tired and so hungry and so bruised and so bugbitten and so wet.

Ashuco! I screamed with a raw throat. Ashuco! Where are you?

No response.

I was alone, lost in the jungle. And night was coming.

A sickening sensation rose in my gut. I struggled for control, fighting the irrational panic I felt welling up inside.

No, I realized, that wasnt right.

The most frightening thing about this panic was that it wasnt irrational. This fear was well-founded, justified, reality-based. Barring a miracle, I was going to die in this jungle. Maybe today, in this very spot, alone in the rain. I had seen the animals, the bugs, the rot, the effects of the constant heat and humidity.

I knew what the jungle could do.

The fear exploded into full-blown panic, a wave of dread that left me shivering in the tropical heat. It was followed by a hot rush of adrenaline that threatened to send me screaming into the jungle, crashing blindly through the wet foliage.

Run! some primitive instinct screamed. Get out of here! Just drop the gear and run!

But there was nowhere to run to.

Instead, I fell to my knees in the mud and groped at the zipper of my backpack. With shaking hands, I retrieved my battered journal and fumbled to a blank page. Clutching my shiny Fisher Space Pen (Guaranteed to write upside down, underwater, and even in outer space!), I hunched over the journal, struggling to keep the paper dry.

A splotch of bright red blood splashed across the page, spreading like a fungus. I choked back a sob. I knew it was nothing fatal, nothing even serious, just a little seepage from the deep gash on my torn left hand. But the sight of that crimson stain blooming on the page was horrific, a dreadful portent that triggered a fresh surge of fear.

I ripped the bloodstained page from the journal and threw it into the rain. It fluttered to the forest floor and lay there curled and limp, like a wounded bird. A single tear snaked down my scratched cheek, mixing with the rain and sweat. I scribbled in a wild, rambling hand.

This trip was a mistake, a fatal mistake. We are going to die here. All of usAshuco, Esteban, Darcy, Mario, me. The jungle is going to take us all.

Thunder rumbled, then exploded in an earsplitting clap that shook the soggy ground beneath me. Lightning illuminated the horizonless tangle of trees and brush, revealing in a flash my utter, complete aloneness.

I stared down at the journal. My words were barely legible, a black, spidery scrawl that looked like fear crawling across the page. Looming up at me were the words die here.

I ripped out the page and ground it into the mud, then forced the fear into a corner of my mind. I felt it waiting there, struggling to get out, to gobble up the last of my reason.