No Land in Sight

Our accommodations were indescribable, but I will do my best. The lodge was supposedly located on the edge of the river, however due to the flooding, it was now located in the middle of the river. It was up on 10-foot stilts, but this was hard to tell, as the river had long ago flooded the original floors and patios. It was made up of approximately 5 rooms.

The boat was parked on a floating dock. We ducked through a three-foot tall doorway and entered the dining room. The roof beams were so low we had to bend over and practically crawl under them. Off to our right was the kitchen, the stove sat in a foot of water and a baby splashed beside it. Off to our left was a hall with three 6 x 6 ft. rooms down each side. At the end of the hall was a lounge with 6 hammocks and a TV, the TV sat on a table, perched in at least 3 feet of water.

The bathrooms sat on the floating dock, the original outhouse visible behind the house by just a roof peaking out of the water. One of them was filled with angry bees, ensuring that most of us wouldn’t even go near it. Electricity was run off a generator for a few hours each night, but when the lights went out the lodge was in complete darkness.

At the other end of the dining room was a second hall. This had originally led to a bar type area and a patio, but that was now deep under water. Instead this area had been sectioned off into additional rooms, we stayed in these rooms, towering over the walls and crawling through doorways and under roof beams. We shared our rooms with all the creatures of the river. A fish swam across our floor, a crab crawled across a doorway and a frog leapt onto my foot.

Planks of wood crisscrossed the floor of the rooms. They had been recently laid to keep our feet, tables and beds above the water. However, the river was still rising and by the time we would leave, 2 days later, these beams would also be underwater.

Our mattresses were mere inches out of the water. They were draped with mosquito nets to keep the bugs at bay. This resulted in us sleeping in a sort of a see-through tent, watching a swarm of bugs walk across the thin fabric, mere mesh separating us from the giant spiders and other creepy crawlies we saw. Sleeping in a river, listening to the water lap against your bed and the rain beat down on your leaf-covered roof, watching your boots float across your floor, knowing that if you accidentally drape your bare feet over the edge any river dwelling animal can crawl across them or worse, this, I can guarantee you, will make even the most water loving adventurer dream of dry land and tall mountains, and dream of that, I did.