AMAZONAS - Mission Possible - 2011

A sertanista is an uniquely Brazilian term that gives up its meaning to what WORLDWISE EXPEDITIONS first expedition to the Amazon is about. The word is that given to a profession that folds all the skills and passions of a frontiersman, ethnographer, adventurer and human rights activist; these tasks are all rolled into a single eclectic vocation called a ‘wilderness explorer’ ( Wallace S. Nat Geographic 2003; 204: (2), 2-27 ).

In 2001, Dr Marc Shaw was the Team Doctor with Sir Peter Blake on his ill-fated voyage into the Amazonas Region of South America. 26 members went on that Expedition to the hinterland region of Brazil and Venezuela in 2001, the first time any such expedition from Australasia had been into this remote territory.  WORLDWISE EXPEDITIONS is planning a return journey to the Amazonas regions of Brazil and Venezuela, as its inaugural expedition, to visit the region explored with intrigue and fascination by Alexander von Humboldt, AR Wallace, the 1968 Geographical Magazine Hovercraft Expedition, and more latterly by Jacques Cousteau and Sir Peter Blake. 

There are four aims with intended missions of WORLDWISE EXPEDITIONS:

1. To survey valued fauna and flora in regions travelled to. To document this gives greater understanding of the impact and influence of the region’s complex effect on global warming.
   
   
2. To initiate medical-humanitarian programmes and work with medical personnel in a fieldwork situation.
   
   
3. To develop educational programme for use in schools, so that children will be able to communicate with each-other and develop ongoing relationships with children from other countries and cultures.
   
   
4. To initiate and develop exchanges between cultures. To this end, there is an emphasis on visual and performing arts between the cultures of New Zealand and those visited by WORLDWISE EXPEDITIONS.

It is intended that the work done on this expedition will be recorded in academic journals – so there is an ongoing acknowledgement of regions travelled to and folk visited, and the ‘delicate balance between old and new’ ways of survival.

The Amazon Basin includes a diversity of traditional inhabitants as well as biodiversity in both flora and fauna. The journey was exciting and mesmerizing: new images, new experiences, new animals and plants, and new cultures.  Going into this beautiful and remote region is an experience in human nature, in communication and in self-enrichment.

‘Completing such a journey made me so much richer than ever I could otherwise have dreamed. I have never been so challenged in 30 years of practicing medicine. I wanted to see  if  ‘on going to the edge of ‘a cliff’ and jumping, I could fly … I did, and I am so much richer than ever I could have dreamed. That others need to gain this fulfilling experience is reflected in the origin of WORLDWISE EXPEDITIONS ’  Marc Shaw writes.