Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters

Dillard describes her trip to the Napo River in the Ecuadorian jungle, accompanied by three North Americans and four Ecuadorians. The jungle is an extraordinarily beautiful place, and Dillard feels at home there: “This will do, I thought. This will do, for a weekend, or a season, or a home” (71). At night, Dillard loosens her hair from braids so local children can play with it. She overhears one of the North American men describing his high-powered job back in civilization, marveling at what he’s doing “in a tent under a tree in the village of Pompeya” but also wondering why he would want to go back (73).

Dillard details the wide river and the wildlife living around and underneath it, including anacondas, crocodiles, and stingrays. Dillard marvels at the “extraordinarily clean people” who live by the river and bathe multiple times a day (74). The river stays 90 degrees, and sometimes villagers will plunge themselves in at night to stay warm. Though the jungle is beautiful, unseen dangers also lurk within: jaguars, cannibalistic tribes, and oil equipment. Dillard and her group travel the water on canoes. At a school in a local village, Dillard and the other North Americans sing the children “Old MacDonald Had a Farm.” Dillard concludes that the Napo River “is not out of the way. It is in the way” (77), a place of inexpressible beauty and peace.