Advanced jungle training phase began deep in the jungle at "jaguar's paw". After setting up base camp and getting settled in, we met our badass jungle instructor Marcus, a Belizean who knows everything about the jungle, and then some more. So much so that the special forces get sent to learn from him! Our first lesson was on plants, trees and their uses. We all felt quite bewildered trying to take in all the information from the mighty Marcus! We drank from vines, learned to use to trees to help us survive with anti fungal trees, trees with antiseptic properties and then the trees that are not so useful, like the Bokanaboi tree (also known as the bastard tree and poison wood!) After this fairly mind boggling session we moved on to fire lighting techniques and had a race to boil some water for Colin’s tea but the real highlight was watching Marcus demonstrate the use of natural techniques to start fires.
Day 2's lessons consisted of traps and more plants. Everyone was looking forward to making some traps but once again Marcus blew us all away with dead-fall traps and snares before we got let loose into the camp to practice making them for ourselves and discovered just how tricky they really are to make. Our second plants lesson focused more on plants that were edible and we all beat the hell out of a Kahun tree with our machetes to get to its edible "heart" that resembled a sweet cabbage!
Day 3's lessons focused on the art of water collection- how to do it, where from, and improvised methods of collecting water, followed by a lesson in the slaying of chickens. After 3 chickens being accidentally decapitated and quite a bit of blood, we plucked and gutted our 5 chickens for a feast later on that night that left everyone a big greasy mess, but everyone was chuffed to get some fresh meat in their bellies.
On day 4 Marcus took us into the undergrowth once again to show us how to construct an emergency shelter, which was more physically demanding than most of us expected I think, but the lessons learned that day became incredibly useful during the brief rains on belt kit night. Later that day we practiced some trail finding techniques that would help to teach us to follow trails in the jungle and hopefully not get lost, but some of us still managed to get lost during the exercise!
The next 48 hours of advanced jungle training consisted of the infamous belt kit test. We each disappeared deep into the dense undergrowth armed only with our machetes, emergency rations, our belt kits and most importantly, our badass jungle skills. I think everyone really enjoyed the test and we got a chance to practice our shelter and trapping skills, however a few individuals did suffer due to the lack of caffeine (Max!), or a good night’s sleep in a hammock (Dan!).
After finishing our solo 48 hours, we had a well earned wash in the creek and spent some time relaxing before the next day’s activities.
The remainder of our advanced jungle training consisted of lots of navigation practice and medical practice so that we could look after Colin when he inevitably gets lost. The final lessons were in river crossings which everyone had great fun doing as we all got to pretend to drown and get dramatically rescued.
To conclude, everyone really enjoyed learning some badass jungle survival skills in that week and test our metal during our 48 hours alone in the jungle...
