This resurvey was quite an adventure, through extremely hard conditions. The journey to Colônia Nova Aliança, that has only 35 km of dirt road took a full day, because the car got stucked several times. (the car was pulled 2 times by a truck, once by a tractor, and another 3 by people). . . . And after getting stuck once again, we finally arrived, but unfortnatelly the car broked down, at only 15 m from the colonist house. Murph's law, the "tyre rolling" was completely broken so I sent someone to town to get a new one.

Without car we had to walk, and walk a lot. This wasn't a problem because I like walking, but the very hot sun was a problem, and walking from 11:00 am to 2:00 pm was unbearable. I tried to stay indoors during this period of time and work harder after 2:30 pm, but at this time of the year it rains almost everyday just about after 3:30 pm. Too bad to be true. So we end up walking under the rain or under the sun. The average distance from out host home and the other settlers varies from 6 to 14 km. A few times we arrived at our host home after dark, but I was scared of snakes because we walked sometimes through the forest or second growth patches.

The man I send to town arrived after three days. (everybody was kidding me saying that I would probably never see him again neither the money) but just to tell me that the US $80 I have him wasn't enough to buy the part and the oil I need. So I worked more one day and went myself to town . . . .

To get to town I left very early in the morning - 5:30 am - and walked through to fields and forest only 7 km to find a logging truck that was about to leave.How luck ! !

Well, at noon I was sill on the road and helping load the truck with logs. After two hours on the main road the first car the passed in direction to town and I jumped on it. We got stucked some 15 km later. To have an idea the truck tyre almost desapeared in the mud. A - no kidding - 0.80 m deep hole. I arrived in town coverend in mud at 5:00 pm, bought the part with checks, got a mechanic and a car and went back to the colony. . . . Soon the car was fixed and we left. At 11:00 pm we were back in town.

Next day morning, I had to say in the air conditioned hotel room till 3:00 pm because I was not felling good due to the non-stop full day under the sun in the back of a truck. . . . .
At one hand this was a good experience because I really understand now the transport difficulties the colony faces and why everybody complains about it.

The travel to São Felix was not too bad as I expected. We went on the back of a pick-up truck, and although crowded (13 people, 2 kids and two chickens on the truck and 4 people on the cabin) it was better than a bus. . . .

To get a better sample, I choose to survey the colony in the two opposite extremes. One 4 minutes down river from town (Santa Rosa) and other 5 hours upriver (Chadazinho). About half people I surveyd had definitive land tittle, but only a few are registered . . . and only few are in the name of landholder. Usually, the tittle is on name of the previous holder (i.e. when the previous owner sold the land, he gave as well the tittle). Sometimes the farmers got also a power of attorney paper, sometimes not. Registering the tittle and transferring is very expensive and this is the reason people usually do not do it.

On the colony further away (Chadazinho) almost nothing is sold. It is completely subsistence, because transport cost and also because there is no market (the town is far and also too small). There was plenty of fish and game. Jaguars and wild pigs are always present. I was fishing with a 8 year old boy when he jump back and I saw in the water a sucuriju snake that was coming his direction. This species is a kind of constrictor and can swallow a cow. Although this one was not very big (the thickness of my arm) it could pull boy to the water to swallow in smaller parts later. Actually it is dangerous only if the boy was alone because the snake is not poisonous and would go away if more than one person fight back and hurt it. Anyway it was quite a surprise. . . . Just in case, I did not swim in the beautiful Xin river anymore because my contract was not signed yet and I thought this was case I would like to be insured. By the way, does [the] insurance pays for consultant swallowed by a . . . snake?