Episode 1 I Bought a Rainforest


Episode 1

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When he was seven, Charlie was obsessed with kingfishers.

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When he was 13, just looking at animals wasn't enough,

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and he was compelled to take pictures of them.

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So it's hardly surprising

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that Charlie became a wildlife photographer,

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and his job has taken him to the most remote corners of the planet.

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He often says that the world

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is easier to understand through the lens of a camera,

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but if you've been to the places Charlie's been,

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you can't escape one simple fact.

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Time is running out for our world.

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I didn't want to sit around and spend my life being

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depressed about the environment, not doing anything about it.

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So I thought, right, if I can do my bit,

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at least I know in my life I've done my bit, however small that is.

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Charlie wanted to make a difference

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so he did something that sounds crazy.

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He went to Peru to buy a rainforest.

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It makes you realise how important this place is.

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To know that there's still people in there that have got

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no contact with the outside world.

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To protect the forest, Charlie needed to stop the illegal loggers,

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ranchers and gold miners from cutting it down.

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But the more time he spent with local people,

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the deeper and deeper he got drawn into their lives.

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You forget all the problems, all the environmental stuff,

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and you just get fixed on getting some gold out of it.

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There are those that say it's already too late,

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that human beings have wrecked the planet,

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but if we're all going down,

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Charlie's going down fighting.

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It's estimated that the Amazon is home to a quarter

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of every land-based species on the planet.

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And yet we've studied less than 1% of this ancient rainforest.

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It's stood for more than 20 million years,

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but if we continue to destroy it at the current rate,

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it will all be gone in less than 200.

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But the most staggering fact about the Amazon is that we've been

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hearing for so long that it needs protection that we just don't care.

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Or at least we don't care enough to do anything about it.

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I got a phone call one day from my mate in Peru,

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and he just said to me, out of the blue,

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"Do you want to buy some rainforest?"

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And really, without even thinking about it, I just said, "Yeah."

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So I've gone and bought 100 acres of forest.

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Well, me and your mum have bought it.

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Why did you just buy it when you've never seen it?

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That's a good question. It's a perfect question.

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I didn't really tell Philippa immediately, I just went ahead

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and did it and subsequently, she has gone to great lengths

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to point out all the gaping holes in my knowledge of the place

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and my trust with people.

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I knew what he was going to do from the moment he started even mumbling

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about it, I knew where it was headed and I knew why he needed to do it.

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We all just need him to go there, see it, and then just come home.

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Charlie has flown to Cusco,

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the last big city in Peru before the Western Amazon basin.

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His land is still a day's drive away but before he gets to see it,

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Charlie has to pay £6,000 for his 100 acres of rainforest.

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I've done it!

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I just bought a piece of Amazon.

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This road is hilarious.

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We haven't stopped going up now for about two hours.

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It's just on the other side of this hill.

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The problem is this hill is the Andes

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and it seems to be going on forever.

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And the thing is, I'll get there

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and it'll just look like all the other forest, but it'll be my bit!

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Of course, you have to be pretty well off to entertain

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the idea of trying to save a rainforest.

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Conservation is a luxury mainly enjoyed by the rich.

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And let's not forget that in Britain we've never been

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shy of using our resources.

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After all, we've cut down most of our trees,

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killed half of the wildlife and poisoned the sea.

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But sometimes we have to draw a line.

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And for Charlie that line is Manu National Park.

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The thing about Manu is that, of all the rainforests in the world,

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it is the best one, and it's the most biodiverse place on Earth.

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Some of the stats about it are just mind-blowing.

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To think that in one National Park

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that's about half the size of Switzerland,

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you can have 10% of all the bird species in the world.

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That's what we're dealing with here.

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Although it's a protected area,

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Manu is under attack from illegal loggers.

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But to get into the park, they have to go through Charlie's land

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which is strategically placed

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at the end of the only road for miles around,

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and one of the reasons he bought it was to find a way to stop people

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smuggling valuable hardwoods out of the forest.

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Blimey, that's it! It's a shame it's pitch black, isn't it?

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But before he gets to grips with the issues facing this corner

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of Manu, Charlie wants to see exactly what he's bought.

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Oh, this is beautiful.

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When you think of the Amazon, South America, all of that,

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that's what I'm thinking of - a place like this.

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Camp is just there and there's a little trail coming down.

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I need to get the machete on it, walk down to here.

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Look at that, there's the bath! This is my bathroom, then.

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It's got to be.

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Beautiful.

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Someone's cut this trail within the last couple of months.

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This looks nice but it's not. This is knackered forest.

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This is all just crappy grass, bamboo.

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All these things that grow fast once the forest has been cut down.

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But the diversity here's unbelievable.

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I'm probably being stalked by about three or four different

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species of mosquito at the moment.

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And there's cracking birdlife here, insect life's unbelievable.

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It's still important stuff, secondary forest, it's still packed with life.

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And you know, now I'm here to protect it,

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it's only going to get better, isn't it?

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Who knows what we could end up with?

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At the end of the first day, Charlie's only explored

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a third of his land, but it's clear that the big trees were taken

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long ago, which is why the loggers have moved into Manu.

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But the park authorities are so underfunded

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that there's little they can do about it.

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There are only 26 guards to patrol 17,000 square kilometres.

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So Charlie's taking matters into his own hands.

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I bought the land because I wanted to do some good.

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So the idea now is,

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I stop illegal loggers getting into the National Park and logging it.

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There has to be rules, there has to be regulation,

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there has to be decent protection for Manu National Park.

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It is so important, not just in Peru, but to the world.

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I know it's only a sign with some words written on it

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but it kind of makes it official now.

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It says, "Don't mess around with my bit of forest, not on my watch."

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Charlie is going to stay in the Amazon for the next few months

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to explore all the threats facing the rainforest,

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and to try to find ways to protect his land and the National Park.

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I'm already covered in bites,

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probably cos I've got a tent full of biting flies.

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Charlie's job often takes him to remote places,

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but he rarely contacts his family.

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If you get homesick in the middle of the rainforest,

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you'd soon go mad with the bugs and the heat.

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The experience of walking into a rainforest is bizarre.

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It's claustrophobic, it's hot, it's deeply uncomfortable.

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And you can't escape it,

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there's no way of escaping the feeling you get from it.

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And then you're basically a walking salt cellar,

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there's very little salt in the Amazon.

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So the moment you walk in and start sweating,

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everything wants a piece of the action.

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So you get covered with insects all trying to get salt off you.

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And then also adding to that, you've got all these other insects,

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the biting ones that are trying to get blood out of you.

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So you very quickly become a valuable part of the ecosystem,

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part of the organism.

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Green hell, they call it. That's what it is.

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For anyone used to western comforts, living in the rainforest

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is like living in a kettle.

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A kettle full of mosquitoes,

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but because it's so rammed with life,

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the Amazon is Charlie's favourite place on Earth.

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Where's it gone? Where's it gone?

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Stay there. Stay there.

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Stay there. No.

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That's the problem with this.

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You think, "Oh, yeah, I'll just document all the insects I find,"

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but they reckon there could be half a million.

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I could be doing this for the next 500 years.

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I got you. I got him, I got him.

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So far, Charlie's seen little more than grass and bamboo

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in his patch of forest, but over the border in Manu,

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it's estimated that every acre contains

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nearly three times more native trees than the whole of Great Britain.

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so it's not just of interest to the people wanting to cut it down,

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it also attracts the occasional scientist.

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Thanks, Rob, don't mind me!

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Rob Williams is a conservation biologist, and Charlie's nabbed him

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to explore the area of his land closest to the National Park.

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There's a hut there, look.

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Hola!

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Hola!

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They've got some chain saw blades.

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What's all this, Rob?

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That's coca.

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What, cocaine?

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This is the coca leaf that, yeah, that cocaine's made from.

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Blimey.

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Someone's got a habit, haven't they?

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-Shall we go in?

-Yeah.

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Hmm. That's not good.

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That's really weird. That's spooky.

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I'm wandering around someone's house.

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Well, there's some forest that's been cut down.

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I think this explains the coca leaves in the house.

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Why?

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Looks like coca plants to me. Shall we go and have a look?

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If that's coca plants, do we really want to be walking up here?

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Shouldn't we be a bit...scared?

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You've got quite a production here, Charlie.

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Bloody hell, look at it.

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Someone's been here recently pruning and harvesting...

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-How recently?

-I mean, within days.

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I mean, he's eaten his pineapple and then lain down on this

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sheet of plastic on nice, soft, cut vegetation.

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That's just blown a massive hole in the rainforest bubble.

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Coca leaves have been a sacred part of South American culture

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for thousands of years.

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But Peru is now the largest exporter of cocaine in the world,

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and Charlie's ragged patch of land is the reality

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of what's happening to the rainforest.

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According to the park guards, Charlie doesn't just have

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a field of coca to worry about.

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Somebody has written a reply to his sign on the border of his land.

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Do you think it's a genuine threat?

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What a massive cock-up.

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It looks like Charlie has been terribly naive.

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It's rumoured that the guy who owned the land before him is a local crook

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called Tito, who did time for processing cocaine.

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The guards suspect that Tito and his son Elias

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are one of the families logging the National Park,

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and that they are still using the hut on Charlie's land as a base.

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It's not somewhere that I feel particularly safe any more,

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and it worries me that at any moment a load of guys on motorbikes

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could turn up with guns and do me over and rob me,

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and that's not really what I had in mind when I bought it.

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I thought, "Jesus, probably the best purchase I ever made."

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I don't know what to do with it, I'm a bit down on it, but, you know,

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it's better than a load of crap sitting around my house doing nothing.

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Oh, I've bitten off way more than I can chew.

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I'm useless at doing anything but taking photos.

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After two weeks, Charlie has had enough,

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and decides he needs to get away from the problems on his land.

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He's not the first Westerner with deep pockets to try

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and save a rainforest, but fortunately for Charlie,

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not all of them have been scared off by the local people.

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A day's boat journey east is the Creese Foundation,

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a research centre that specialises in trying to understand

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how to restore damaged rainforest just like Charlie's.

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He couldn't have come to a better place for advice,

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but Charlie's more interested in photographing the animals

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being studied by head biologist, Andy Whitworth.

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Ah, look at his little face.

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Have you got the anti-venom?

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I'd rather have it quickly.

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A poisonous one, Andy?

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An arboreal pit viper. One of the most dangerous ones out here.

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This is enough maybe for the first couple of hours

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until you would get somebody to a hospital.

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When you say "couple of hours to get someone to a hospital,"

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do you mean the hospital that's 12 hours away in Cusco?

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Yeah, but we can stop at a small medical facility on the way.

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All right, let's go.

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Do you get nervous when you're doing this?

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Yeah, most definitely.

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I never get complacent, every time I handle a snake, I'm switched on.

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Oh, he's beautiful.

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Isn't he just?

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He's quite a mean little guy, he's going to be angry,

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he's going to want to strike.

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OK. So you see how he's S-ing now?

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He's ready like a spring... he wants to go.

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Can he reach me from here?

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He's full body length, so... 70 centimetres, 80 centimetres.

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This guy's heavily haemotoxic,

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so if you take a bite from him, you're going to bleed

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from your gums, from your nose, from your eyes.

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Sides are toxic as well so it will start to eat away at the flesh.

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So your skin falls off?

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Yeah, pretty much.

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You wouldn't think something so small would be so deadly.

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Ah, come on, little fella, back on the hook.

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See, he's rattling his tail, he's getting really angry now.

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This is the tricky bit, you've just got to watch your fingers.

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Oh, that's not good. Don't come up there!

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Hey.

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Ah, OK.

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Well done, sir.

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Cheers.

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Oh, it was lovely. What a beautiful animal.

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I'm a bit disappointed I didn't get

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to use my anti-venom for the first time.

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The foundation own an area 20 times larger than Charlie's

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that was once little more than a wasteland,

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but now it's grown back to create a healthy secondary rainforest.

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Look, he's right here, he's right here.

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He's just jumped onto that stem.

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This would have all been logged,

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there would have been agriculture here, coffee.

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So you can see it can regenerate given time.

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So there is hope.

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To see what wildlife might return to his land if given the chance,

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Charlie has asked Andy to take him to an animal hotspot.

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-Andy, how far to go?

-An hour?

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Oh, only another hour and we've only been going 25 minutes.

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-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-We'll start getting to the hill soon.

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Oh, good, we've got a hill. Fantastic.

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There's very little salt in the Amazon,

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so mineral-rich areas are the forest equivalent of an oasis

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and attract animals from miles around.

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You know we're getting close now.

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You can start seeing trails all over the place.

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This is getting a bit heavy.

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So this is where the salts must be coming from,

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out of these rocks, and as the water's running off,

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it's gathering here in this pool.

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So you see the animals, they come in from all different directions,

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and you see them shoving their head right in here.

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-Are they eating this?

-Yeah.

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I think they're one of the most important things in the Western Amazon basin.

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Without them, the animals wouldn't exist.

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They need the salt so badly, and without these clay-licks,

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they just wouldn't have it in their diet at all.

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The plants pretty much take everything up,

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so all the nutrients, everything in the forest is stored in the canopy,

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so the soil and everything down here is really poor,

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and then you suddenly get these little pockets of salt

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and it's like gold to the animals.

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It's what they need.

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Camera traps automatically take photos of anything

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that passes in front of the lens.

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But it's often more luck than judgment guessing where

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the animals are going to be.

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Pretend you're a tapir.

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Lovely. You do a good tapir there.

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Many large mammals also use human trails,

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as they are the easiest way through the tangled undergrowth.

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Yeah, beautiful. There, I reckon.

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I think there are eight species of wildcats in Manu,

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so could get any of them, but they're really hard to see,

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and to get shots of.

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I've done this for months in the past

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and only ever got one shot of them.

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OK, cat man.

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You even snarled!

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Andy's great. He's just a young, very enthusiastic,

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incredibly knowledgeable bloke, who's just deeply in love with the forest.

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Wandering around it with him is an education.

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Nice tree there.

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Yeah.

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This is a cedar, Charlie.

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So, if you planted a few of these on your land at the moment,

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these cedars, this forest here is pretty much what your area

0:26:110:26:14

-should look like in sort of 30 years' time.

-Really?

0:26:140:26:17

-Yeah.

-This is beautiful.

0:26:170:26:18

The real problem you'll have now, Charlie,

0:26:220:26:24

is when you start getting the trees like this and they start

0:26:240:26:27

getting to a decent size, you're going to get people coming in.

0:26:270:26:30

They're going to want these trees then.

0:26:300:26:32

So, it's a sort of vicious circle, isn't it?

0:26:320:26:34

You make it better, create a nice forest,

0:26:340:26:37

everyone's going to want to kill it and chop it down again.

0:26:370:26:41

You've got to be nuts to do something like that.

0:26:420:26:45

I think I'm stupid, is what I am.

0:26:470:26:51

Yeah, it's true.

0:26:510:26:53

I'm still reeling about the fact that I bought the worst bit

0:26:530:26:56

in the most dangerous place in the area and everyone is laughing at me.

0:26:560:27:01

And I don't really want people knowing I'm there

0:27:030:27:05

and knowing what I'm doing cos I don't want to get shot or robbed,

0:27:050:27:08

or any of that stuff. And I'm vulnerable out there.

0:27:080:27:11

I'm vulnerable camping in that place.

0:27:110:27:13

It'll be a tough job.

0:27:130:27:15

Charlie's not going to enjoy everything that he's got

0:27:200:27:24

ahead of him, because he's going to have to change.

0:27:240:27:29

It's the local people that are going to protect it,

0:27:290:27:31

not Charlie in 30 years' time.

0:27:310:27:33

He's not still going to want to stand on that land

0:27:330:27:36

and live in a tent and look after things, so...

0:27:360:27:38

The imperialistic idea of buying up rainforest in a developing country

0:27:390:27:44

from the West isn't the solution.

0:27:440:27:46

Charlie can't save that land,

0:27:480:27:50

until he convinces local people why it's important to do it.

0:27:500:27:54

And that's the challenge.

0:27:550:27:57

Andy.

0:28:150:28:17

What have you seen there, Charlie?

0:28:170:28:19

Fresh jag?

0:28:200:28:21

-Ah, yeah, that's jag.

-That's fresh?

0:28:210:28:24

Yeah, you can see how wide that is.

0:28:240:28:25

Have we got a camera trap up here?

0:28:250:28:27

Yep, we got a camera trap not very far,

0:28:270:28:29

but that's definitely a jaguar pug.

0:28:290:28:32

It could be watching us now, couldn't it?

0:28:320:28:35

And if it is watching us now, what are the chances of us seeing it?

0:28:350:28:38

Should you expect to see snakes in the path?

0:28:440:28:48

One of the biggest ones I ever found was

0:28:480:28:50

just down the trail down here, about another 300 metres on.

0:28:500:28:53

It was a big female bushmaster, stretched

0:28:530:28:56

right across the trail about two and a half metres.

0:28:560:28:59

And a bushmaster would kill you, would it?

0:28:590:29:01

Oh, God, yeah.

0:29:010:29:02

We'll swap round and you can go at the front in a bit.

0:29:020:29:06

Ah! Oh, my God!

0:29:120:29:14

Oh!

0:29:140:29:16

-There's my camera trap.

-Look at how wide that is.

0:29:160:29:18

How nervous am I?

0:29:180:29:20

Nothing. Nothing.

0:29:270:29:30

Ah! It's a puma!

0:29:300:29:31

You got it!

0:29:340:29:36

-Look at the size...big male.

-Let me see, let me see.

-Check him out.

0:29:380:29:42

Ohhh... You're kidding.

0:29:420:29:45

The camera traps reveal far more wildlife than Charlie

0:29:550:29:58

expected to see in just a few days.

0:29:580:30:01

But only ten years ago, this area was hunted out

0:30:010:30:05

and there were practically no animals at all.

0:30:050:30:07

The thing that's hit me more than anything else

0:30:120:30:14

is the speed at which this forest has recovered.

0:30:140:30:17

-Whoa!

-He's staring at it.

0:30:170:30:19

And that made me realise actually that really in a fairly short

0:30:220:30:27

period of time I could get my bit of forest back up to

0:30:270:30:30

being, you know, decent, good land, full of wildlife, full of diversity.

0:30:300:30:35

So that's the main chunk of inspiration I've taken out of this place.

0:30:350:30:39

Charlie's like a child in a way,

0:30:440:30:48

like, he has this inner passion for nature,

0:30:480:30:52

and he wants to photograph it.

0:30:520:30:55

That's his way of telling the world about why something's so special.

0:30:550:31:00

But for him to buy a rainforest is completely off the cuff.

0:31:000:31:04

Who knows what he was thinking when he did it but...er...

0:31:040:31:09

..yeah, he's going to learn a few things.

0:31:110:31:14

The idea that we should create buffer zones

0:31:180:31:20

around national parks to protect the most precious

0:31:200:31:23

forests in the Amazon

0:31:230:31:25

was first suggested in the 1970s.

0:31:250:31:28

But conservationists now agree that it can't work

0:31:280:31:31

unless the local communities are in charge.

0:31:310:31:34

Unfortunately, Charlie's too scared

0:31:360:31:38

to go back to his land and face the people he thinks are logging Manu.

0:31:380:31:42

And yet wherever he goes, he sees more reasons to protect the park.

0:31:440:31:49

Slow down, slow down.

0:31:490:31:51

Just keep the boat at that speed.

0:31:530:31:55

This is unbelievable.

0:31:580:31:59

Just there are four uncontacted Indian women.

0:32:000:32:04

My heart is going completely crazy.

0:32:060:32:08

Everyone keep dead still.

0:32:100:32:12

They're shouting at us,

0:32:130:32:15

I've got no idea what they're saying, obviously.

0:32:150:32:17

WOMEN CALL

0:32:170:32:20

I never expected to...to see them.

0:32:260:32:29

You hear about them but you just never expect to see them.

0:32:290:32:33

As far as anyone knows, there are seven indigenous tribes

0:32:390:32:43

living in voluntary isolation throughout Manu, but combined

0:32:430:32:47

they would number less than a few thousand individuals.

0:32:470:32:50

Though they are rarely seen and often aggressively defend

0:32:570:33:01

their decision to be left alone,

0:33:010:33:03

our world is not totally alien to the tribes.

0:33:030:33:07

Missionaries and illegal loggers have been known to

0:33:070:33:10

lure them from the forest with gifts of cooking pots and machetes.

0:33:100:33:13

But any contact risks spreading disease

0:33:150:33:17

and could wipe them out forever.

0:33:170:33:19

It's just absolutely unbelievable... what I've just seen.

0:33:290:33:34

You know what, we are... 30 miles from my land,

0:33:390:33:43

and there's uncontacted women on the beach.

0:33:430:33:46

That's incredible, isn't it?

0:33:480:33:50

The uncontacted tribes have good reason to stay hidden.

0:33:570:34:00

Between 1850 and 1930, entire populations were

0:34:020:34:07

enslaved by American and European rubber barons.

0:34:070:34:11

A quarter of a million indigenous people died throughout the Amazon

0:34:150:34:19

so that we could have tyres and condoms.

0:34:190:34:22

But many of the tribes did not return to the forest,

0:34:280:34:31

and two days from Charlie's land is the indigenous community of Belgica.

0:34:310:34:38

Over the past hundred years,

0:34:390:34:41

the Yine have embraced many aspects of the industrialised world,

0:34:410:34:46

but they still see the rainforest as their home.

0:34:460:34:49

To support the community, the Yine have a licence to harvest

0:35:220:35:26

a limited number of trees from their tribal homeland,

0:35:260:35:29

a 500-square-kilometre primary rainforest.

0:35:290:35:33

The Yine manage their forest sustainably

0:35:490:35:52

and allow each logged area to recover

0:35:520:35:55

but, controversially, their quota

0:35:550:35:57

permits them to cut down 90% of their big-leaf mahogany,

0:35:570:36:01

a threatened species

0:36:010:36:03

that is protected in some South American countries.

0:36:030:36:06

The mahogany is a rare beast now and I've never seen one before.

0:36:270:36:30

The sad and depressing thing is that that particular mahogany tree

0:36:310:36:36

is marked, and it's getting cut down in 24 hours' time.

0:36:360:36:41

Last year, the Yine cut down nine of the 150

0:36:460:36:50

mahogany trees on their land.

0:36:500:36:52

But this forest is their only resource

0:36:530:36:56

and big-leaf mahogany their most valuable asset.

0:36:560:36:59

Each tree is worth £3,500 to the Yine.

0:36:590:37:04

And by the time it's sold as luxury furniture in Britain and America,

0:37:040:37:08

it could be worth 20 times as much.

0:37:080:37:10

But Charlie wants to know

0:37:120:37:13

what the environmental cost is of cutting down one of these giants.

0:37:130:37:18

And he's asked Andy to gather a group of biologists to catalogue

0:37:190:37:23

every species that depend on this single tree for their survival.

0:37:230:37:27

A bio-blast is sort of a funky name for...

0:37:280:37:32

HE LAUGHS

0:37:320:37:33

..some scientists looking at stuff!

0:37:330:37:35

You take something like the mahogany tree

0:37:370:37:40

and you very quickly assess how many different species there are.

0:37:400:37:44

So they can then have a picture of how much life

0:37:440:37:47

this thing's sustaining.

0:37:470:37:49

I'm going to photograph everything that we can get,

0:37:540:37:57

so that we've got a picture record of it,

0:37:570:37:59

not just a written record of a Latin name.

0:37:590:38:02

The thing about the rainforest is,

0:38:030:38:05

it's very rare to actually see anything in it.

0:38:050:38:08

You get buzzed around by a load of insects

0:38:080:38:11

but to take insects from it,

0:38:110:38:13

and stick them on white,

0:38:130:38:15

you get a really good chance to really have a look at them,

0:38:150:38:18

completely removed from the massive tangle of confusing greenery.

0:38:180:38:22

And it's then that you start to see

0:38:220:38:25

the incredible complexity of all the life here.

0:38:250:38:27

There are actual little characters in this. Little lives.

0:38:290:38:33

The place is just buzzing.

0:38:330:38:35

You know, there's probably three or four species of bee

0:38:350:38:39

just flying around me now.

0:38:390:38:41

But until you actually get one of those, stick it on white

0:38:410:38:44

and have a decent look at it, you can't really relate to it.

0:38:440:38:48

Just taking it off that wing and then this one should just come off.

0:38:520:38:55

You can see almost all of these birds look the same.

0:38:580:39:01

But they'll all have a slightly different niche,

0:39:010:39:03

different things that they feed on.

0:39:030:39:06

A tree like the mahogany that we've got here provides all these

0:39:060:39:09

different levels, these different homes, all the different food,

0:39:090:39:12

and when you remove those trees you remove the complexity of the forest.

0:39:120:39:16

It completely disappears.

0:39:160:39:18

And so you end up with only the very common species, the generalists,

0:39:180:39:21

and you lose the guys like this one that's more uncommon,

0:39:210:39:24

and probably a real specialist,

0:39:240:39:27

and probably relies on the tree that we're working on.

0:39:270:39:30

It's not comfortable, is it?

0:39:540:39:56

There's an absolutely stunning butterfly

0:40:060:40:08

that I've never seen before.

0:40:080:40:10

Don't you move.

0:40:130:40:14

-Yes! I've got it!

-You got it?

0:40:150:40:18

I've got it.

0:40:180:40:19

Now what are you going to do?

0:40:200:40:22

-No!

-You've lost it!

0:40:240:40:25

No...

0:40:270:40:28

The dirt and bees is just so painful.

0:40:300:40:33

Time passes slowly for the big trees

0:40:390:40:42

and this mahogany could be anywhere between 100 and 400 years old.

0:40:420:40:48

When it's cut down, fast-growing plants will rush in

0:40:480:40:51

and scramble toward the light,

0:40:510:40:54

and as the forest loses some of its oldest inhabitants,

0:40:540:40:58

it's inevitable that it also loses the specialist plants and animals

0:40:580:41:03

that rely on the extra sunlight that the upper branches provide.

0:41:030:41:07

Up on these top branches on the far part

0:41:120:41:14

there's some beautiful pink flowers.

0:41:140:41:17

I see them. Yeah, I can just see them up there.

0:41:170:41:20

Really nice orchid.

0:41:200:41:22

Every time I open my eyes, I get bees in there.

0:41:270:41:31

Ahhh, God!

0:41:310:41:33

HE SPLUTTERS AND LAUGHS

0:41:330:41:35

It's just crazy! It's crazy! Oh, my God!

0:41:350:41:39

How can something so incredible just be so awful at the same time?!

0:41:410:41:46

Ever get the feeling the tree is trying to say something?

0:41:460:41:49

-Yeah, "Leave me alone."

-Yeah.

0:41:490:41:51

God knows how many creatures I actually catalogued today

0:42:070:42:10

and how many I sat and photographed.

0:42:100:42:12

But that's just the tip of the iceberg.

0:42:130:42:16

It's depressing not just cos the thing's coming down,

0:42:200:42:23

but all these little lives that I looked at today,

0:42:230:42:26

everything's changing for them as well.

0:42:260:42:28

So, you're not just cutting down a tree,

0:42:290:42:32

you're destroying a whole ecosystem, a whole world.

0:42:320:42:36

It's totally bizarre to me

0:42:390:42:42

there should be a demand for this

0:42:420:42:46

because people think it looks nice.

0:42:460:42:49

There's no reason on Earth

0:42:510:42:54

anyone in Britain needs anything made from mahogany.

0:42:540:42:59

Yet, we're still importing

0:42:590:43:03

more mahogany than most other countries in the world.

0:43:030:43:06

-Oh, he's nice.

-Yeah, found this...

-Nice, mate.

0:43:170:43:20

-Grab him.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

0:43:200:43:23

Amazing.

0:43:410:43:43

This thing that we've got in the box is not something to mess about with.

0:43:480:43:51

It's a wandering spider.

0:43:510:43:53

It's the one spider in South America that you could potentially die from.

0:43:530:43:57

SIGHING AND CHUCKLING

0:44:030:44:06

Oi... That was on my finger.

0:44:090:44:11

-It's on the ground?

-Yeah.

0:44:150:44:18

All right, let's try again.

0:44:200:44:22

-Did we get any in the high traps?

-Yeah.

0:44:330:44:36

Jenny just told me that there's 36 butterfly species that we've found.

0:44:360:44:41

We don't have, we have similar.

0:44:410:44:42

-We don't have it?

-No.

0:44:420:44:44

So it's a new species... Excellent.

0:44:440:44:47

In the whole of Britain, there are seven native species of amphibian.

0:44:510:44:56

Around one tree in the Amazon, the team found 21.

0:44:580:45:02

In total, they found 204 different species in just 24 hours.

0:45:090:45:15

Some are potentially new to science

0:45:170:45:20

and may not exist anywhere else on Earth.

0:45:200:45:23

But there's one species that depends on this tree

0:45:280:45:31

that Charlie didn't think to photograph.

0:45:310:45:34

I suppose the thing that gets me is, I've watched since I was a kid

0:45:530:45:56

and been taught at school all about the Amazon

0:45:560:45:59

and rainforest destruction and logging

0:45:590:46:02

and all these environmental problems.

0:46:020:46:04

You know, I'm 40 now and those problems haven't gone away,

0:46:040:46:07

it's all still happening.

0:46:070:46:09

We had awareness in the '70s of what was happening to the Amazon.

0:46:150:46:19

Bugger all's changed, has it?

0:46:220:46:24

HAMMER STRIKES NAIL

0:47:120:47:14

An hour. Over 100 years gone in an hour.

0:47:270:47:30

That's all I can think.

0:47:310:47:33

People can have nice tables...

0:47:530:47:55

..coffins.

0:47:580:48:00

Lucky them, eh?

0:48:050:48:07

Nothing at all...says to me this is the fault of the community.

0:48:340:48:39

It's not their fault, they've got to survive. This is their land.

0:48:400:48:44

I can't...I cannot understand why people...

0:48:480:48:53

HIS VOICE CRACKS

0:48:530:48:55

..why people need to buy mahogany in the first place.

0:48:550:48:57

But it's not really about blame, is it?

0:49:010:49:04

It's about...trying to sort it out so that it doesn't have to happen.

0:49:040:49:08

But they've got to survive,

0:49:130:49:16

but I don't believe this is the way.

0:49:160:49:18

When I embarked on this project, I thought it would be much more simple

0:49:330:49:37

and I knew the answers, and actually,

0:49:370:49:39

the more I understand it, the less I understand it.

0:49:390:49:42

Because it's a very complex situation,

0:49:460:49:50

but...I feel like at least I'm doing something.

0:49:500:49:54

Three square kilometres of rainforest are destroyed

0:49:580:50:02

every day in Peru

0:50:020:50:03

and up to 80% of the trees felled are cut down illegally.

0:50:030:50:08

The system is so corrupt that by the time timber leaves the sawmills,

0:50:100:50:14

it's almost impossible to know where it came from.

0:50:140:50:18

But Charlie didn't come to Peru to solve all of the problems facing

0:50:220:50:26

the Amazon - he wanted to protect one corner of Manu National Park.

0:50:260:50:30

For the last three weeks, he's avoided returning to his land,

0:50:320:50:36

but if he doesn't face up to the illegal loggers now,

0:50:360:50:39

he may as well go home.

0:50:390:50:41

Yeah, they must have been... What they do is they bring it all out

0:50:440:50:47

and they pile it up and load it onto a truck.

0:50:470:50:49

It's almost certain that the previous landowner, Tito,

0:50:510:50:54

and his son Elias have been moving wood through Charlie's land

0:50:540:50:58

and the tyre tracks lead to a field that he hasn't been to before.

0:50:580:51:03

This massive area was burnt to the ground years ago

0:51:050:51:09

and now it's being used to grow crops.

0:51:090:51:12

Look, and there, that rim of trees is national park.

0:51:150:51:19

That's been logged. That should be primary forest, there.

0:51:210:51:24

If Tito and Elias have been here recently,

0:51:300:51:32

then it's possible they're still in the area.

0:51:320:51:35

It's actually the worst situation we could be in.

0:51:390:51:42

Elias is illegally logging the park and the whole reason

0:51:420:51:46

I bought that land was to stop the national park getting logged.

0:51:460:51:49

So I'm a bit... I suppose I'm a bit annoyed.

0:51:530:51:56

Actually, I think the thing to do is go and meet him.

0:51:560:52:00

Fresh footprints, there.

0:52:190:52:22

That can't be more than half an hour old.

0:52:230:52:26

In this heat, it would have dried out by now.

0:52:260:52:29

It's weird, isn't it? Tracking a human.

0:52:290:52:31

Chain saw.

0:52:370:52:39

I think I hear a chain saw.

0:52:400:52:42

We've got to measure this one up.

0:52:470:52:49

I don't really want to...bust Elias,

0:52:490:52:54

illegally logging in the middle of nowhere.

0:52:540:52:56

Er...

0:52:580:52:59

It could actually be quite dangerous.

0:53:000:53:04

MECHANICAL WHINE IN DISTANCE

0:53:040:53:07

That a chain saw?

0:53:070:53:09

Yeah, a chain saw, and we're in the middle of nowhere

0:53:090:53:11

and we just walked half an hour up a small forest creek.

0:53:110:53:17

WHINING INTENSIFIES

0:53:170:53:20

Elias!

0:53:290:53:30

Elias!

0:53:320:53:35

Hola!

0:53:350:53:36

Hola!

0:53:390:53:41

-Hola.

-Hola.

-Como estas?

0:53:480:53:51

Hola, Elias.

0:53:530:53:55

Elias...hola.

0:53:550:53:58

Elias. Hola, Elias.

0:53:580:54:00

Elias. Como estas?

0:54:070:54:09

Hi.

0:54:090:54:10

You are a hard man to find.

0:54:120:54:14

We need to... We need to talk about the land.

0:54:180:54:22

You have somewhere to sit and chew your coca while we talk about it?

0:54:220:54:26

Si.

0:54:260:54:27

MAN SPEAKS SPANISH Tito?

0:54:310:54:34

Because the thing I don't want, Tito,

0:54:560:54:59

is I gave you lots of money for the land and then...

0:54:590:55:02

you have all the money

0:55:020:55:04

and then things just carry on the way they were when you owned it.

0:55:040:55:07

Now is the time I want to protect it so that it can get better.

0:55:070:55:11

But I'm not some rich gringo who's come here to throw people off land.

0:55:130:55:16

That's why we need to talk.

0:55:160:55:18

Don't know what to say to that.

0:55:530:55:55

Not 100% sure I believe it, but...anyway.

0:55:570:56:02

I need to think about it, Tito.

0:56:090:56:11

It's balancing...what...

0:56:240:56:27

I suppose, ultimately what I value more.

0:56:270:56:31

Do I value protecting Manu

0:56:310:56:35

more than I...value...a family?

0:56:350:56:41

And that's what is complex for me because...

0:56:430:56:45

..I probably value Manu more.

0:56:470:56:51

So I've really got to...

0:56:530:56:56

I've got to put my pity and sorrow for them aside

0:56:560:57:00

and get on with the job that needs doing.

0:57:000:57:03

That's my thought at the moment, and that means booting them out.

0:57:030:57:06

They need to leave the land.

0:57:110:57:13

Next time, Charlie's wife comes to Peru

0:57:180:57:21

and sees straightaway that he's making a terrible mistake.

0:57:210:57:25

I knew it wouldn't be easy.

0:57:250:57:27

I knew conservation isn't just about putting a fence round something

0:57:270:57:31

and leaving it, and Charlie won't be told anything.

0:57:310:57:35

Charlie is more determined than ever when he sees the devastation

0:57:370:57:41

caused by gold mining.

0:57:410:57:44

But it's not as easy as he'd hoped to get Elias off the land.

0:57:480:57:52

-You know, what sort of

-BLEEP

-would I be if did?

0:58:010:58:04

Go on an interactive journey with the Open University

0:58:080:58:11

to explore the challenges facing the rainforest.

0:58:110:58:14

Go to...

0:58:150:58:18

..and follow the links to the Open University.

0:58:200:58:23

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