Brazilian Adventure

Brazilian Adventure is a book by Peter Fleming about his search for the lost Colonel Percy Fawcett in the Brazilian jungle. The book was initially published in 1933 by Alden Press. Overview In 1925, British explorer Colonel Percy Fawcett, along with his son and another companion, disappeared while searching in Brazil for the Lost City of Z. Not long after, Peter Fleming, who was literary editor for London's The Times, answered a small ad seeking volunteers for an expedition to find out what had happened to them. Fleming's story of that 1932 expedition is told in Brazilian Adventure. Despite a great deal of fanfare, the expedition seems to have been very poorly organized. Fleming and his companions do not seem to have done much preparation, not even bothering to learn any Portuguese. They left everything up to the leader they hired, an eccentric American, Major George Lewy Pingle (not his real name) who lived in Brazil. They sailed from England, met Pingle, and followed him to the Araguaya river and down it, with Fleming, an admirer of Hemingway, blasting away at the wildlife "for sport" as they went. When the expedition reached the Tapirapé River, which Fawcett was known to have traveled, the group fell apart. Major Pingle, whose bizarre moments of unreason had been making things more and more difficult all along, claimed the search was impossible and he was giving it up. Some of the members of the expedition agreed with him. Fleming and two others, however, decided to continue on their own and left to go up the Tapirape with their bearers. Traveling through the tropical jungle was very difficult; eventually only Fleming and Pettiward could keep going. When they spotted natives in the distance who were said to be cannibals, they turned back. They were still uncertain about the fate of Fawcett, but they had turned up more clues than they started with.