The torn green awning flapped in the early-morning breeze with its sweet scent of rich wet earth. The sun was rising over the rainforest in a rush of orange. Birds picked up their singing, echoing across the water. Maggie couldn’t help but wonder how many such mornings were left in the Yasuni. In front of them, a huge barge came into view, slogging upriver, stacked high with 36-inch thick lengths of pipe. To carry away the black gold. Destined for one of the two last pristine remnants of Amazon rainforest. The report of the canoe’s engine popped off the giant metal hull of the barge as they swept by and Maggie saw the name stenciled on the sides of the pipe: Commerce Oil. Halfway to Yasuni, they stopped at a tienda, the last store before the jungle, to gas up, where there was cell-phone coverage. Maggie helped the driver lug a can of fuel to the boat and he accepted her offer of a cold drink. Inside the store, originally built decades ago by nuns who ran a nearby mission, when all that lay beyond here was unspoiled jungle, Maggie found numerous shoppers, oil-workers stocking up on beer, cigarettes, and other luxuries, although traveling water-bound shops would fill in—at a handsome markup.
