If there’s one takeaway from tonight’s episode of Gold Rush: Parker’s trail, it’s don’t EVER go swimming in Guyana’s Rewa River. If you want to come out alive, that is.
Because this week’s unsettling instalment of the hit Gold Rush spin-off shows that although this murky waterway is many things, hospitable to human life it is not.
Wary and on the lookout while they navigate the bends of the Rewa, Monsters and Critics’ exclusive clip shows Parker Schnabel and his team traveling down the river as caiman pop up all over the place.
In the water and laying on the banks, they appear to be everywhere. But Parker knows what everyone’s thinking as he says to Rick Ness: “How many of them DON’T you see?”
Rick looks slightly nervous, as he looks around and admits he’s finding the place “spooky”.
The Rewa river is a natural home to both black and spectacled caiman, as well as giant anaconda and flesh-eating red-bellied piranha.
This is most certainly somewhere you do not want to fall out your boat, with man-eaters galore lurking everywhere. It is also home to an astounding and annoying array of insect life like large, biting black horseflies.
The crew has taken no food supplies so they must fish for a meal.
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Cameraman Sam Brown can be heard coaching Rick in the background, before he lands a red-bellied piranha in a matter of seconds. Then, a feast of flesh-eaters come in as the team catch one after another.
The group marvels at the physiology of the deceivingly diminutive piranhas, which have layered and intense muscles around their fearsome jaws.
Gingerly, Ness opens the mouth of one as they all carefully inspect this tiny but deadly fish’s frightening rows of teeth.
“That would leave a f****** dent, man,” says Rick.
As the team effortlessly continue to pull in piranhas with their bait, Parker jokes: “These fish want to be caught!”
Here’s hoping the crew all stay in the boat until they get to where they are going.
Gold Rush: Parker’s Trail airs Friday at 9/8c on Discovery.