On October 1st 1769, Isabel Godin des Odonais left her Peruvian hacienda and went deep into the jungle. She was to join her husband in Guyana, whom she had not seen him for twenty years. The expedition had 41 members, including 31 native porters to carry the sixty boxes of luggage through the jungle. The aim was to reach the Amazon, where Doña Isabel's husband had chartered a boat. It was a 1500 mile journey through the jungle, using 18th-century methods. It would be a calamity.