It is 02:40. Anton and I have staked out a small corner of a mostly empty departures hall in Brasilia. We have just flown in from Macapá - where we said goodbye to our sorry yellow boat - and will shortly be on our way to Sao Paulo. Thinking it useful to commit our very first reflections on the past 60 days to paper, Anton and I ordered a couple of drinks (a Stella Artois for him and, thanks to the antibiotics, coffee for me) and buckled down.

It's been a very eventful 24 hours; well, 36 hours to be fair. As Mark and I reached our final checkpoint we realised that we were going to make it, and even with a bit of time to spare. It's thoughts like that that catch you out though as suddenly we dropped out of 8/9kmph down to 1.5/2kmph. As we moved out of an island network we came head on with the full force of the tidal Amazon; we would battle on for 20 minutes just to break for water to see our meagre mileage taken back from us.

So I had written a large blog about the occurrences in Manaus yet what started yet again with the line "well what an eventful 24 hours" and was only supposed to be a short one-page recap ended up being a three-page, drama queen, blow-by-blow moan-a-thon. The moment for that blog has long gone because now we are what we set out to be in August; we are just two very good friends, neighbours even, doing something amazing and having an amazing time doing it.

I'm back in Iquitos, it did seem much longer than the way out there. It was no easy decision to take. I get myself cheering for them and I'm happy to see their progress on the map.

I'm sure it will be now even more seen full for them to accomplish the journey. I was the translator in a foreigner land now they have to talk and understand the river, and Anton and Mark are doing it very well.

Don't pay attention to scaremongers. No matter how noble the intention, tales of robbery and murder will forever put you off visiting one of the wonders of the world. People love stories of anguish and horror, particularly when based in fact. However, they do a poor job at contextualisation and fail to link factual data to statistical probabilities.

We have come to a point in our journey where we are no longer going in the same direction. I will not be continuing with the team from this point. I have brought Mark and Anton as far as I can, translating, setting up receptions in every port, bringing them through the most dangerous part of the river, teaching them to read the river and current and how to navigate the Amazon at night. From now to Macapá they do not need me anymore, and I have done everything I can for them.

I think I'm not sleeping properly due to a combination of stress and exhaustion. The exhaustion isn't going to get any better for the next few days / weeks but I realised last night that the stress I can deal with. As soon as I see the other guys today I am going to explain, explain that yes I am stressed at the moment and that I realise it, also to apologise in advance for being awful to be with when I am stressed and to ask them to tell me when they think I am letting it get to me too much, they will be able to see better than me anyway.

At the very first moment that we started talking about this journey and its possible challenges, it sounded that would be close to the mission impossible, not because of the possible events that could create obstacles, for example storms. It was almost stressing to hear all the warning about the pirates, river villains and the Brazilian authorities.

I came to Peru and decided to live here because of the jungle and I think there is hope and amazing potential. The people are left to their own luck and the jungle left to be abused and used as if it could be replaced after we destroy it. After a short talk to Anton and Mark I thought that this was maybe my chance to talk to people who are listening. To talk to people that are interested in helping and hoping to do something for the Amazon.

More than showing the Amazon, and its beauties and issues, for me this trip has been both treacherous and rewarding. I’m used to physical challenges but this has become more than that, a mix of competing egos, personal unfinished issues, experiments with emotional balance, and the 24x7 lack of privacy.

It's very hard to be told what your faults are; it's especially hard to be told what your faults are whilst you are blowing all of your energy trying to row the length of the river Amazon, so as the facts were pointed out to me the news cut me deep. Annoyingly the 48 hours previously I felt as strong as an ox. Physically I was weak however mentally I was as strong as I had ever been, I felt amazing with a capital 'A'.

Anton's been very candid about last night's clearing-the-air and the build-up of small frustrations and misunderstandings that led up to it. None of it should surprise. We are human after all – three of them – sequestered to a small ocean rowing boat in intense heat, deprived of sleep, sex and solitude, on a river the colour of cities (to borrow from Saul Bellow).

As we neared the border we all felt an amazing sense of relief. Our very expensive yet completely useless GPS maps and system kept promising the next bend would be ours and yet each one showed just more and more water, islands and riverbank. As night set in we realised that it was not going to be as easy as we first thought. In the dark we could finally see first the lights of Santa Rosa, the frontier town in Peru, then further in the distance the lights of Leticia and Tabatina.

Last night Murilo woke me for my shift extremely excited; he had been followed by a pod of pink dolphins for the past two hours and in the background I could hear them all breaching the surface to breathe and see what their crazy intruder was doing next. As a rule dolphins will not come to a boat; they've learnt that it can be dangerous as a local with a gun could see an easy meal. However in the pitch black of night they kept scaring me by creating loud whooshing noises right next to me.

I could have cried, and I actually did a little. Well, a lot to be honest. The boat had finally arrived to us but our ordeals had only really just begun. The shipping agent that we love so dearly had given us a number of different days and times for arrival, but that story we know. The boat had arrived battered and broken, the keel was split along the hull where they had dragged it along the floor, and the body was scratched and punctured.

Well I'm finding it harder and harder to stay positive; on the outside I am calm and supportive with the other guys, however inside I am prepared to murder someone. We are all currently in Nauta which is our official start point. It's still 20km away from the Amazon by name but here we have supplies and assistance if needed, however we are still yet to receive a boat.

In the boat we have an array of different sprays, covers and treatments but as you know we don't have the boat so in the meantime I just have to struggle through. We also have a bright yellow boat which is not the smartest colour to have chosen - we will however be out on the water and my hope is that on the water there will be fewer bugs and any bugs there are will be blown away by the breeze.

These past five days have been so long. Since I had the fortune to join the Row the Amazon team I kind of pressed pause on my life in Iquitos so I could spend more time with Mark and Anton. My English is very limited to express (in writing) what I feel about them, I couldn't reply to Anton's words about me it would not make justice.

Alcohol is a funny thing: it doesn't combine well with exercise, it is a no-no for commercial negotiations. It quickly produces behaviours that are politically very incorrect. It makes fools of the best, and voyeurs of the rest, of us. Yet in spite of it all - or because of it - it can also do wonders for team development: it breaks down barriers and cuts to the chase far more quickly and more effectively, than do more sophisticated team-building exercises: people lower their guard and, in doing so, show you their mettle.

This weekend we spent a couple of nights bonding at Murilo's reserve in the jungle. When I call it a reserve I mean it as well - this isn't one of those tourist venues with paths and a pool, this is the real deal. I won't blog about what Murilo has and hasn't done with the place because I can't do it justice, and he can tell you himself now, but I will however talk about what we discussed.

Wow how things have changed over the last week, up and down, round and round. So as you now know we have a new and improved team, and what a line up. Murilo has joined our team and it feels like it has been planned since the start, I don't mean that in some strange aligning of the planets way, I mean that it feels comfortable and normal. We have already introduced Murilo and he has also introduced himself so now you have three points of view, opinions and experiences heading your way.

I don't know what Patti's typical working day is, but I know that, when she comes to the hotel in the afternoon, she carries with her a list of calls to make, or an email that has been sent and even files and documents for us to take. As soon as she gets here she tells us both something in Spanish, then grabs one of our laptops and heads straight for Google translate to get the message across clearly, then she will pick up our phone (local tariff) and make countless calls on our behalf to shipping agents and storage places, booking accommodation and excursions if we want them.

More than anything, I like to be in direct contact with nature and the jungle. I believe this is a great chance to call attention for the Amazon and try to motivate conservation and spread the word of preserving and loving the animals. Rowing the Amazon will give the physical feeling of its magnitude.

So as usual at coffee Mark and I began talking, we are now a team of three but Murilo has other commitments with his businesses so he can't always join us which is a shame because it's these little points and conversations that will jell us all together. Anyway the conversation came to what type of person we thought we were, I often find myself trying to figure out what part of me brings me to these points in my life.

So it's a done deal. Late last night we 'signed up' the third member of our team. Born and raised deep inside the dark heart of Brazil's jungle, Murilo Reis is as tough as they come. At 5'10" he isn't massively tall. Nor is he particularly big. But he's the real deal: mentally tough, muscular (in a stringy, understated sort of way), hugely experienced, and Zen-like - not easily fussed or disturbed, unafraid, his threshold for pain several standard deviations above ours.

The abundance of time gives one cause to reflect. Despite the excitement of bobbing along the river in a few days' time (in truth we'll be rowing as if our life depended on it, seeing that we need to cover at least 80 miles a day, every day), I worry about what I know is to come. Forget the pirates: they are a possibility, albeit a strong one. Let's focus on the certainty, namely of ordinary guys stuck on a small vessel with no place to go, no privacy, and no possibility of respite.

I can't believe how this event is developing, I'm not a religious person and I've had to point this out a surprisingly large number of times here, yet something somewhere is afoot. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that I have experienced the effects of someone or something else's influence on my life, I've recently described my life as seeming to be controlled by the tides, with surprising and uncontrollable lows followed by amazing highs.

Our shortlist (until early this morning) consisted of three people, all of whom more or less fitted the bill (the emphasis on 'more or less'). The first, a Peruvian, seemed perfect: an ex-SAS who speaks both Spanish and Portuguese, and spent 18 months training with the Israeli Special Forces. Alas, he ventured out into the jungle eight days ago and hasn't been seen since.

It's not as stupid as it sounds, we would be faster, safer and with the right person we would be able to avoid trouble and negotiate our way through encounters. Already we have decided to ditch the weekly stops for sightseeing and human interest stories so why not make it safe and fast as well. It should be pointed out that we were advised this during our planning stages and a number of high profile adventurers were suggested but we wanted this for ourselves and said no.

Anton and I have taken to skinny-dipping in the middle of the night. I had a go at around midnight last night, Anton at 3am. The pool's pretty much right outside of our bedroom door and helps take the edge off the heat. And frankly it feels kind of nice to have removed all firewalls between skin and the elements - even if climbing out of an ice-cold pool naked is never a proud moment, or at least for me it isn't.

So Mark has been here for almost a week now and I know I am feeling much better at least. We have shared the burden of the boat and also discussed our feelings about loved ones at home. We both miss everyone desperately but we aren't throwing the towel in just yet, don't worry.

Let me let you in on a little secret. Aside from our various 'formal' reasons for doing something as stupid as rowing down the Amazon unprotected - things like raising money for Leonard Cheshire Disability, however superbly worthwhile, and the pursuit of a novel piece of auto/ethnography and of research questions that can only ever be unearthed by means of first-hand experience - there are others: Anton and I have each had a pretty volatile year.

With a bit of luck the boat will be joining us in a week as well. We are both hoping to get started by the 10th at the latest, but hopefully sooner, as this way we will still have a chance of completing the row before our flights home. In the meantime though we still need to prepare; provisions need to be acquired and a plan of action for when the boat finally arrives must be formulated. And of course we need to look after each other as well. Mark has been a very uplifting influence on me and now I need to make sure I have the same effect on him.

During our private viewing of Fitzcarraldo, we did manage to down two-thirds of a bottle of the most stunning gin - Cambridge Gin, made by our friend and colleague Lucy Lowe, and labelled specifically for our Row the Amazon adventure - before heading out for a night of karaoke. It's all a bit of a blur now but I do believe I actually lost my karaoke virginity that night to John Lennon's 'Imagine'.

Voices are raised, hands are being held up, all my positive thoughts are running away from me right now and I can see it all falling apart. 'No, no, no,' is all I hear and the panic sets in. Lackeys are now throwing tyres out of the container. We used them to protect the boat during transit, but as we don't have a permit to import tyres they have to go.

I sat there in the meeting with four other people, everyone speaking Spanish except me. I feel my hackles rising and I tell myself that any outburst is not going to help, so I slip into irritated-Anton mode instead and sit there in complete ignorance as they talk about me and my "allergies to food" and "medication". They speak in passionate, aggressive tones and I get more and more annoyed.

Our shipping agent hasn't sent the correct form or signed the right box and now Karen from Lima wants to take all of our food and medicines off the boat and impound them. I'm stood in the centre of this market hearing the news on a local phone and feeling completely helpless. I try all of my best tricks: flirting, apologising, playing dumb (this one is easy), but not even the offer of paying whatever it costs is enough to get the boat out. Suddenly everything is in jeopardy and we race back to the hotel.

The indigenous people of the Amazon are no stranger to superstition. From our 'sophisticated' armchairs, we smirk at the thought. That is, until we realise that the very best (and almost certainly most ambitious) athletes are little better. Examples are mostly well-known: Canadian hurdler Angela Whyte never carries her podium clothes with her to the track at international competitions for fear of it jinxing her performance. Lawn bowler David Mathie plays with the price tag still attached to his right shoe, whereas his colleague Erin Marie Roth carries a poker chip with her when playing internationally ... If this seems mildly amusing, just remember that many of us are really no more resistant to such illusions in everyday life.

As I walked out of the airport in Iquitos I remembered why I love this city so much. Firstly it's warm; even at midnight the temperature is high. A local ex-pat turned taxi driver was waiting for me, and as we zipped through the streets of Iquitos - still quite busy considering it was midnight on a Sunday - I considered what my next few days will be like ... The worrying thing is that the boat hasn't arrived here yet. It was supposed to be here on the 14th, and I was looking forward to getting it ready for Mark's arrival, but now it looks like I have a bit of enforced R&R (which I think I need). There is so much stuff that I haven't finished yet and this is my chance - all these little jobs that have been brushed aside will now get my full attention as I sit in the sun and the heat and dip into the dodgy-looking pool.

Another week, another adventure. Our boat has arrived in Lima, Peru, but has been held for 'safeguarding' by our friends at customs. Fortunately help is at hand. Our fixer for Peru (formerly Chief of Police in Lima) assures us that, while customs officers keep changing their minds as to what to do with a golden yellow rowing boat, all will be well. Our Brazilian fixer, who once accompanied Sir Peter Blake on his fateful mission, has been active too.

Anton and I have taken out plenty time to discuss what matters most (and what doesn't) as we prepare to row the length of the named Amazon river, unsupported. Others have kayaked, swum, even walked, the length. One poor soul tried motoring his way through in a bathtub surrounded by empty oil barrels but never got beyond the Brazilian border. The authorities just wouldn't have it. Several brave individuals have traipsed as far back as the river's source; that, sadly, our ocean rowing boat would never manage. Food and water included, the damn thing weighs nearly a ton. But, as far as we can tell, no one has rowed it - especially not without a support crew.