It was the low season, and we and a German couple were Kapawi’s only guests. Visitors typically fly in from Shell on four-, five- or eight-day packages of standard jungle lodge fare: dugout canoe rides, guided forest walks, and spotting animals (Kapawi’s remote location within a protected reserve offers a particularly excellent chance of that). Riding back the next morning from a clay lick enjoyed by chestnut-fronted macaws, we came across pink river dolphins. Later we paddled a canoe looking for anaconda but returned satisfied by yellow-rumped caciques nesting beside hoatzins, a prehistoric-looking, pheasant-sized bird with a spiky mohawk. Alone on Kapawi’s self-guided trail one afternoon, I startled (I should say the reaction was mutual) 30 ring-tailed coatis, which leaped onto tree limbs and then fixed me with beady stares.

But Kapawi places an emphasis on cultural activities, and guests can learn how women make nijiamanch or spend a night in a local Achuar community. Lodge staff members can also arrange participation in a dream-sharing ceremony with guayusa tea. But through a local shaman who knew and trusted David and Shakai, I received a special invitation to drink natem, which is how I landed, on that final evening, in Tsumpa’s house.

Tsumpa and his wife, along with a dozen children and grandchildren, live by themselves high above the Pastaza River on a tidy clearing ringed by coconut palms, manioc plants, fruit trees and a garden of various plant medicines. It was dusk when we arrived; in the distance, isolated cumulonimbus thunderclouds were set aflame by the pink-orange sun. Tsumpa was seated within a bucolic tableau: his sturdy wife prepared bowls of nijiamanch and tended to chores, while one daughter sat on a bamboo platform breast-feeding and another wove a headband. Dogs napped on cold ashes; an orphaned, saddle-backed tamarind monkey hopped onto a bunch of plantains; a toucan perched on a nearby log.

Tsumpa served me the natem in an adjacent hut. All appeared normal, until after what seemed like 20 minutes it no longer did. A montage of images emerged from the darkness — neon crystals, a lion. Soon my body dissolved into the surroundings, swallowed by a sea of energy. Unmoored and disoriented, I was adrift in a more expansive reality.

This brought a greater awareness, and I began to perceive things that had been imperceptible, like a low-frequency vibration permeating the environment. The hum of the universe? My thoughts drifted between visions. I imagined myself basking in the sun on the flanks of the volcano Chimborazo. I saw images from childhood and of random friends back home, all presented like scenes from the narrative of my life. Then my father appeared, seated in a chair before me, like a ghost. For several minutes we exchanged the sentiments that I had regretted not expressing before he died: What a life we shared, we both seemed to say. I looked down and noticed I was sobbing, and when I looked back up, he was gone.

Tsumpa was whistling and shaking leaves around a sick baby that had been brought to him for a cleansing, and Shakai asked if I’d like the same. I sat before Tsumpa and felt his hands on the crown of my head. His whistling seemed to conjure a protective field; in the leaves fanning my shoulders, I sensed a dusting of energy.

“Look at the stars,” Shakai said. The night was alive and glorious. Stepping outside felt like entering a larger room, the constellations stretching overhead as a low-hanging ceiling. David noticed my lingering sniffles and offered a bowl of tobacco-infused water, a traditional remedy, to clear my nose. Snorting it triggered a surge of intense sensation and then violent waves of vomiting unlike any I had ever experienced. More bizarre were the accompanying sounds: primeval bellows so loud and resonant they seemed to echo for miles. After, I could hear Tsumpa’s daughters giggling, and soon we were all laughing.