After 66 days battling exhaustion, delirium and fearsome fish-life, a 52-year-old man yesterday became the first person to swim the full length of the Amazon.

Martin Strel, a Slovenian marathon swimmer who was also the first to conquer the Yangtze, the Danube and the Mississippi, was recovering on a boat off the Brazilian coast after his 3,375-mile voyage.

He had completed the journey four days sooner than anticipated.

Strel hopes his feat will help highlight the importance of preserving the rainforest. He also wants to raise awareness of Alzheimer’s and other degenerative disorders, and to promote telemedicine, which lets doctors see their patients remotely using a webcam, allowing populations in inaccessible areas such as Amazonia to benefit from modern medicine.

He was too tired to come to the telephone and had a variety of stomach disorders, but his son Borut, 26, who is the expedition’s leader, said: “I’m extremely happy because we have been working really hard.

My dad’s lying in his room. He’s okay, he’s a tough guy.”

Strel junior said his father, from the Slovenian town of Mokronog, had thanked his team for “doing something incredible”.

Martin Strel’s journey began on February 1 at Atalaya in Peru and ended at Belém in Brazil.

Matthew Mohlke, 32, part of the 22-strong squad, said Strel had avoided malaria but suffered a larval infection, nausea and stomach problems among other ailments. He also faced piranhas and bloodsucking toothpick fish.

Strel has not yet decided the site of his next great swimming feat, but it is likely to involve another vast river in 2008 or 2009. The Nile, the only river longer than the Amazon, still awaits.

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