Reddit reviews Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice

Anthropology here, I recall reading something about this in the book Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice.

The writer was in the South American jungle talking with a clergy man (iirc) whose hobby was to listen to stories from members of the various tribes he came in contact with. These tribes had rarely (if ever) had any contact with the outside world and so their stories were through oral tradition, passed on verbally from generation to generation. According to that man one of the more memorable ones he heard was a tribal legend about a time when their ancestors had traveled long distances hunting large animals and had to cover their entire bodies in animal skins to keep from dying.

The author speculates that if that story held true it could have been an actual oral tradition of the crossing of the Bering Strait, preserved through storytelling. So, in hot, humid environments like the Amazon the concepts of snow and ice may have been lost through time but actions their ancestors had taken to survive it could have stayed in the stories. They would have at least had the idea that some factor had been there that necessitated those steps even if they didn't really understand the meaning or purpose behind it anymore.

Edit: I want to point out it was the author's speculation, not mine. As much as it's an amazing idea to think the crossing could have been retold for that long, it's also unsubstantiated.

Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice by Mark Plotkin is a good read about his work with Amazonian people and their medicines.