Welcome to the Jungle, we have fun and games

From Andean mountain ranges to the sub-tropical Amazon rain forest, the journey continues!

It was pretty harsh on our bodies going from the cold temperatures of Machu Pichu to the hot and humid 35+ weather of the Amazon. The journey started with a 5am transfer to Puerto Maldonado, a small Peruvian town close to the Brazilian and Bolivian borders. From there, we took a nice leisurely 3 hr canoe ride on the Thabopata river, one of the tributaries that flows into the Amazon. The sun was shining and the warmth was a great reward for the past few days. We enjoyed a pretty sweet lunch on the boat too: chicken tamale, eggs, fruit, and my favorite, a cerveza! It was pretty cool to see the wildlife along the shore. We saw macaws, turtles, and lots of other fancy birds that I have no idea what they are called. The river though was mud brown. Kind of pretty gross compared to the azure blue waters of Easter Island. But after seeing pounds and pounds of llama, alpaca, horse, goat, and dog poo on our trek, I just didn´t care!

Once we arrived to our jungle lodge, we were greeted with a welcome cocktail by the french owner of the lodge. I tried my best to suck up to her by using my french. I don´t know if it worked, but it seemed like Anita´s and my breakfasts were a tad larger than the rest of the group. i guess all those years of french immersion finally paid off.

Later that evening, we were treated to a nocturnal jungle excursion. All we were armed with were knee-high rubber boots, a flashlight, and gallons of insect repellant. Oh my god there were so many mozies and other bugs (liane, you would not have survived). Unfortunately, our guide didn´t let me try the machete he used to hack our way through the jungle. The sounds of the jungle were pretty intense. the usual chirping of the insects were interspersed with the loud cackling of monkeys, hooting of owls, and other mysterious sounds of the nite. The monkeys and owls were too far up in the canopy of the forest for us to get any pictures, but we were able to find a few small snakes. There are apparently anacondas slithering around as well, but we were not able to find any that evening. We took it pretty slow due to the darkness and to the fact that were sloshing around mud that was about mid-calf high. This would be our warmup for the next day´s adventure.

Another early 7am start and we were off to the jungle again. Once the sun comes out, the noises of the jungle are distinctly different. Hooting of owls were replaced with the cackling of macaws. Chirping of crickets were replaced with ribiting frogs. We were able to catch glimpses of the monkeys we heard the nite before. It was pretty cute to see the mother monkey carrying baby monkies and she jumped and swung from tree to tree. We saw the tracks and poo of wild boars, though no sight of the animals themselves. Our guide said they were jaguars as well, but it was very rare to see them as they tend to stay far away from humans. After a 4-5 hour trek to start our day, we had lunch and ventured out into a jungle lake. That was pretty relaxing as we chilled out and fished for piranha´s. The piranha´s are about 8 inches long with HUGE teeth. Apparently the suckers are vegetarian, but are attracted to blood, so we used bloody beef as bait. Worked like a charm as you could see the school of piranhas attack as soon we put the beef in. However, the safety pin we were given to use as a hook was pretty useless as most of us had no luck. Only one scandinavian girl caught one for the hour we fished.

After that, we made our journey back to the lodge. The route back was a nightmare. In order to make it back before sundown, our guide said we had to take a shortcut. This shortcut turned out to be quite challenging. It was not a real path, so our guide pretty much blazed a new trail by machete-ing a new path. Dude was not so careful with his backswing as the blade once came pretty close to my head. Also, his new path required us to wade through waist-high, brown murky water. Not too bad for me, but it was an issue for for AJ as it was chest high for her. Now, it wouldn{t have been so bad if it were for only a few minutes, but we ended up treking through this stuff for several hours. It got pretty treacherous at points as we were slipping on tree roots. Sometimes the ground would drop a foot or two as well. It was totally like the movies. We had to carry our backpacks over our heads, inching our way through the jungle waters. Logs were floating around chest high, and guess what we saw on a few of them? HUGE tarantulas about the size of a volleyballs! We also had to cross several "bridges" of fallen trees. Yours truly even fell off one and into the water. Luckily i was able to save the camera, but i was totally soaked. Of course, it didn't really matter as we were all already soaked waist high, but the ego sure took a bruising. Anita said "it was like watching an accident in slow motion. Saw it coming but couldn't do anything to help." And get this, the "shortcut" took about 4 hours. BRUTAL!

Anyhow, we made it back wet, muddy, devoured by mosquitoes, but alas, still alive and in one piece. Our reward for all this was a night time jungle cruise and we were able to see a bunch of caymans (Amazon crocodiles). Suckers are huge and have eyes that glow in the dark. Our guide would flash a spotlight up and down the river banks and all of a sudden you could see pairs of glowing orbs coasting along the river.

I'll post pictures of the past several posts shortly for your viewing pleasure. Next post: The Galapogas Islands!

Wgr & AJ