August 2nd, 2015
Again we wake up before the sun and enjoy some porridge and crackers before meeting down at the boat and heading out for our second jungle walk. This time we head down river for what is going to be our biggest adventure, as today’s trail make’s yesterdays rough trail look like a highway through the jungle.
The boat lands and we again clamber up the muddy river bank and into the jungle. The narrow winding path leads us through the impossibly dense undergrowth deeper and deeper into the jungle. On the way we find lots of wonderful creepy crawly insects, more fascinating fungus and a pair of lizard who’ve made their home on a rather large tree.
Then we come upon something strange. Something very strange, a sloth supposedly sleeping on the ground. Now in lots of amazon lodges (not Tapiche) from Iquitos guides will pull sloths down into boats to take pictures holding them. It yields photos like this. And I’m quick to take this oppourtunity.
Cute picture no?
Even cuter with this beautiful face.
Except wait why does he look so sad?
Maybe it’s because this sloth is dead and practices like pulling sloths down into boats, traumatize sloths and bring them one step closer to death. This particular sloth appears to have fallen from the tree and died on impact. We all feel really bad for the little guy and eventually move on with slightly heavier hearts at having witnessed the great circle of death.
My camera is sadly having a very difficult time with the humidity and is also on it’s definite last legs. (The replacement is ordered and on it’s way to Bolivia though I’ll miss old Bluey, it’s seen me through more amazing places than any camera before since I purchased it during a short layover in the Delhi airport.) It gives out early on in this walk and misses a crucial moment.
Jose who is with us this time while Pepe hangs back with Tristan, who has a much nicer camera than any of us and so requires a little slower pace to get the photos he wants. Jose hears something and instantly leads us off the trail cutting through thick undergrowth for about 20 minutes until we stumble out into a small clearing under some towering palms. Up in their leaves Jose directs our glance to two beautiful Guacamayo’s (Blue and Yellow Macaws). How Jose found them and found us such a good viewpoint I’ll never know, but the young man’s work is impressive.
My camera comes alive too late for the Guacamayo’s but just in time for the beginning of the swamp and the small jungle crab jose finds and removes from our path. The little scamp scuttles away, grateful not to be crushed under the sole of my rubber boot.
This is where the path gets difficult, and in reality disappears, as Jose and Pepe lead us through a thick swamp in the middle of the jungle, and we sing into the knee deep mud and water. It’s arduous work but quite interesting and definitely cultivates the sense of being deep in the juggle, my soaked and muddy legs confirm that.
The rest of the walk passes more or less uneventfully, Jose takes the sloth to a dignified resting place, we find a frog or two, a single spider and then it’s time to climb back into the boat and head back to the lodge for a dip and lunch.
After a brief break and a tasty lunch I’m back at the dock enjoying watching the butterflies flutter around and the constant animal calls that fill the jungle air at all times.
Before long though we’re headed back into the boat for our afternoon activity. Today it’s piranha fishing, something no one is that excited for. Still spotting some turtles on a log, our first of the trip, makes it a cool ride up.
We head up river a little further and pull over at the entrance of another little lagoon landing and getting out the rustic fishing equipment. Now I’m going to admit something that undeniably makes me a huge hypocrite. Catchign the piranha was tough, but I brought in the biggest one to the boat, that said watching it flop around in the boat and gasp for air quickly became unbearable, to the point where I tossed it back and gave it a second lease on life. Later that night I ate a bunch of the fish that Jose caught later in the day without much of a problem. Weird and frustrating.
We end the fishing early and head further upstream to a tent on a beach that will be my home for the night along with Allie. It will be our shift to guard against turtle poachers in the reserve and it will prove to be quite an adventure. Now though we’re just there to watch the sunset and look for caimans. We see one back in the laguna behind the beach but it disappears before I can get a photo. We do see some massive tracks in the sand as Jose and Pepe try to convince me there are caimans her that measure anywhere between 4 and 15 meters long. Nice try guys.
Still while the giant caimans don’t present themselves, the sunset definitly does, and mixed with the ever growing soundscape of the amazon at night, it creates an idyllic paradise for all of us to while away the last brief moments of daylight before heading back to the lodge for dinner and to pick up our camping stuff.
After dinner we are boated back to our tent, the air absolutely infested by mosquitoes and other bigs making quick and smooth entry very important. Drifting to sleep listening to the thunderous roar of the jungle is an experience I will never forget, and waking up around 1 am to Allie questioning a voice outside the tent was terrifying. I climbed out to see who was there and instantly one man darted off the beach and back to his friend in the boat, speeding away in the night. A real life turtle poacher encounter, and I didn’t even get the time to use my war cry, “TORTUGAS!!”
