Date of Entry: October 17th 2016
Date of Writing: January 7th 2016
As promised it’s a very early start, so early that the moon is still shining bright above the ghostly lake as we embark on our wooden canoe back towards the trails leading out of the national park, but that’s not where we’re headed, we’re headed deep into the jungle back trails in an attempt to see macaws and other colourful birds socialising at a selection of dead trees from which they lick the minerals.
We land back at the swampy boat dock and head a short ways along the trail we walked in on yesterday. This early in the morning the jungle is bubbling over with life, the soundscape more fibrant than ever,and countless colourful birds flying by above us, some parrots even finding a perch to observe us from briefly.
Full of bleary eyed anticipation at these early sightings we follow Bastian off the main trail climbing through a tightly knit mix of grasses, ferns and small trees, following something you could loosely define as trail.
After maybe 25 minutes of climbing and trying to stay close Bastian pulls up in a small clearing looking out at the sparser canopy, a few dead tree trunks standing out against the deep green background of the amazon. Here we wait and hope we made it early enough to witness Macaws feeding.
We wait in a perfect stillness and silence as some groups of macaws fly by over head, eventually Bastian shakes his head and say we’ll try one more position and hope for better luck, and sure enough it’s the perfect decision, as soon a trio of Guacamayo’s find a perch in a near by tree. We snap our camera’s then notice a pair of huge toucans further back in the canopy. I try to tippy toe through a bog to get an angle for photos and end up sinking in thigh deep with one leg before snapping the photos of the toucans. And the bird menagerie isn’t complete yet,as some huge vulture like beasts land in another dead tree nearby. Wow!
Eventually the macaws take flight and the toucans take cover so we head back through the thick amazon jungle. After a brief incident where two german ladies fail to follow the line of us Seperating us into two groups and leaving us lost in the jungle for 5 minutes before Bastian circles back and finds us again we get back on to the main trail and start heading back to the boat.
But the fun’s not done,far from it.Not even for the morning outing. A short distance along the trail we encounter another family of Red howlers. It’s probably the same family as yesterday but there seems to be more of them now and the light is much better for photos,of which I take many.
Everyone seems ready to keep going but this time I’m a bit firmer, begging Bastian for just a few more minutes with the monkeys. He eventually concedes and then a minute later proceeds to entirely lose his cool as he spots something in a tree the howlers have only just move to explore.”Paresoso!!!! Paresoso!!!” he almost shouts suddenly entirely animated. We follow his extended finger and find a sloth ever so slowly crawling down the tree and away from the howlers. Granted it’s practically sprinting when measured in sloth speed. Here’s the photos, I’ll try to upload the video when I find some better internet as watching these things move is spectacular.
And still our morning outing isn’t done because after eventually leaving the sloth behind and boarding out boat, Ben taking his turn to paddle us across the lake (and doing a terrible job of it too) we come across another group of squirrel monkeys on the trail back to the lodge. They are small and not uncommon but the way they hop around with reckless abandon makes them a lot of fun to watch.
We head back to the lodge and enjoy another good but small lunch,meonce again consuming what ben might describe as a criminal amount of juice and then we spend a while relaxing and playing cards before our afternoon outing, a trip across the lake to a tree hiking trail, taking us past some of the mightiest giants of the jungle, but before we can get to the trail, something fantastic happens, something I hadn’t dared hope for. Ahead of us, at about two of clock the otters appear, this time endlessly closer to our boat.
We watch them and row desperately to get closer and closer as they swim, playing and hunting all at once, popping their heads up with fish torn to shreds held between their paws enjoying an afternoon snack. They are utterly incredible to watch, and even swimming you can tell how big they are,growing up to 2 meters in length. I’m not even 2 meters. Holy hell! Bastian guesses they are headed to a certain dead tree they’ve been known to take an afternoon nap on and thank goodness he’s right. We follow them there and pass by as close as we dare over and over again, allowing for some of the best shots of these incredible creatures. It’s more than I could have hoped for.
I take hundreds of photos from the rocking boat as we try to get as close as Bastian will allow as there are strict regulations in place so as not to disturb the otters, and I couldn’t cut them down to just six,so here’s a bunch more.These creatures are incredibly rare and part of me still can’t believe I’ve been so lucky as to see them in the wild like this, with a small group of friends on a wooden boat in the middle of an amazon lake. Perfection.
Eventually Bastian says we have to leave them be and we head on to our planned activity, the tree walk. It’s certainly very interesting and some of the trees are both impossibly big and lots of fun to climb around the roots of, but after the otters, I mean it’s hard to stand up to that kind of competition. Still,we have fun on the trail with Bastian telling us about the trees and the various uses local tribes find for them,some medicinal,some for building,and some strange trance like practices too.
As we continue on the short trail loop we find an awesome built in vine swing and all take our turns experiencing it, me deciding to forego grace and individualism like the true hero I am and let the others feel good for helping me. I’d love to say I’m not proud of these photos. (Including the ben butt photo) but I’m not going to add liar to the list of things I am. We also get a brief sighting of our third kind of monkey on the trip, a small group of brown capuchins distant in the tree tops. I manage one photo maybe worth sharing,nothing more.
Back at the lodge after an uneventful boat ride back which is surprising given the events of today we settle down to a game of President or Asshole and I am quickly made president and then dealt a pretty unbeatable behind. Serves those damn canadians I’m travelling with.
We head out for one more pre dinner outing to a wildlife viewing tower down at the one corner of the lake we haven’t explored. Again by today’s standard we don’t see much,a few birds n the boat ride and then our first good look at a lone capuchin monkey closer by which yields some good photos. It’s ridiculous but the way this days been going I half expected a jaguar to try to swim it’s way into our boat.
We head back and eat dinner only to discover our program for the day which started around 4 am isn’t even over. We’ve still got a night walkleft to do,and I know from experience that the jungle is an entirely different place at night.
We don’t have to go far, in fact we don’t even leave the lodge before we see a huge tarantula on a tree, and are told that this one is indeed very dangerous to humans which makes me shiver thinking about the two I removed from my room when I was in the Amazon with Sara.
We head deeper into the darkness of the jungle, all with decent flashlights and find an impressive variety of the crazy interesting stick insects,giant grasshoppers and even a deadly black scorpion on a tree just a few feet from the path. Get stung by one of those and you’ve got minutes to live. An hour or two if you’re lucky. Its downright terrifying.
A decent distance way from the scorpion (thank god) Bastian asks for a volunteer and I foolishly put up my hand. He then takes away my flashlight and leads the others a long way away until I can’t see anything and I’m left alone to the darkness of the jungle. The sounds and movements are frightening at first and it does cross my mind that everyone in the group has been annoyed by me on multiple occasions undoubtedly, what’s to keep them from leaving me here. But then my thoughts turn and I start to think deeply about how lucky I have been this year and indeed since my travels begin. Not only have I seen huge parts of the worlds, interacting and learning from countless different people of countless different cultures, but I’ve also found a woman I love who is waiting for me back in Brazil which is an incredible feeling. I can’t wait to go back home and that’s a feeling felt in a different way now, so thank you Renata, for giving me a home where i feel I need to be. this is not meant rudely to Canada which is full of people I love, but I guess this is just a different kind of love, and one I’ve been missing for a long time.
By the time Bastian comes back for me I’m calm and at peace as he leads us back to the lodge and we all head straight to sleep utterly exhausted yet still eager for our last day in the jungle together.
