Las Pampas

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May 1st 2008

Published: May 30th 2008

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Ali Baba

River sunset

Take 2.......had just finished the blog for this place & then kicked the off switch by accident & so lost it....so here I go again. So much for automatic saving!! Rurrenabaque is a town in the northern part of Bolivia with jungle & grasslands (known as the pampas) all around. It is also papaya & banana-growing country too......so even if there wasn´t a whole lot to do I was happy out sitting in the market slurping papaya shakes!!! Most travellers come here to do a pampa tour &/or jungle tour. I arranged to do a tour of the pampas & after a night in a grotty hostel I headed off on the dusty bumpy road to the point where our tour began. The 3-day trip involves travelling in a motorised dug-out canoe along a river & looking at the wildlife along the way. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of crocodiles all along the river.....some basking in the sun on the parched banks while others lurk in the very murky waters.....with only their eyes & tops of their heads giving them away!! We were fortunate enough to have our own resident crocodile at the hostel where we were staying so we could

Crocodile trouble

get up-close & personal with him. He wasn´t a captive or anything like that.......but he knew where the good stuff was so he hung around each day for the leftovers of either rice or pasta. He would lumber at the riverbank & then creep up to take a mouthful.......then maybe take the sun for awhile before slithering back into the water. So here we were 2-3 meters away, snapping frantically at our "pet croc".

There is so much wildlife to see all along the river.......loads of different varieties of birds including vultures; monkeys, dolphins & capyburras. Capyburras are funny looking creatures....I´d describe them as a cross between a pig & a bear but I heard someone else call them oversized rodents which is probably more accurate. Over the 3 days we zipped up & down the river, went pirana fishing (they are so small they are hardly worth cooking!!)......throdded through the marshy pampas in search of anacondas.......which was a fruitless effort if not a smelly & muddy adventure. I was lucky enough to have a pair of wellies that didn´t have holes but the poor girl that was less fortunate ended up getting more mud on her than anyone

Turtles

A family of sun-worshippers

else. However we did get to see an anaconda....our guide was determined to find one & waded waste-deep through the muddy waters hunting; so while we were tucking into our lunch, he wandered in with a snake around his neck. Was too busy eating to take a photo....a girl has her priorities!!

After watching the sunset we went along the river with our torches lit. When the light of the torch catches the eyes of the crocs they are illuminated orange....not such a nice feeling to feel so many eyes watching you......especially when that creature has the potential to rip you up in no time at all. Anyway we didn´t have any men overboard so didn´t get to test that theory.

I think that sums up the Pampas tour.....it was so long ago now that I´m probably forgetting something. Oh yes....we had the opportunity to swim with the dolphins too.....being the seasoned traveller I am I decided that it may not be the wisest of moves to go swimming with the dolphins. I do love dolphins but apart from the crocodiles that were lying on the banks all around, the water was warm & brown....a breeding ground for

Capyburra

So what do you think he looks like??

parasites that haven´t even been discovered yet....so I declined. The dolphins never bothered interacting with those who got in to swim so I wasn´t disappointed. Despite the assurance that no-one has been attacked by the crocs, I don´t think I´d be able to relax anyway with them all around....where you can see them.....& what about the ones you can´t see??

From Rurre I headed back to La Paz on the 20-hour marathon bus trip. I don´t mind long bus trips now but I do look forward to nice buses again....It wasn´t as nail-biting on the way back.......at that stage I felt like I´d been on this road several times on the various trips so surely it wouldn´t fail me now!!

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