Rurrenabaque

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So...on to Rurrenabaque, which is the deepest into the Amazon Basin we have ventured. We decided against taking the bus for the 24hr journey across un-paved road (the route by road takes you down ´The Worlds Most Dangerous Road´again!), but instead settled on a TAM (bolivian military airline) flight.

The flight itself went smoothly, and the flight crew was most attentive, serving dodgy sandwiches and REAL coca-cola (which is more than you get on sleazy-jet!). The landing was interesting....on descent from the clouds all that was visible was grass and trees, see pics!

Getting off the plane, we were hit by the intense heat and humidity. The landscape was totally different to that of La Paz and the altiplato, even though we were only a hundred miles or so North.

In Rurre ourselves and another couple booked a 4 day tour by motor-canoe to explore the pampas (wetlands).

After a 3hour jeep ride over rugged and unforgiving dirt roads, we got onto our canoe for our 6 hour trip upstream to our camp. During the boat ride we discovered we (Rachel) had left the camera battery back at base camp in Rurre..... luckily for us Christiaan (our fellow tourer) turned out to be professional photographer who kindly allowed us copies of his photos. So thanks Christiaan for the photos (we have had to re-size them to make them small file sizes so the pics on here may not do you justice!)

Check out his website www.mooibeleicht.nl - he´s a great guy and a really good photographer! (Plug over!)

The trip was great, we saw loads of wildlife aswell as having an adventure on our nights camping. Our guide, Hector was great and his wife Maria was an amazing cook!

(Fellow travellers - Amazonica tours (run by jimmy) are REALLY good - just round the corner from the Amazonas office).

After 4 days on the boat, we got back to Rurre and found that we had to stay an extra day due to a postponed flight because of bad weather. However, much to our releif (no ATM machines in Rurre and we had both finished our books!) our Amazonas flight took us back to La Paz on Monday morning.

Currently in Cochabamba after leaving La Paz on Tuesday 11th April.

Love to everyone.

R&C XXXX

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Photos

Trolley Dolly
The sandwiches (ham) were dodgy but the coke was cold and we stole the "Transportes Aeros Militar" plastic cups.

Gate Number 3
Here we are... hot and steamy in Rurre. Actually the strip we landed at was an hour out of town (so you can draw similarities between TAM and Sleazyjet et al!) The other more expensive carrier lands 2 mins from Rurre. 1 flight a week to here.

Baggage Reclaim
At first they were going to send our bags by jeep to Rurre... but they drove 100yards and decided to offload them and give us them then and there!?

Rurre!
Very chilled out, similar in a way to Thailand, certainly temperature and landscape wise. Plus the addition of children riding motorbikes and the usual gang of dogs, chickens and pigs roaming the streets...

"The Davinci Code is Ridiculous"
¿Que? This ´truck´was driven by an eccentric American hippie who obviously holds Dan Brown in high regard...

HMS Canoe
Here we are... Hector the guide and our boat (although somewhat less-laden than it was on the trip to the camp!)
**Christian De Groot**

Las Pampas
We snaked our way down the River with this being typical of the scenery, dense and green.**Christian De Groot**

Monkey grande
On the way to the campsite we saw loads of wildlife, this was one of the first (rather shy) monkeys we saw.**Christian De Groot**

Stalk-ish
We saw so many things we don´t remember the names...it was a bit like a Stalk. (M&D - its what I imagine the stalk on the roof to be like)**Christian De Groot**

Yellow Monkey Pequaña
These little monkeys were in the trees and bushes along the side of the river. They make high pitched screetch while shaking the branches to try to scare us off.**Christian De Groot**

Turtle
They climb out of the water and bask in the sun on branches, only to plop back in when the boat comes past. **Christian De Groot**

Canoe 18-30?!
We weren´t the only group on the river, as this group of ´loco´ Israelis demonstrates! **Christian De Groot**

Sloath
Sloooooooowly does it! **Christian De Groot**

More Birds
A bit like pheasants or peacocks with blue faces and a ´crown´ don´t know the name though....**Christian De Groot**

The Camp
Ok, we didnt camp all the time. We stayed in the safety of these huts with ´skeeter nets and showers so it wasnt all river-washing and bites.

Walking through ´jungle´
Hector took us for a walk, upon which we accumulated many mosquito and ´diablo´(red ant) bites... look, Rachel is inspecting hers! **Christian De Groot**

Anaconda searching...
Hector a.k.a Steve "you little rippa" Erwin wanted to catch us an Anaconda... unfortunately (or not) none were available **Christian De Groot**

Campsite
On Day 2 we went a couple of hours upstream and found a place to camp. Despite the conditions, Maria still cooked us a superb meal! **Christian De Groot**

Campfire
Yeah I remember my scouting skills. The idea was to build a small smokey fire to get rid of the mozzies, but I went a bit overboard and it was a bit of a bonfire by the end and we got bitten to sh*t because there was no smoke. **Christian De Groot**

Night time camping
If you shine a torch into the water, the eyes of aligators reflect back red, like menacing cat´s eyes. To our amazement, Hector´s reaction was to climb out of the safety of the boat and grab a ´baby´ aligator (it was about 1m long!) and pull it onto the boat for us to inspect in awe. No photo unfortunately. **Christian De Groot**

Pìrhana Fishing
We spent quite a while trying to catch Pirhanas (spelling?) with bits of steak but all Chris caught was a tiddler and it didnt have teeth :( **Christian De Groot**

Fishing II
Eventually Marilyn caught one, even though it was only a littlun - Check out the teeth! The meaty bit is the steak, not fish guts! He was thrown back unharmed (apart from the hook-hole!)**Christian De Groot**

Capibaras
Giant Guinea Pigs! We caught a glimpse of these on the boat ride back. **Christian De Groot**

Finally - our ride home!
Rurrenebaque airstrip in all its glory! The ´marshaller´ sprinted out of the bar-shack to guide the plane in (it had already arrived!)

Up into the Andes
Having climbed for about an hour we still barely cleared the mountains back into La Paz! So ends the trip to Rurre!

Comments

[mom]

Great pictures of the wildlife that Christian took. The little monkeys look sweet and its a pity you didnt catch any piranhas Chris. Only 8 weeks left of your adventure not quite the same in sunny Brum at the moment. Make the most of it, speak soon luv mom xxxxxx