The Pampas!!

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Hola everyone! We just returned from the Jungle and the Pampas in Rurrenabaque, Bolivia (Amazonas). We took a 3 day tour in the Pampas with our guide "Kikay" or Kiki I called him, and another 3 days in the Jungle with our quite but fun guide "Jaun". Its a 35min army plane ride or 23 hour bus ride along the "Most dangerous road" - literally, two of the girls said the wheel was hanging off the edge, and they also blew a tire... Vanessa road this home from the Jungle 2 days ago... me and Siri flew!!) The Pampas were amazing, other than the 3 hour bumpy jeep ride to our boats, but there were 7 of us girls (including me, Vanessa and Siri) which was fun. In meeting Kikay within 10min of our boat ride on the amazon to camp he had cracked a beer and had thrown one at Vanessa (lol). Instantly we were surrounded by Crocodillos and birds, where Kikay felt he needed to crash the boat at every site (drunk maybe? no haha). It worked out nicely when we found a tree of monkeys (spider monkeys i believe...) who were plenty happy to see us when we crashed the boat once again into their tree with about 100 plantains in the front of the boat. We got some awesome photos and videos of them trying to steal our plantains... I have a feeling Kikay put them there on purpose... as all the other supplies were at the back of the boat. From there we were takin on a 3 hour boat ride along the amazon river, it was so relaxing we all nearly fell out of the boats as the height of these boats were nearly equal to that of the the river. Upon arriving at camp we were fed popcorn and hot chocolate, unpacked, put up our mosquito nets around our beds, and ate a buffet dinner before heading out on our "Night tour of the amazon river". We saw the glowing eyes of an owl and tons of crocs, as well as sat in the boat silently to listen to the sounds of the night... (awesome!). From there we actually got out of the boat (!) and walked to a river that crocodiles sat with there mouths open catching miniature fish (thousands would jump at a time!)... there were so many mosquitos we didn´t last long though.
Our second day was "Anaconda spotting", where they take you to a field / swamp where you cant see what your about to step on... ya. So you can very easily step on some sort of animal. It was terrifying in a funny way (I clearly didn´t get bitten or attacked). Unfortunately we were one of the groups who didn´t see any anacondas (maybe for the best??). Getting back to camp a guy had stepped on the tail of an alligator (luckily nothing happened but supposedly the guide jumped backwards frightened!) and another girl had a fly lay eggs inside her leg (a fly lays eggs on the beak of a mosquito, and in bighting you it leaves its larva to hatch). One group of israeli boys saw 3 anacondas!! In the afternoon we went Pirhana fishing (also very exciting - I had already been warned of a couple stupid tourists who grab the pirhana inside the boat, and the fish bights a chunk out of there finger...). I was the only one to catch an edible one (a big one! sort of), Kikay caught us another 6 or 7, and a couple girls (including Siri) caught little ones to later that night be used as bait to catch catfishª!. So we had Pirhanas for dinner... so so so so so delish!! About as fresh as you can get Albertans!! Later that night a few girls went fishing for some catfish, and were quite successful, they caught enough for us to have one each for lunch our last (3rd day).
On the 3rd day we were awoken bright and early to jump in the boat and watch the sunrise, the photos I got and will post soon are fantastic! We heard the Howler monkeys screaming at 6am, it was so intense!! Then after breakfast we did the funnest part of the trip and went swimming with the pink spotted dolphins. Its not what you think though... this isnt a zoo or fenced in, they are completely wild and hang out in a few particular spots. You take a chance that you´ll see them, jump in the murky brown water with crocs sitting just meters away watching and attempt to call the dolphins over! We got pretty close, on bit a girl Justines toes (its like a babys mouth...) and they were within a meter above the water. One was playing with another guy splashing him... it was amazing. My photos may not give it justice.
It was sad to go home from the pampas, but we had a fabulous time and no injuries (haha). The weather was so hot and warm... I miss it already!! La Paz is slightly cold. I must catch my bus to Uyuni - Salar de Uyuni... Look it up!! It was #1 on my to do list... its a whole new world there. I will update on the Jungle next time...
Ciao Love Tessa

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