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Published: August 24th 2007
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I’m living in a tarantula breeding ground. I share my ‘toilet’ with a boa constrictor and poison dart frogs. My bath is a stream, my best friend, a machete. We have the “smelly scale” which runs from 1-10. 1 being ok; 10 being unbearable. Where I am right now, 1-9 is acceptable. I dream of chocolate day and night. Welcome to the Amazon rainforest…
We are volunteers in far eastern Ecuador. An expedition aimed at wildlife data collection and protection. Hiking the impossible jungle terrain for hours everyday, we live bathed in sweat and covered in rashes. But we smile. No privacy, no dry clothes and mould. On a massive scale. What more do you need for a whole lot of fun?...
Need a clearer picture? Picture this:
Sleeping under the thickest canopy of trees known to man. Surrounded by exotic bird calls and croaking frogs. The forest floor around our camp is a city of ground dwelling tarantulas. We have found over eighty different specimens. Some have never been seen before. Many are bigger than a dinner plate. I was an arachnophobe when I arrived. Yesterday I let one run up my
arm. This is very definitely ‘getting out of my comfort zone’…
Cutting a new trail through primary virgin forest. Unchartered Amazonian land. Exciting. We average seven miles a day of mountainous, obstacled terrain. Yes I have legs of steel! We are bitten, scratched, torn and stung. Our clothes wet with sweat to the point of saturation. And still we have another 4km of up-hill jungle floor to cover…
I Take a break next to a five hundred year old tree. With buttresses the size of a small semi. I kid you not, everything in the Amazon is over sized and under estimated. Blue morph butterflies the size of books. Leaves that could shade a small car. Cockroaches the size of hamsters. And the rain…
RAIN RAIN RAIN... THE most amazing rain I'll ever hear... Rainforest downpours are sensational. I can’t hear a damn thing. Within seconds my wellies are full, clothes drenched, and the most colourful tree and poison dart frogs are out... amazing...
This is me:
Waking up to see a giant wolf spider (highly venomous) sitting on the top of my mozzie net... good times... Waking up
Wierd and wonderful
A space-age looking caterpillar we spotted during a night transect again to find a vampire bat caught in my mozzie net feeding from my nose and two others flapping about having been hanging upside down on the bunk bed... even better times!...
Making an entirely natural raft with the locals from palm and coffee trees and then taking it down the water ... stringing together rubber rings and tubing 4km down the Napo River... insanely good fun...
This is me:
Carrying 50lb bags of flour up what we called 'the hill of death'- from the dug out canoe up to where the camp is. That means when there's a food order we have to carry it all up there..... OH MY GAH you have no idea the pain that runs through my limbs.... I am now a proud owner of my first pair of biceps.
Eating porridge for fifty days in a row. Gaining 10 pounds... damn! Having wet moldy clothes all day everyday. Nothing dries in the rainforest. Even the things you save, and think are clean- are in fact growing a lovely thick mossy blanket of mould on them...
And that brings me on to what we call
Piranha
The most delicious fish I've ever tasted 'jungle stench'. I stink. Everyone stinks. No matter how well you scrub yourself or your clothes… this smell follows you everywhere. It’s a combination of sweat, dirt, mud, rot and mould. And strangely, it's one of those smells I hate and love at the same time... Maybe that’s just me?
Mud. mud mud mud mud.... Peeing and pooing into 'the pits'- Two wooden drops discreetly covered by a wall of crumpled up black tarpaulin... The perfect nesting place for all sorts. And inside there are hundreds upon thousands of maggots... Ummmmm...
This is still me:
Cooking in head torches for thirteen people with the very basics of ingredients to play around with... No electricity. No running water... NADA...
Washing in a nearby stream. Which I adored. Just me, the jungle, fresh cold water from the Andes and the giant blue morph butterflies flapping around me... heaven!
Lying back in hammocks chilling to reggae. Baking banana and chocolate 'jungle cakes' on coals from a fire. Interesting and very hard work but wow it tastes great....
And still me:
Sleeping in a constantly damp smelly bed. (I find
Les toilettes...
... Be thankful this isn't a scratch 'n' sniff photo... a cure to that problem- by sprinkling talcum powder everyday.)
Wearing wellies for fifty days in a row... Finding a new snake every time we’re in the forest. Seeing the largest rodent on earth called a capybara... (Basically a rat the size of a dog.)
Visiting ox-bow an lake further east and seeing caymen, massive
Pterodactyl-like birds, waterfalls and fishing for piranha. (That is WILD fun.) Then cooking the piranha over fire... So out of this world that even our three in-camp veggies try it. They love it. The best fish I’ve ever had...
Swinging over deep jungle canyons on a vine.... Yes, I’m in a jungle swinging on vines!
Getting up at 4.30 or 5am in time to record the bird calls... Working with the local high school upstream. Clearing their fields of fallen logs and branches so they can plant papaya or plantain trees for sustainable agriculture. Digging ditches and playing games, dancing... so cool.
Having camp parties on Saturdays. Decorating the comedor in leaves and vines for a Tarzan and Jane'esqe fiesta... White water rafting down grade 4 rapids. Cliff jumping in bat-filled giant caves hidden from
the rest of the world. Plunging off a 60ft drop and making the best friends from all over the planet. The best time of my life.
By Sarah Blackett ©
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