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Published: November 28th 2008
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Fuzzy!
Isnt she cute! From Quito to Rio Napa
We arrived finally in Ecuador after flying forever from NZ with a v. brief stopover in Santiago. Quito, I could take or leave to be honest. Its not the nicest place in the world, and the Old Town, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was nice enough, but a bit, ummm, grotty really. There were some beautiful churches, covered with gold leaf on this inside, and museums, and we went to the Vivarium (snake house) which was pretty cool. But there is definatey an undercurrent of unsafe in Quito and we met people who´d been mugged for their cameras and wallets. But we were just very careful and were completely fine, not even pickpocketed when we accidentally went a stop too far on the local bus system and ended up in dodge-ville - we caught the next bus straight back to where we were supposed to get off! We stayed four days in Quito which was too much really, but we needed to wait for our jungle trip to begin.
We flew over the Andes to Coca, an oil town in the jungle and from there made our way by motorised canoe up
the Rio Napa to Sani Lodge, owned and run by the Kichwa peoples of Isla Sani. After about two hours we trasferred to a smaller canoe to get to our lagoon and the logde. Its just beautiful, all you can see is the thatched roofs of the lodge peaking from the greenery of the forest and tendrils of mist hang between the trees. The landscaped gardens with the guest bungalows are completely hidden from view. We were doing the cheaper version and were camping in a clearing hidden in the forest across the lagoon, only one tent visible from the water. Our tent was actually a tent within a tent, pitched on a raised wooden platform with a thatched roof, covered with canvas 'walls' and thankfully was even more secure, insect-wise, than the bungalows. Which was just as well as on the first night there was the biggest cockroach Ive ever seen in my life sitting on the outside canvas, literally the size of my hand. I didnt freak out though, but I didnt get a picture either. I was too stunned I think. The noise at night was incredible, it was like as soon as the sun set, someone
switched on the Noises of the Jungle CD, the insects would all just start as if on cue, and they were so loud! And every morning you´d wake to the sound of howler monkeys...
We had two guides, our native one, Hugo, from the local community, and our bilingual guide from Quito, Lorena, and they were just brilliant. Knew everything about everything including what the indigenous use all the plants for, even birth control! Lorena in particular was excellent, just so enthusiastic about everything and great craic too. Every day we'd get up at 5.30am (I know!), paddle across the lagoon for breakfast and head off hiking in the jungle for a few hours. We'd have lunch at 1pm and then do a different activity in the afternoon or evening - go to the 40m high viewing tower for bird watching, piranha fishing (didnt catch any!), caimon alligator spotting (in the dark their eyes glow in your torch light) or, mucho spookio, a night hike in the forest! To be honest, the jungle wasnt as scary as I thought it would be and in fact, I became very fond of our resident tarantula, who lived in a bush beside
our tent. Each night, Id go check on her and there she'd be, sitting on her leaf waiting for some prey to happen by I guess. She wasnt actually massive as tarantuals go, but still the biggest spider Ive ever seen in my life, and I probably wouldnt have been too happy if she'd decided to come visit us in the tent! She was cute though, all fuzzy! Simon wasnt as keen on her as I was, for some reason... I think we may have been lucky with the time of year too as we werent plagued by insects - Ive heard reports from other travellers that they got eaten alive. So far, we are managing not to contract malaria or anything orther exotic diseases!
We didnt see as much mammal activity as I would have liked but there were 8 of us in our group inc. the guides, which doesnt make for very subtle jungle trekking, its hard to keep 8 people quiet! But we did get to see two different groups of very cute Noisey Night Monkeys sheltering in their tree truck holes - they look like content, furry little old men but with HUGE eyes -
a tamarind monkey, a big troupe of capuchin monkeys and some squirrel monkeys all trying to find a spot to cross the river. But apart from the night monkeys, they are up so high and moving so fast, its pretty hard to see them clearly, and you just catch glimpses really. So no photos of monkeys for you unfortunately. We saw masses of birds, which I know doesnt sound that exciting, but the birds here are incredible - come in all shapes, sizes and colours. Loads of macaws and birds with crazy-ass hairdos. Of course we saw insects, reptiles and amphibians to beat the band - huge stripey milipedes, grasshoppers, stick insects, butterflies and weird plant-like catterpillars, lizards and iguanas, beetles and frogs including the poison dart frog (used by the natives to make poison darts) and the glass frog which has a transparent belly through which you can see its internal organs! We saw tapir and agouti tracks but not the animals themselves unfortunately. And we saw a snake on our night hike which was pretty cool. He was banded, about 1 to 1.5m long, but very slim with a small head, and pretended to be a branch when
we approached. I dont think he was poisonous. There are lots of snakes about but they are very hard to see. So that was cool. And of course there was Fuzzy, the tarantula! The forest itself is really cool, with all these crazy trees like the walking pine which moves about 1m a year to find better light. There are vines hanging everywhere, weird fungus, trees with thorny and spikey trunks etc. There are termite nests in loads of the trees and we even ate lemon ants one day - seriously! They taste lemoney, surprisingly enough. They have citic acid instead of HCL, and that gives them their taste. Simon won a lump of fungus for being the first to volunteer to try them!
I was extremely jealous of one particular guy, Christopher, a birdwatcher from the UK, who had connections somehow and had his own personal guide. There was only the two of them, going quietly through the jungle and he got to see a family of howler monkeys one day (we only heard them every morning at about 5am - I cant even describe the sound they make its so bizzare), six different species of monkey another
day, an agouti and, the creme de la creme of jungle sightings, a jaguar with two cubs. Seriously, lots of the locals havent even seen a jaguar and they've lived there all their lives. The bastard!!
Anyway, apart from not being able to cuddle a big cat, we had a great time in the jungle and its definately something I'd like to do again, maybe in a different part of the Amazon basin, if we have the time and money to do it on this trip...
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