Blogs from Amazonas, Peru, South America

We were up at 4.15 am this morning so we could take the boat upstream to Tambopata National Park, where we went bird-watching. Tambopata is the local name for the Peruvian Amazon, the part we are in has the evocative name of Madre De Dios (Mother of God). In the National Park, there are two clay licks, areas of high sodium clay where birds gather to ingest sodium to balance toxins they take in from unripe nuts. Peru is the only place this happens as in other rainforest areas the nuts have enough sodium from the soil. We saw lots of beautiful birds: scarlet macaws, blue and yellow macaws, severe macaws several kinds of parrots and parakeets including the blue-headed pionus which is very striking. The guide set up a telescope to give us a good ... read more

Spanning nearly 4,345 miles—roughly the distance from New York to Paris—the Amazon River is an awesome natural wonder, home to fascinating creatures like pink dolphins, piranhas, Amazonian manatees, and crocodile-like black caimans. It snakes through a total of eight South American countries, including Colombia, Ecuador and Peru (to name a few), though its largest portion can be found in Brazil. On our trip to Amazonia, we probably saw less than 100 miles of this great river. When they say everything’s bigger in Texas, they ain’t kidding. At a length of 255 feet—just 15 yards shy of an entire football field—the massive car wash at the Buc-ee’s convenience store of Katy, Texas, is truly the leader of lathering and the sorcer... read more

The longer I travel, the stronger my feelings that I made the right decision to leave the UK get. I had no idea how long I'd be traveling for when I left for Indonesia in April 2014. I didn't even know whether I'd like teaching children or not. Now I seem to know the answer to both of these quandaries; for at least another 20 years, and 'I love it, and want to continue doing it as I travel!' Why do I still want to travel after having lived in four countries over three years then? I'd say the primary reason is that I don't like feeling too comfortable in life; I get lazy, I don't read, and I don't learn anything about the world or myself. I left the best-paying job I've ever had to ... read more

The next day we started with a canopy walk through the treetops, along 9 rope bridges. It was really pretty and lots of fun - hard work in that heat though! We saw a poison frog but not much other wildlife. Lunch was a buffet feast in a local village where we had steamed catfish, huge piranha, mashed plantains among other things. Oh and an absolutely disgusting warm local jungle beer. Eww. We ate with our fingers in the traditional style. The food was surprisingly good. In the afternoon we started a village visit which after 10 minutes became a flooded village as we experienced our first Amazon downpour. Within minutes the ground was under 15cm of water! We took shelter and watched on from a local house as the kids continued to play soccer in ... read more

Onto day 2. We awoke early for a pre breakfast cruise in the skiff. Weve been told the majority of the activities will be early morning and evening to avoid the heat of the day. After lunch is reserved for siesta, which suits me fine! The temperature is lovely that time of day, so even though I'm not a morning person it was an enjoyable ride. We saw lots of colourful birds and just cruised wround enjoying the morning. Then it was back for breakfast before we took the skiffs to a local rum distillery. Upon arrival at the rum distillery we were shown the still, it's pretty old fashioned but obviously works a treat. We met some baby buffalo which are farmed for meat. By this stage we were all dying of heat exhaustion so ... read more