From the city to the jungle and back

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Hello All!!

Sorry it´s been awhile, the jungle is very unaccomodating when it comes to internet connections. We do however, have power and hot hot hot water. Which leads to my next comment that the best shower I have had so far has been in the jungle! How awesome is that?

So the cool thing about the jungle is that when it rains it rains extraordinarily more and more intensly than it does anywhere else. Imagine a helicopter droppinh gallons of water on you at one time....the sound is like thunder literally, and the quantity could drown someone stuck in a 6 foot hole, if they were my height. You can prepare for the rains by looking for low flying grey to black clouds. Once you have spotted them you have roughly 5 minutes to get into shelter or prepare for a shower outside. You can usually hear the rain before it hits. It is a little unsettling to say the least.

So I ended in Puyo talking about going clubbing in Quito, that is grand we did a lounge a bar and then an after hours bar. I managed to maintain gusto even up to 4 am, that was impressive. What killed me the most was the smoking in the clubs, holy cow!

So my drink for Ecuador is Cuban Libre, which is like 75 % rum and 25% coke and lime. Hello drunkedness. I am going to switch back to Puyo and leave Quito.

So it turns out I read the information wrong on the website for Santa Martha. I thought it said you had to be at the refuge by 9 or 12, instead in meant the buses leave at 9 or 12. This meant that I got to the bus terminal too early and did not want to wait for the 12pm bus, because I thought I needed to be there at 12.........

So I took a taxi, the cost wsa 35 US$ which is expensive, I felt a little jipped but I wanted out of Puyo and onto the refuge. I took the offer and off we went. Taxi drivers like I said before, speed here it is no different in Puyo. We were doing between 50-80 all the time.

There was some construction at the beginning of the road to the jungle which meant 20 min waiting to pass. Small talk with the cabbie, and an offer of one halls bon bon. hahaha. I passed.

So once past the blockcade, 80km/hr down a lane and a half road of gravel and giant rocks. At one point we fished tailed. I tried to maintain a coolness but the fear was leaking through, and my eyebrow was furrowed for most of the ride. Not to mention the dilation of my pupils as another outlet of fear.

Much of the ride was stray dogs, chickens and cows along the road. There is always someone walking the road, and at various points there was also small villages and houses strewn about.

Nonetheless I arrived an hour later in one piece 37 dollars less. It stung a little, but the excitement of being at Santa Martha cancelled it out.

So I arrived and was greeted by one of the girls from the family that lives at the bottom near the road. She took me up the stairs made of tree logs that seemed to go on for ages. A stray dog (which I would later know as Scrappy Dog) followed close behind me, he is just a pup and a real sweet heart. As we passed through the no tresspassing sign, the sounds of parkeets alerted me that I was really there. One parkeet the baby, known as baby was squaking like his death was immient, I felt for him. The kinkachus ( i think that is right, think the monkeys from the movie with Dustin Hoffman ¨Virus¨I think) Anyways it was those guys- I am still grasping some of the names. There was about 5 of them. Then up some more stairs and there was Ricky the crazy giant dobberman that is surprisingly nice. He was eating something, he probably caught a chicken from the neighbours.
Up some more stairs and the ground evened out a little and there was a lush garden fenced off with dead trees. To my right was a lush red macaw, he was by himself because he kills other macaws...yikes...

We eventually got to the living hut and there I was introduced to what seemed like all English people, there was actually 4 english, 1 french and 1 german. Very diverse. They were getting rid of termites in the roof of the room I was staying in. Lovely.....
We were all introduced and went through the introductions etc, I got a bit of a tour and waited for the other new comers.

When they came it was 2 more English Sarah and Ned. Funny I was expecting everyone to be older, yet everyone was within 5 years of me. Very cool.

So after we got a tour of all the animals and a rough outline of the duties we would be performing. I was introduced to 5 free parrots that got to hang out around the area and the huts. ! blue macaw called the Hoff, he doesn´t like girls he likes boys only. Try and touch him and risk losing a finger. The other macaw was also red, but a lot nicer with a cool mohawk thing going on on his head.

To the left of the free birds was a Coati, she has to be one of my favourite animals there. It´s hard to describe her, I find a picture. She is just a baby, she kind of looks like a furry armadillo. Very cute. Her name is Bubba and she lets you pet her and scratch her. I got to witness her eat a frog that was unfortunate to get too close to the cage. Neat.

Down the hill to the Wolly monkeys, there is two of them, one is called Monster because the previous owner was feeding him steriods. Poor thing. The other one is called Johhny, they like hand massages, and show respect by covering their face with there arms. Soo cute. A little further down is the ocelot and margay, they are really neat cats, the ocelot is similar to a jaguar but a lot smaller and the margay is similar to the ocelot but even smaller. (A couple of days later they managed to get out, because Ricky the dog, made a hole in their cage trying to get a chicken foot- right, they feed them live chickens. I was ok with that, I guess because I didn´t see it. They were eventually caught with cunning traps and more chickens-in the process they unfortunately killed 5 parrots 😞

The other parrots who are kept in a cage are super cool! Some of them laugh at you, which can be a bit unnerving at first and some can talk like R2D2 from Star Wars, how wierd!???

So yeah that was that. The duties include: getting up before 8 for breakfast. 8:15 to 9:30 feed and clean the cages. 9:30 to 10:30 ish break more food and reading and what not.
10:30 to 12:30 is various tasks. I went to the jungle twice to build a path for a hut for the family, which involved carrying sacks of rocks from the stream to the path... I was sore. You felt like an android after a few trips. I managed. The second time we went back we had to carry 20 lb logs on our shoulders through mud, I was not impressed, there is a slight indentation from the logs on my shoulders, not to mention that I fell twice into the mud. One time my boot actually came off and into the mud was a foot...gross. hahah it was funny in retrospect, but not in the moment. I swear I was going to die, it felt like slavery. But I managed after the mother of the family came along carrying one herself. I had to maintain an bit of self respect, but to be honest at the moment I would have surrendered my ´toughness´for a muscly man willing to lug those bloody logs around. Unfortunately, not the case, so only a figment of my mind. After we got the bloody things down we had to finish the path= get more rocks and carry them on our already badly bruised and tortured shoulders.... we prevailed and since then I have been sore.

The other day we went into the jungle the other way and took bamboo illegally from a man who doesn´t seem to be around anymore. There we are standing in the jungle with Armundo the father of the family that lives at the refuge, chopping down bamboo with machetes and piling them in a clearing. When we were done we had to carry them in 5´s down the road-ON OUR SHOULDERS- without getting hit by cars and other passing motorists. That was fun.

To be honest I am really enjoying myself. On breaks I lounge in the hammocks and read while trying not to get poohed on by the parrots above my head. At night we have cook offs and people pair up and cook. Last night we played table tennis on the dinner table while listening to Grease. Some people were drinking rum as well, they weren´t as good. Oh and if anyone asks you to play table tennis in Ecuador, it is 5 serves each and points are earned regardless. I lost the first one because of this...

So now I am in Baños on a break, I went to the market earlier and haggled with a merchant. I got a poncho, a hammock and a bag for 25 bucks. Not too bad. Tonight we are going out for a nice dinner and then drinks and then to to the club . I am getting my laundry done, which is nice because 6 1/2 hours of the days I am covered in mud wearing gum boots...hot! Fun though.

So it will be nice to have clean clothes 😊

Tomorrow I am going to the a spa and swimming an using the hot tub and maybe a full body massage for like 25 bucks which is more thatn I can say for spas in Canada. We will see. I am definietly going to the hot springs down the street from my hostel. I really like Baños there is so much too do. I may also go bridge jumping. I am debating getting a tatoo in Argentina. Don´t be surprised if I come home with one. I think for now I will debate Argentinan or Ecuadorian Havaiannas while taking in the city and maybe having some quality espresso.

More update tomorrow hopefully. Miss all of you dearly.

Enjoy.

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Impatiently waiting latest update
From the jungle, back to the city : )