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We went back on forth whether or not we were going to come to the jungle... again. We felt we had done so much jungle stuff in Malaysia that we almost skipped this. Then we went in and talked to Rosa Maria in La Paz. She started Madidi travel and founded the Madidi National Park, where all the tourists of Bolivia go to see the Amazon Basin. She was a staunch advocate for saving the rainforest and even had a National Geographic article written about her and the park in 2000. She single handily convinced us to go to the rainforest and more importantly, she convinced us to go with her company. So many operators here are bad for the environment. They pick up the animals or treat them poorly. Rosa Maria had opened a new sanctuary she called ¨Serere¨ just outside the National Park. It was more money than we wanted to pay (story of our lives), but it sounded amazing and we knew the guides would be knowledgeable and eco friendly and we knew our money would go back to saving the rainforest. So we thought it was worth it. There are two companies that fly small Cessna from
La Paz to Rurrenabaque (where you leave from) and we opted for the cheaper one to save us some money on this venture.
So the morning came! We had a 7am flight, so we would arrive in Rurrenabaque by 8am and hop on our boat transfer by 11am. We left our hostel in La Paz at 5:30am to make it to the airport by 6am. We were in the waiting room ready to board our plane a little after seven when they told us our plane was delayed by one hour due to bad weather in Rurrenabaque. Ok... we expected this (flights are often delayed) so no big deal! At 8am they told us that our flight would now be delayed until 12:30pm at the earliest and to go back to La Paz and call then. Well, none of us wanted to pay for the 1/2 hour cab back to La Paz so we decided to stick it out at the airport. There were about nine of us. At 12:45pm we were told we could get a plane at 3pm at the International Airport and they would take us there at 2pm. Well, none of us had eaten and
we knew there was food at the international airport, but they would not take us until 2pm, which meant we had to eat at their restaurant. Many people eating there were getting soups, shakes and other food. When we asked what there was they told us we could only have egg sandwiches. Even when we pointed out the soup to them, they said we could only eat egg sandwiches. Some customer service! We were transferred the five minutes to the airport! We would have walked if we knew it was that close. When we went to check in, no one at the airline had any clue who we were and they were so confused. Bolivianos were cutting us in line and all of us were getting pissed off. They finally gave us our boarding passes (with everyone having the same seat number and the same name!) and we went through security. We boarded the plane to find us all getting kicked out of our seats because everyone else had assigned seating and we all had the same seat number. We finally got that sorted and we were off. A small Cessna that first took us over the Andes and then
On the boat to Serer
With Erin and Stephen (they were in our group)into the jungle. An hour later we landed. We were ready to get off the plane when we heard the news. We had landed in Trinidad! It was still another hour to Rurrenabaque. They had put us on a flight to Trinidad to save them money since our flight to Rurrenabaque was not full! So a little before 7am we landed in Rurrenebaque! 11 hours after our initial plan. Since we had missed our tour that day, we checked into a hostel and talked with our tour company. It was ok to leave the next day we just had to push our flight back one day.
The next morning we were ready to go into the jungle. We woke up early so we could talk to our air carrier to get our flight switched. As it turns out, our flight Friday morning was the last one for the weekend and we couldn’t fly until Monday morning! Well... so much for being ahead of schedule. Still we wanted to make sure we had a good time in the jungle.
So we were off. A three hour boat ride down the river Beni to Serere. The river rises north of
La Paz and flows northeast through the pampas. One of the tributary rivers is Tuichi River in the Madidi National Park. Tuichi River joins the Beni River upstream from Rurrenabaque. South of Rurrenabaque, Río Beni runs through the rainforest. We were heading south- into the rainforest and the Amazon Basin! I had a bit of a cold so unfortunately I fell asleep most of the three hour boat ride. So much for checking out the scenery. When we arrived we hiked about a mile further into the jungle to get to the lodge. The heat, humidity and mosquitoes were already getting to me. While walking the mile to the lodge there were groups of mosquitoes following us. I could see them flying behind Chris who was in front of me. We had long sleeves on and mosquito repellent, but it didn’t seem to be helping! We were escorted to our jungle ¨hut¨ which turned out to be this amazing villa in the middle of the rainforest. It was clean with giant beds with mosquito netting and the entire cabin was open. There was netting all around it to protect you from bugs, but you could see right out into the
forest. It was gorgeous. Even the bathroom was open. You would take a shower or sit on the toilet looking at the trees and listening to the sounds of the jungle. It was amazing! So relaxing. We had siesta time and I swear every time I lay in that bed listening to the jungle I would fall asleep. I am not a napper, but I napped everyday we were there.
The main building is about a 15 minute walk through the jungle. The main lodge sat right on a lake and had hammocks and lounge areas for chilling out. It was gorgeous. We had an amazing English speaking guide Nelo, who grew up in the rainforest about nine hours down river from where we were. He was so smart and knew everything about the forest. When we arrived, after our nap, he took us out on the lake to spot animals. We didn’t have much luck, but did manage to see some monkeys in the trees. They were really far away and moving too quickly for us to catch them, but it was a start. The lake itself was gorgeous and reflected the trees perfectly on the water. Plus
at sunset everything turned this amazing color and it was gorgeous. That night we went out on the river again, but this time to spot caiman. We would get out our flashlights and look for the reds of their eyes. Nelo could tell by the size of their eyes how big they were. The biggest we saw was about 13 feet long, but we didn’t really see it, just the eyes. We did a smaller one on shore that we managed to get a photo of, but that’s about it. We also saw an owl on the river and lots of bats.
The next day it was all about hiking. We did a morning (5:30am-10am) hike. We managed to see some monkeys, but nothing special. We tracked down some howler monkeys by following their sound. You can hear them for miles and miles and finally were quiet enough that we got close enough to snap a quick photo before they ran away. We were exhausted and starving by the end of it. Then it was off on our afternoon hike. Still nothing special. That afternoon we went out on the lake for our first day of piranha fishing. We
were fishing with giant chunks of beef and ready to catch a million piranhas. The second we put our meat in the water we would feel these tugs on our line. Then we would pull up our line and there would be no meat and no piranha. Everytime one would bite we would get so excited, but they wouldn’t stick. Finally, Jeff got one to stick. He caught a yellow piranha which is the middle size you can catch. Red are the smallest and white are the biggest. He pulled it in the boat and it came off the line and was flopping around. I was jumping up and down and hoping it wouldn’t bite off my toes! After it died down we all posed for photos with us. Not long after that Chris had a bite. It was huge, we could barely pull it up. Jeff had to come help him. When they pulled it up, it was the biggest LOG I have ever seen. Poor Chris! We were all so excited, but it was just a log. It did make for a good laugh though.
That night we did our first night hike. We walked for about
an hour without seeing a single thing! We were not having any luck. Only one piranha and no animal spotting.
We did one more morning hike after breakfast the next morning. We did not have high expectation because of our luck so far. We were walking and talking and all of a sudden there were monkeys above us. Both Squirrel and Cappachin monkeys. Nelo guessed there were about 100 monkeys passing above us. We just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
That afternoon it was off to try for piranhas again. Nelo took us to Lago Gringo in search for more fish. Still, after a couple hours on the lake we had nothing. Then we met Choclo. Let me tell you a little background on Choclo. We had read the National Geographic article and Choclo was mentioned in it. He was born and raised in the jungle and was in charge of taking the National Geographic people out into the jungle. Trust me... he had some stories to tell. He once was attacked by a group of wild pigs. They climbed trees to escape and one of his friends didn’t make it. When
the noise calmed down they went down to see what happened. They only found pieces of his friend. The pigs devoured him. Another one of his friends had his entire butt bitten off by a wild pig. So... when it comes to jungle man, Choclo was it.
Choclo told us to come over and fish near his little hut because he had caught 15 piranhas in the time we caught none. We went out to his dock and threw the line in. Immediately the piranhas started biting again. We were so close to catching some. Chris even had one out of the water before it fell back in. After another hour there we still had caught nothing. I think jungle man Choclo was laughing at us Gringos, but oh well... we tried.
The last day at the lodge we decided just to relax before heading back to Rurrenabaque. In the morning, Nelo taught us how to make jewelry out of some of the jungle materials. We gathered seeds and nuts from the forest and sanded them down to make two necklaces and a ring. The coolest part about it was when Nelo started to burn an egg carton.
I was wondering why he was doing this. Then he told us to rub the ash on the jewelry. Why ash? Well, the ash is a natural polisher and it made the nuts shiny and made our jewelry look professionally made. From now on the next time you need to polish your silver you can just burn something and polish it with ash. Way cheaper than taking it to a polisher!
After four days we said our goodbyes and took the boat ride up stream to Rurrenabaque. We spent the next few days relaxing in Rurrenabaque waiting for our flight out on Monday. Since Rurre is such a small town there wasn’t much to do. Hence why we got caught up on our blogs and were able to actually publish the ones we had written. Good luck catching up on all these! Everyone has a lot of reading to do.
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Courtney Enriquez
non-member comment
who ever knew
That you could eat piranahs (SP?)!!! I know we trump them in size... but those teeth freak me out ;o) Be safe, Court