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Published: August 6th 2007
Luckily the sickness had subsided in the morning to allow me to make the flight to Rurrenabaque in the jungle an hours flight north of La Paz. The flight itself was a real experience, on a 19 seat plane which landed on a grass/dirt runway in a clearing in the forest. Having spent the last few weeks at high altitude (and cold temperatures), it was nice to be greeted in Rurrenabaque by oxygen (only 105 metres above sea level), and sunshine that actually provided heat.
We spent the first night in Rurrenabaque, before starting our organised pampas tour the following morning with a group of Dutch, Canadian and American people. We took a 3 hour drive down a dirt track, before getting on a wooden canoe with our supplies and guide, Oscar, for the next 3 days and headed down river on a 3 hour boat ride to our camp.
The boat trip was great and the river not very wide, so we were immediately getting very close to alligators, capybarra, caiman, turtles, pink dolphins and an unbelievable amount of birds. The best part of the ride was stopping to watch a group of over 20 squirrel monkeys attempt a tree to tree jump over a small river that adjoined ours. Really better than watching the animal planet on tv, we watched as they took it in turns to pluck up courage to make the leap. Some of the younger ones were clearly scared and kept attempting to make the jump before dashing to the back of the queue to watch and learn how it was done. After 10 minutes, they all got across safely, a few getting wet as they miss judged the distance.
After getting to camp we went to watch the sunset and then went on a boat ride in the dark to find alligators (you can see the red eyes on the water by shining a torch). The next morning we put on some welly boots and went for a 3 hour walk into the swamp lands in search of anacondas (only the odd story has been recorded of the large 9 metre snakes eating people, so we felt extremely safe. Usually they only eat small cows !!!).
It was a rather anxious walk as we were told to head off alone to cover more ground and have the best chance of locating one in shin deep swamp (it absolutely stank). We eventually found one, but only about 2 metres long and following a wrestle as it tried to bury into the mud. We also found a dead cobra but were assured that the cobras living here did not kill humans but would only put someone in hospital for a week of serious pain!
In the afternoon we went in search of the pink dolphins which we would be able to swim with. Apparently pink dolphins in the area mean that the piranha fish, aligators and snakes would keep their distance and we would be entirely safe, hmmmmmmm !!!! Anyway, we found a group of 5 or 6 and got in the very brown water for a refreshing dip, considering we had not showered for a few days and it was extremely hot and dirty.
The following morning we finished with some piranha fishing with meat on crab-lines and managed to catch lots between the group, with me being one of the only people not to catch an actual piranha (i did catch another fish), much to Rachels joy having caught a nice one. The guide did not let anyone take the red-belly ones off their hook as they are quite aggressive and fingers can easily be lost. A boat ride and drive back to Rurrenbaque left us with a good night out with the group we had shared the trip with who had provided lots of amusement. The most amazing thing about the 3 day trip was that it cost 25 pounds each all inclusive !!! The best trip so far.
After flying back to La Paz, we got a bus to Copacabana on the shore of Lake Titicaca which is where we are now. It is the Bolivian Independence day celebration going on right now which we had not realised, so unfortuntely rooms are all taken except the honeymoon suite in probably the best accommodation in town. Well we thought we would treat ourselves at 16 pounds per night and take full advantage of the overhead view of celebrations, hot showers and the best view of the lake.
It seems the Travel Blog have managed to lose our previous entries so if anyone kept copies on their email, please let us have them in due course. Remembering what we did yesterday is hard enough, let alone a few weeks ago.
Kriszta, thanks for your SOS email, having not heard from us for a few days. It was quite funny that we had not had any emails from anyone else including parents !!
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Steven
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The trip sounds amazing !! Elaine say's it sounds like hell and no place for a honeymoon couple :-) I've recovered and emailed Rachel all the lost blogs too. Keep having fun and writing the blogs to keep us going.