Amazing Amazonas Part 1

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With our return date looming and our point of departure being half a continent away we decided that a couple of flights and a boat ride were necessary to ensure another call to Oneworld partner airlines wasn´t required in order to chane the date again......to be fair changing the date was out of the question given we had 2 tickets for U2 at Wembley on the 15th of August. We flew from Bogota to Leticia. Leticia is the Colombian town at the three frontiers, which is he point in the Amazon where Colombia meets Brasil and Peru. We had arranged to stay at a lodge, Tacana Lodge about 40 mins out of town, run by an Ex-pat Brit called Steve McLear and his Colombian partner, Elena. Steve's a top bloke who has been in South America for years and in Colombia for about 5 years. He proved an excellent source of information and was able to arrange a number of activities for us whilst we were in the region. Elena is lovely and treats you as though you are part of the family.

Our first activity was that evening where we decided to go on a night walk through the jnugle. Steve arranged a guide from the local community to tale us on a walk. Ann was a little concerned about the fact that walking through the jungle in the night would bedificult for Gordon on account of the fact that he had 1) broken his arm; and 2) managed to lose his head torch......not sure where, though it added to the long list of stuff we had managed to misplace over the course of the last 7 months. The wwalk proved exciting right from the start, mainly thanks to our guide and of course Travis, a friend of Wendy's who joined us. Travis managed to pat a spider when he put his hand on a tree......when he questioned our guide as to its potential to do harm he received the reply, "si, si, muchos pericoloso!". A little shaken we continued and Gordon was able to put into practice the Tarantula teasing techniques we'd learned in the Bolivian jungle.....that is tapping a twig at the edge of the Tranatula's burrow and waiting for it to rush out and hold on......those furry critters have one heck of a grip!

Once back at the lodge we discussed our options for the next few days. Priority one was to make sure we had our boat from Leticia in Colombia to Iquitos in Peru all booked and organised. We were aiming to leave Leticia and Colombia on the Sunday, which would give us 4 days to get to Lima and hence our flight back to London. However there were a few other things that we wanted to do. Primarily we wanted to spend some time looking for river dolphins on the Amazon River, visit the Island of the Monkeys and see the famous Victoria Reina Lillies. We'd also heard about this village down river from Leticia, meant to be indicative of life on the Amazon, with a fair chance to spot Caimans!!

So it was that we headed out on a day long trip on the Amazon river which included Isla de Mono's, the Victoria Reina Lillies, fishing for Pirahna's and generally enjoying the best of Amazonian life! First stop was an opportunity to see the massive Victoria Reina lilly's and of course have our pictures taken with a Tamarind and a couple of Macaws.....it was Captain Gordon and his parrot's. From there we headed to Isla de Mono's where we experienced the full force of a troop of squirrel monkeys. These little fella's we'd first encountered in the Bolivian Pampa's. The ones on this island are the remnants of a troop who has been brought to the island for study purposes. Now they are completely habituated and have no fear of humans. Walk into the jungle with a banana and you will see the effects. Describing the onslaught is one thing, experiencing it though is another. We'll let the pics tell the story on that one though!

We continued on our walk which I have to say was uneventful.....aside from the growing bank of dark clouds. We paddled across an inland lake and then walked through the forest back to the lunch spot......just in time for the mother of all storms to be unleashed........truly it was as if the sky had gone black and the rain just pounded and pounded. Rain really can't hurt you, but the wind has a tendency to blow down trees in the Amazon because most of the root system's aren't very deep. Luckily none blew over in this storm, though it didn't stop another tour group from high tailing it back to their boats......hmmm storm on the water....harks back to the Drake Shake.....Wendy wasn't having a bar of that.

We spent the rest of the afternoon searching for river dolphins.....successfully.....they really aren't as rare as the Discovery Channel make out.....we also took in a spot of fishing, much to the displeasure of the two vegetarians in the boat......Ann proved most proficient reeling in a couple of catfish......one of which sqeaked and squawked!

The next day we headed up river to a town where no road leads to. The only way to Puerto Narino is by local. It takes about an hour, maybe two to get there heading against the flow of the Amazon. One thing that strikes you about the Amazon is that it really is just one HUGE super highway. The part of the river we were on at times was so wide the far bank was a a hazy distance away.....you really can't comprehend its enormity until you see it. We got to Puerto Narino and on the advice of Steve....proving to be a very valuable source of information, booked into the best hotel in town......small town with no road.....best is a relative term! Still was a lot better than most places we've stayed at! We then met up with the guy that Steve had suggested who put us in touch with a guy who would be able to take us up river in sarch of dolphins, caimans and other creatures of the jungle. Well wild life being wild life it doesn't always go to plan. After roasting for a couple of hours in the dug out and not seeing so much as a splash of dolphin, the afternoon rains came in and much like the day before on Isla del Monos the resulting downpour soaked us through...relief though from the day's heat. We eventually saw dolphins though....and had a great time following them around.....

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Photos

Not the nicest spider in the world
This was one where our guide said....."si pericoloso"

A Snake in a Tree
this is the one that Ann discovered whilst we were playing with tarantula's

That Snake again
this time our guide said, "no, non pericoloso"