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Published: March 7th 2013
Here I am in Cusco, all on my lonesome. Ben went off to do the Inca Trail on Monday and gets back tomorrow tea time. It's the first time we've spent a day apart in five months so it feels very strange and I feel like I'm at a bit of a loose end! I don't know what to do with myself! I'm missing him! We both agreed that it was best for me not to do it because of the trouble I've been having with my knees. It would have just spoilt it for us both. I'm gutted but it's not so bad because I did the Inca Trail seven years ago so doing it again was just greedy really!! That leaves me in charge of both the blog and the photos so I best get cracking!
Ben last wrote when we were on the Ecuadorian coast in a little laid back beach town called Canoa. The next morning, Sunday the 17th, we decided to get out of Ecuador asap and head into Peru so that we'd have time to have a jungle adventure before having to be in Cusco for the 1st of March. This would give Ben
time to acclimatise before doing the Inca Trail on the 4th. (At an elevation of about 3400m it does leave you feeling quite breathless for a few days!!) So, without any planning we just set off and decided to see how far we could get in as short a time as possible...let the nightmare journey commence! We got a bus from Canoa to Bahia (1hr), a bus from Bahia to Guayaquil (4hrs), a night bus from Guayaquil to Piura in Peru (11 hrs, including a border crossing), another night bus from Piura to Tarapoto (18hrs) and then a taxi ride from Tarapoto to Yurimaguas (2hrs). Shattered! The worst journey was the bus ride from Piura to Tarapoto. It was beautiful and very scenic with winding mountain roads but once it became dark, this wasn't any good-especially as at the edge of the mountain roads with steep drops there were numerous memorials for people who had gone over the edge! Plus the driver seemed to be in a massive hurry, overtaking and putting his foot down, with the worse thing being that he was the only driver for the whole 18 hour journey. It didn't give us much confidence and security
in wanting to relax and sleep, which we couldn't really anyway because we had the front seats and there was very little leg room!
Anyway, arriving in Yurimaguas, the plan was to try and get a boat asap to Iquitos (a 3 day journey) and from there book a jungle tour. As always, our plans changed quite a lot! We got a moto taxi to take us to the port but we ended up chatting to the driver (Ronald) and he told us he worked for a company that runs tours from Lagunas to go into Pacaya Samiria National Reserve. We'd considered doing this but even though we'd heard it would be cheaper, it sounded like harder work to organise. Once we'd learned though that we could book the tour from Yurimaguas, we went to the company with Ronald, chatted to him and sorted out a 5 day 4 night jungle trip in the Amazon. We were pleased about this as we'd actually read that Pacaya Samiria was better for seeing a more varied range of flora and fauna...plus it was a lot cheaper! This was all good but it did mean that we'd have to be leaving in
a few hours so only had time to buy a hammock and eat before we got on the 10 hour cargo boat journey to Lagunas. I really wanted a shower!! So on Tuesday we were on the boat with our hammocks set up ready to leave at 2pm but it didn't actually leave until 3:45pm. The boat was full, the telly was loud, the hammock was uncomfortable...not a great journey! Also the boat stopped for some reason a couple of times in the night which meant that we didn't actually get into Lagunas until about 3am. A woman from the company met us off the boat with a torch, as there were no street lights on and she told us that there was no room at the hostel so we had to stay at her house. When we got to her house I needed a wee, so with torch in hand we went out to the toilet at the bottom of the garden. When Ben shone the torch on the toilet, we could see three massive cockroaches sitting on it as well as loads of mozzies flying about! I told Ben there was no way I was sitting on that
so he shooed the cockroaches away. When I then approached the toliet I could still see a big cockroach waiting for me under the rim of the lid, feeling about with its big antennae! Needless to say, I didn't have a wee that night and Ben had one in the bushes! In our room, it was packed with mozzies (we did have a mozzie net though) and the bed was very hard...rubbish sleep again and still in need of a shower! (I was hoping to get one in Lagunas as soon as we arrived but it didn't look promising, especially as they only have electricity from 4:30-7am and then 6-11pm!)
The next morning, Wednesday, (well, a few hours later!) we were taken to the office to have breakfast and get ready fro the trip. I decided I best have a wee before we set off but as Ben had already used the facilities, he advised me not to bother-he said it made the last toilet look like it belonged in a five star hotel! We sorted our stuff out so that we just took a small bag each and then set off with our guide on a moto taxi
to get into a boat at the start of the reserve. There were a few stops along the way because the road was just a muddy mess really so the bike kept getting stuck and we had to keep getting off. We set off in the afternoon with our two guides, Marcielo and Juan doing the rowing and us two sat in the middle surrounded by the supplies we needed for the 5 days. (Oh and I had a wee at the side of the road in the bushes during one of the times the moto taxi got stuck!)
Pacaya Samiria National Reserve consists of primary rainforest and covers an area of about 8000 square miles . As it was the rainy season, a lot of the area was flooded which meant that we spent most of the time in the boat. On the first day we had a couple of hours in the boat (with a short stop for a fruit break!) and then stopped at a lodge to have dinner. A family were staying here so Marcielo used their kitchen to cook. It was a lovely spot with lots of birds flitting about and various fish swimming
underneath us. Marciel cooked some freshly caught catfish which Ben wasn't too thrilled about as he's got one for a pet at home! (this one was much bigger than Plec though!) After dinner, we carried on for a couple more hours and stopped at a lodge called Gloria where we were to spend the night. Although the bed was hard, they actually had a shower here! Yesss! It was lovely to be clean again! We just pottered about the lodge and had a bit of supper before getting an early night. I suppose with no electricity, you live by the light?!
The next day we set off after breakast and stopped after a few hours for dinner which Marciel cooked camping style. We then carried on to the next lodge where we were sleeping and again pottered, looked out for wildlife and read. There was also a Chilean guy staying there so we chatted to him and at supper we also chatted to the men that were stationed there-a good old chat about litter! (no 'talking rubbish' jokes please!) The next day we went for a walk in the jungle with Marcielo which was really interesting as not only
did we see more animals, we also learned about the medicinal properties of various plants. We got to eat some different fruits and drink some proper 'jungle juice' as well!! We stayed at the same lodge again that night.
The next day, Saturday, we headed back the way we came and stopped at the Gloria lodge again. In the evening, Marcielo took us out on the boat to try and spot some crocs! We didn't see any crocodiles but we did see some frogs, a guinea pig (!) and a kinkajou-a small rainforest mammal that is apparently not seen very often due to its nocturnal habits! On Sunday, we got up early to make it all the way back to the start of the park entrance in good time.
Each day in the jungle we saw loads of animals but unfortunately our camera started playing up and so sometimes didn't work. Also, the battery was running low as we hadn't had a chance to charge it for a while so we couldn't just snap away as much as we would've liked to. Such a shame and we were both gutted. Anyway, I didn't list what we saw each
day as we saw some of the animals everyday! I'll list now all the things we saw, in no particular order! Tui Parakeets, Woodpeckers, Toucans, Smooth Billed Anis, Black Collared Hawk, Ringed Kingfishers, Capped Heron, Cocoi Heron, Horned Screamers, Tiger Heron, Falcons, Harpy Eagle, Bats, Great Egrets, Anhingas, Blue and Yellow Macaws, River Turtles, Pink River Dolphins, Golden Orb Spider, Bullet Ants, Leafcutter Ants, Green Iguanas, Common Squirrel Monkeys, Woolly Monkeys, Red Howler Monkeys, Monk Sakis, Brown Capuchin Monkeys, Saddleback Tamarins, Sloths and loads of other insects, birds and butterflies! The most amazing thing about the jungle though was the sounds and it was definitely noisier at night! During the day you could here screeching and squawking from the birds, the trees rustling and branches snapping when monkeys were close-by, chattering of some monkeys and the monster like sound of the howlers (which never ceases to amaze me!), splashing of fish, turtles and river dolphins, insects buzzing...oh and the sound of Juan at the back of the boat, hocking up and gobbing in the water interspersed with the occasional trump! Then Marcielo making involuntary monkey noises which although he sometimes did to attract monkeys, he also seemed to do it
for no reason so we concluded it was a form of Tourettes!! During the night, it was the frogs mainly making all kinds of sounds, plus birds squawking, insects buzzing, monkeys screeching and bats flapping (they were actually flying through the hut!). I suppose noises always seem louder at night but this was just one noise after the other, all night-if it wasn't one animal it was another! We heard a few other interesting sounds too- the sound of a crocodile splash (Juan said he saw it) and the sound of a little Capuchin Monkey being attacked and then carried off by a Harpy Eagle!! Poor thing! Another amazing sound was the rain...you could hear it coming from quite a way away, it sounded like some kind of huge motor!
Even though we'd seen and heard some amazing things I was glad to be out of the jungle! My bum was aching from being sat in the boat (our bums were often numb!) and I just wanted to get back to some kind of civilisation! (I think Ben would have happlily stayed longer though!) On Sunday, after unloading the boat, we were taken back to Lagunas to pick up
our bags fron the office. (As soon as I put my backpack on I could smell wee...think a dog must have taken a liking to my bag?! Yuk!!) We went straight to Eco Hospedaje, booked in for a night, got a shower(!), put some clean clothes on, gave the owners some laundry and went out to a lively 'bar' where they were playing loud music and locals were dancing and drinking! We had a couple of beers and a bit later found the only place in town to eat! There's really nothing to do in Lagunas so we were hoping that the next boat to Nauta would come sooner rather than later. To cut a long story short, in the end in didn't come until Wednesday morning! (but we didn't know this until Tuesday night!) Monday wasn't so bad because we managed to get some breakfast from our hostel (as there wasn't really anywhere else) and as we were eating our bread, butter, jam and coffee, a couple of gringoes walked in! We ended up spending all day and night with them, just talking and talking! It was great and we got on really well with them. As there was
no where to go, nothing to do and nowhere to eat, (the place we'd eaten at the night before was closed?!) we bought some pasta and veg and used the hostel kitchen to cook together. We actually ended up having a nice day with Michael and Ryan and will definitely be keeing in touch with them. (nothing to do with the fact that they're moving to Hawaii soon...!!) We'd been told that the boat to Nauta would probably arrive about 2-4am the next morning but just before we went to bed the hostel owner told us there was no boat! That meant another day to kill in Lagunas!!
So on Tuesday, we passed the time by playing Scrabble, cooking dinner and having a few beers and then at about 9pm the hostel owner told us that the boat was due to arrive at 7am the next day. Hooray!! (We were starting to worry a bit because we had two flghts booked for Friday and the boat to Nauta takes 24 hours!)
We finally got on the boat on Wednesday morning with the boat setting off just before nine. Dinner, tea and breakfast were included in the ticket and
the food was average but substantial! We spent most of the time on the boat reading and trying to get some sleep on the hammocks! The boat journey was interesting (but slow) as we got to see lots of little villages along the way at the side of the river-some we stopped at and some they just used a little tender to whizz people off the boat and across to their village. At the villages we stopped at, loads of locals would get on selling food and drink and it was manic at these times! There were people from about the age of 8 up to 78 selling things like fish, rice, plantains, cakes, nuts, crisps, tomales, fizzy pop and some were even selling parrots for 50 soles! We also saw one woman bring on a pig in a cage to sell and another woman brought a monkey on board!
We arrived in Nauta on Thursday morning at 10am and it was chaos. As soon as the boat came near land, about 30 blokes jumped on..and I'm not even sure why?! They weren't passengers! I think they were moto-taxi drivers trying to get a fare?! We eventually managed to
get off, walk up the street away from the mayhem and get a moto taxi to the 'bus station'. From there, we were quickly ushered onto a minibus for the two hour journey to Iquitos. In Iquitos, we soon got a room in a hostel, showered then went in search of food and drink! We then just spent the rest of the day pottering as we were worn out and acclimatising to the civilised world! Iquitos is a nice big city, very touristy with loads of gringoes hanging about! There were loads of places to eat, sleep and drink but the fumes from the moto taxis were horrendous. In the afternoon it chucked it down so we were stuck in a bar for a while and at night we went out for food and a few more beers.
Friday morning, we were up at half six, feeling a bit groggy, to get our half eight flight to Lima. The flight was a bit delayed but we got to Lima in plenty of time to catch our half one flight to Cusco, which was also a bit delayed. So basically, we've been in Cusco since Friday, just having a walk
around and finding decent places to eat and drink. It's very touristy here with tour agencies, cafes, bars, restaurants, hostels and hotels everywhere but it's a really lovely city with a nice feel to it. We had a nice few days together here before Ben went off early Monday morning and since then I've not been feeling too great-think I'm pining for him!! I've sorted us some tickets for a night bus on Friday to go to La Paz in Bolivia where we'll cycle down the 'World's Most Dangerous Road' (aka the Death Road!) and then probably head to Copacabana to see Lago Titicaca. A couple of weeks ago we found out that our Dads and my Uncle John have booked to come out and see us so we'll be meeting them in Lima on the 18th March!! Hilarious! Can't wait to see them. They're staying out here for a month! Right, I best get off and get the photos on now! I'm sure Ben will be blogging soon to tell you all about his Machu Picchu adventure! I can't wait to see him tomorrow!
P.S. After the Lagunas experience and taking into consideration the Nicaraguan school life, I've
told Ben that I will never ever moan or complain about anything again! Let's see how long it lasts!
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Lorrainne Burnitt
non-member comment
Yet another enjoyable read Shelley, hope ben got back to you safely. Enjoy your time with your dads and uncle. xx