Advertisement
Published: July 28th 2010
Edit Blog Post
Boats
Ours leaked a bit, but these were ideal for this type of trip. I first heard about the Pampas tour as a poor man´s alternative to exploring areas near Iquitos, Peru. I passed on the 20 hour, dangerous road journey to Rurrenbaque and opted instead for a 40 minute flight. Through Honey Tours (located in La Paz on Comercial across from the Wild Rover hostel), the flight was about 1000 BS and the tour (through Indigena Tours, which was pretty good) was an additional 550. The guides definitely respect nature on some level, but if you are looking for something less intrusive (they fed the hawks piranhas we caught and seemed to have some sites prepared, including a croc they killed after it (according to them) bit off the leg of a girl 25 days earlier, and the locals burn some of the area for their crops - it isn´t technically a national park), opt for one of the more eco-friendly groups. You likely won´t see as much wildlife and it will cost a lot more, but from what I've heard, you will participate in and learn more about sustainable living and tourism.
I think my car is wider than the fuselage of the plane, but the giggling pilots got the job done and
Black Caiman
And everyone wanted me to go for a swim? I arrived in Rurre at about 8 AM. The city is on the Beni river, but the tour is a much more narrow estuary, Yacuma.
DAY 1
It takes three bumpy hours by jeep to get to the river, and then three more hours by boat to get to the camp. The final three hours are filled with wildlife, however, and the boats are comfortable (the seats even have backs) if the weather is good. We saw turtles, caimans, capybaras, squirrel and howler monkeys, and countless birds, including eagles, storks, ibis, birds of paradise, falcons, and vultures.
At night they had to give us something to do, I suppose, so they took us back on the boats to look at the eyes of animals at night. The crocodiles´ red eyes were easy to spot every few feet, but the blue eyes of the anaconda eluded us. The flashes of the cameras didn't seem to be very good for the animals, and we probably ruined some meal opportunities for the predators.
DAY 2
The next morning we set out sporting rubber boots (with holes in most of them) on an anaconda hunt. They didn´t tell us until afterward that walking knee
R.O.U.S.
¨Rodents of unusual size? I don´t think they exist.¨
The largest rodent in the world, an adult Capybara is 3-4 feet long. They all share a cynical expression as their clumsy, fat bodies in environment of crocs, alligators, and anacondas seems to be an elaborate joke on the part of mother nature. deep in swampland was probably pretty dangerous (what with the wasps, crocs, and snakes) and that the sun would be scorching hot, but the whole scene mainly seemed like a setup for us to come across a baby anaconda on the other side of the wetland. We walked a bit further after that, searching for other snakes, but to no avail.
After an amazing lunch, we climbed into the boats again to search for and swim with pink dolphins (nice idea, but there was no way in hell I was getting in that water). We tracked several of them for quite awhile and got some good glimpses, but I wasn't fast enough with my camera and they didn't seem to be terribly playful that time of day.
On the way back we stopped at another camp and had a Gringos vs. Bolivian futbol match in the red sunset and orange full moon and then headed back to our camp for dinner.
DAY 3
After breakfast, we took some pieces of meat and basic fishing rods with us to fish for piranhas. I basically just fed them really well, as they took the meat off the hook without being caught. Others
Turtles
I guess that positioning maximizes the number of turtles per log.... in the group caught a few, though, but I didn't get why we didn't eat them for lunch rather than throwing them to hawks and falcons—this part didn't seem very responsible.
After the trip I spent a night at Hotel Oriental. It was okay for 30 BS per person, aside from the thick mold on the walls. Nearby is the self-proclaimed ´famous´Mosquito Bar, but we had excellent food at the Monkey Bar - the pizza was impressive. Rurre wouldn't be a bad place to spend an extra day after your tour.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.296s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 17; qc: 73; dbt: 0.1412s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Justin
non-member comment
Awesome!
You have more guts then me!!! I would love to go there and try some of these things but my nerves wouldn't survive the plane ride! Glad you are well and everything is good. Awesome pictures!