Fresh back from the Cuyabeno National Park in Ecuador’s part of the Amazon Jungle. We’re Pretty darn stinky all ’round. The first casualties of the trip have been notched up and now (as anyone who comes within a few meters will tell you) my walking boots are beyond salvage. I think I well and truely stinked out the various transports we used to get the 13 hours back from the jungle to Quito yesterday. The first big expensive fataility too. While trying to take a picture of a catapilar that looked exactly like Dougal the dog from The Magic Roundabout (although I have to say it looks nothing like him now!) I dropped my brilliant little LX3 camera. Now it’s busted and the only thing I can do is buy a new one.
This was a brilliant trip though. We went for the 5 day trip rather than the normal 4 days it seems that people do. Four days would be enough but the extra day we had just added to the relaxation. It was just the two of us and the guide on the last day so we got a really personal experience on the last treck. We could go slow and stop and look at everything. Not so much ran away either with only two pairs of clod hopping feet to scare them!
We’ve been to the Amazon jungle before, in Peru last year but this was different, this time it was to an area that is almost permantently flooded and using one lodge as a base rather than moving from between lodges. Most of the trips out from the lodge were in motor canoe. Sometimes we had to paddle ourselves though which was great. Every day ended in a canoe to the middle of the lake to swim (in the pirahna and caymen infested waters I might add!) and watch the sunset in the lake that surrounds the island the lodge is on.
Like Galapapos I’ll let the pictures do the talking on this one now!
These little fellows hung out by the lodge everyday
another cheeky monkey. This one makes a horrible noise in the middle of the night (not quite like the howler monkeys we saw last year though that just sound like 14ft monsters!)
Very rare to see this Pocket Monkey so we were pretty lucky. 11cm long, how the guide spotted this I have no idea!
Now my favourite bit, we went on a hike through the jugle at night with only torches for company, so many creatures to see…
and the one that killed my camera…
