Amazonia Lodge Manu National Park

... ready for the morning, Jeff was running around frantically trying to organize all of his stuff. It made me feel good that I was able to just relax while he was frantic.

Oct 24

· This morning was a sad one. We said all of our goodbyes and left on the boat for our long trip to Atalaya. I listened to Hair of the Dog in the beginning, which made me homesick and realize that I am ready for the 518. We picked up some of the boat drivers from ...

... 10 hours in a bus, not to mention getting to Atalaya first on a boat.

· In the afternoon we worked again. Nothing really to comment on but I did find a snail in a shell, which was pretty cool.

Oct 20

· Well today Jeff and I worked in the morning but not in the afternoon. The rest of today we relaxed and I talked a lot with Jose Antonio who is having ...

... in the morning. I saw Leandro leading a group of people in Orange rain jackets into the trails and was immediately confused because I knew for certain that they weren’t tourists. When I asked other members of the staff they told me they were a group of engineers. Now, I was not told that there was a group of engineers coming onto the property to work so I was immediately suspicious that something was amiss. I asked Leandro ...

... boat for better takes. Jim was really happy with it and got some amazingly close shots. Pretty much we feed the birds on the boat and when the boat starts moving we try to keep one bird from a pair on the boat by feeding it while we have the other bird flying. This keeps the flying bird close since they do not want to be far away from their pair or the food.

· The new job is going pretty well so far and I have been slowly ...

Well, we found out from Máximo Nivel that for USD$5 extra per day, we could go to the jungle and volunteer there. So basically, it all started out with all of us going to an information session with the company / organization (?) that actually coordinated the project...that was Tuesday. On the spot, Kushal, Julia, Hiyasmin, and I decided that on Friday we'd be off to Manu for another wild ...

We had a slight lay in this morning, we were due for a knock on the door at 4am, but it didn't come until 4.30am - that extra half hour makes all the difference believe me!! We were going back out on the catamaran canoe this morning, but it was so misty that Joselyn thought we would benefit more from the half hour extra in bed instead. The lake looked eerie shrouded in mist and whilst there was nothing really to be seen in the way of wildlife it was still great to be out on the lake, the ...

Another 4am start today - this morning we were making a vertical journey to the rainforest canopy platform, which is a wooden platform that has been constructed 120ft up in the boughs of a giant ironwood tree. It is accessed basically by sitting in a metal framed canvas chair, which is then hoisted on winches by some very strong men. As you sit in the chair and are hoisted upwards and you suddenly become aware of the space around you and the fact that you ...

... alligators - kind of freaky and the humidity - something else.... We spent two days at the Tambopata Lodge relaxing and checking out the surrounds... There was no electricity in the place so all the rooms were candle lit and flywired - so naturally lit.. They told us to keep all food stuffs away as the little critters get in... so we packed away our fruit etc., just leaving out the malaria and birth control pills - but they even ...

... we could either get a boat to, or hike 18km to a place where a local would row us over, we went for option 2. The hike started out well enough, but when we got to a confusing junction, we took a wrong turn, so rather than a relaxing walk along a hiking trail, we walked for hours on skinny little paths that goats and llamas used. I suppose goats don´t mind walking along a cliff looking 50m down to a rocky shore, but we weren´t too keen on it. No less than 5 times we ...

... Giusi: Arriving in la Paz you could see the bags under our eyes, but no bags whatsoever under the eyes of our 20 year old German travel companion, Greti. So yes, young hearts run free but old bones get tired ahhahhha. Anyway we got there and got a hostal,some rest and a hot shower (again we managed not to get eletrecuted, you have to be extra careful with these electric showers and my dad taught me eletricity and water do not go well together but here in South America they ...