Caiman in the Rain - Eco Amazonia Lodge
Trip Start
Jan 25, 2007
1
16
31
Trip End
Jun 30, 2007
Puerto Maldonado,
Peru
Friday, April 27, 2007
Puerto Maldonaldo is a port city on the Rio de Madre de Dios (Mother of God river). On the map it looks less distance from Cusco as Lake Titicaca in a straight line, but whereas the lake is on the altiplano (high plains), to get to PM you have to climb over high mountain passes, then descend through cloud forest to the plains below. I believe it's a 20-30 hour bus trip, and I would have liked to have done it, but didn't have the time.
The 40 minute plane flight gives you a great view of the mountains and then the vast Amazonion jungle plain that extends for over 3,000 kms to the Atlantic ocean.
Coming out of the plane the air is heavy, hot and humid - temp is 37 degrees, over 90% humidiity, and we are at 200 metres above sea level, a drop of 3,200 metres from Cusco
01 Over the Andes
.Puerto Maldonaldo is a typical tropical town - hot and dusty (except when it rains and it becomes a quagmire), millions of motorcycles whizzing past, mangy dogs, luxuriant vegetation, and a general feeling of torpor. You could almost be in Asia, except everything's in Spanish.
The Eco Amazonia bus picks us up and takes us to the port, where we board a long boat and cruise down the river for a couple of hours to the lodge. It's very relaxing cruising down the wide, brown, muddy river - 700 metres wide at the moment at the end of the rainy season, but only 150 metres wide in the dry season (June to September), I'm told. The river is bordered by high mud banks, with the monotonous selva above, and it is hard to pick any distinctive features.
Our destination is the Eco Amazonia Lodge, where we well spend the next 3 days going on various excursions. The Lodge is basically a big camp, with simple timber bungalows set around a luxuriant garden, and a central complex comprising a dining room, and a bar/games/lounge area. Every day you are organised and given your schedule, eg wake up call 6am, breakfast 6.30am, meet guide at jetty 7am, lunch 1.30pm, dinner 7.30pm, etc. I am rather alarmed by the sign that says the bar opens at 6am - I have visions of tourists setting off inebriated into the jungle and falling into a swamp
02 First view of selva
.We arrive and have lunch then are whisked over the river to Monkey island where our guide leads us through the selva with a bag of lady finger bananas calling out, platano, monos (bananas, monkeys).
They come very soon - black monkeys, capuchins, squirrel monkeys, etc and greedily grab the platanos. We are walking through this mosquito infested, dark jungle and excited by seeing all these animals.
The dining room is huge and different groups are organised together with signs - I and a few others are placed down the far end away from everybody else and our sign says - Without Group. Our lonely little group, Matthias from Germany, Amy & Ryan from Colorado, and myself become a tight-knit little group, and a couple of young Japanese eat with us too. They tell me they met in Melbourne 5 years ago, and they both saw a UFO there, but nobody believes them.
Saturday morning we are woken at 5am, and our guide, Rafael, shepherds us into the boat for a trip downriver. We walk a km and get into a wooden boat and paddle up a small channel for 1.5 hours. We hear howler monkeys with their deep, unearthly sounds (I can't describe it), and see and hear lots of other monkeys, birds, butterflies, etc. Rafael points out the snail hawk, which attacks these enormous snails (up to a kg), then pulls them out of their shell with it's beak, and tells us about a type of eagle that swoops through the forest looking for monkeys.
We arrive at a trail and hop out for the walk to the Cocha Perdida, a swampy area, with a lovely hidden lake. We have been issued with gumboots as we are told the track can be very muddy. I have not brought any socks with me and don't like the idea of walking with my bare feet inside rubber gumboots for hours and rubbing my feet raw (not to mention the smell), but Amy very kindly loans me a pair of socks
03 The selva goes on forever
. At the start of the walk I tread daintily through the mud so as not to dirty my gumboots, but within minutes an incredibly heavy downpour starts and we are all soon completely soaked to the bone. On the way we climb a tree with a rough staircase built around it to a an observation platform above the canopy. Trees absorb 60% of the force of the rain so when you get above the treeline the rain becomes even heavier, which you wouldn't have thought possible. The view is fantastic.Finally we reach the Cocha Perdida and once again we get into a wooden boat and Rafael quietly paddles around in the heavy rain looking for caimans, but no luck (even caimans who virtually live in the water prefer warm sunny days to bask in).
I'm sorry to do this to you but everybody knows:
'the rain in Spain lies mainly on the plain'
well, here's my pathetic attempt to adapt it to our situation:
'the caimans in the rain are mainly low-lain'
We do however see lots of birds nests, flowers, etc and it is relaxing and meditative floating gently in the swamp surrounded by water above and below.
There is a species of palm tree which is ubiquitous in the swamp and it has bears large clusters of fruit, which is highly valued by women because it boosts their oestrogen levels
04 Coming in to land at Puerto Maldonaldo
. Rafael tells us there are men who eat it in secret, as otherwise they would be made fun of.Afterwards we slosh our way through the jungle for 5 kilometres back to the river - the rain is so heavy it fills the gumboots and water runs out the top as we wade through the mud and water trying not to fall over because it's very slippery. When I take my gumboots off I have raw red flesh just above my ankles where they rubbed - without socks I think to myself my feet would have been literally a bloody mess.
We head back for lunch and I go to bed and wake up too late to go to the afternoon excursion to meet a local family.
That night we go caiman spotting and see two - Rafael gets off the boat and scrambles up the bank while I hold the spotlight and he catches a small caiman and brings it on to the boat, where most of us have a hold, except one of us drops it (aren't I discreet not naming names), and Rafael has to catch it again.
Next day we are rostered to go fishing on the Gamitana river so we get up at 7am and go upriver and enter the Gamitana, which is a tributary of the Madre de Dios. Our boat is around 15 metres long and the river is very narrow and the boatman skillfully navigates his way upriver, and a couple of times we have to stop and cut our way through trees that have fallen across the river
05 Local taxi
. Rafael walks around everywhere with a machete and he uses it for everything. We toss our lines and nobody has any luck except Rafael, who catches 2 small catfish, although I do get a nibble but lose it because I'm too slow to jerk the line up and hook the fish.We then drift down the river a bit but this is fraught with danger because the boat is so big and we get caught under trees with thorns on the hanging branches and I get cut and scratched by these as I try and push them away. Of course I have no shirt on which doesn't help.
We motor on and get to where the Gamitana flows into the main river and stop by a huge mudbank. Rafael stands up and jumps in and goes in up to his hips in the mud, and invites us in. I jump in, then Ryan and Matthias, and in a few minutes we are all happily rolling around like pigs in the mud. What a wonderful feeling - the mud is fine and smooth and squelchy, and it's wonderful lying there in the sun and spreading it over yourself, then squirming across the mud to the river and washing it off. Later we go into the middle of the river and jump in and float down the river for a bit, and finally we get to drive the boat, which is quite hard as it's just a heavy engine on a long pole which you have to move - the boatmen make it look so easy but we all do 360 degree turns initially because we haven't got the hang of it. What a fun morning - fishing, mud-bathing, swimming, driving the boat. Lunch is usually a buffet affair and we all hoe in hungrily, then have afternoon naps.
In the afternoon we are taken on a tour of the botanical garden around the Lodge. He shows and tells us about the master plants which shamans use and others which are used to cure cancer, stomach cramps, tubercolosis, eliminate parasites and worms, etc and boost your sex life. To be a shaman the plants and trees have to accept you, by way of a vision
06 Eco Amazonia bus
. On one tree he disturbs a n ants nest with his machete and plunges his hand in, which is quickly covered with ants. he tells us to try it out which we do, and the feeling is like your hand receiving lots of tiny electrical shocks - when you wipe the ants off a fairly strong smell is left behind, which keeps the mosquitoes away. Another tree smells like garlic when he lightly scores it with his machete. Every time he does this he says sorry to the tree beforehand.Rafael says he has been preparing the ingredients for an aphrodisiac, and if we buy a bottle of rum or pisco, we can have a little party tonight and put it together. So after dinner, we assemble in the lounge in our little group, and Rafael brings out 4 bottles, with various ingredients in them - barks and herbs, etc.
I am going to have to swear you to secrecy but here is the recipe:
Base - rum or pisco, mixed with wild honey
Cat's claw (una de gato)
Chuchuasi
Clavohuasa
Mix together and drink (slowly)
The group discussed licensing the product from Rafael and becoming distributors in our own countries
07 Typical street Puerto Maldonaldo
. We had a marketing meeting and decided to call it 'La bomba de la selva' (The jungle bomb), and the advertising slogan will be 'siete veces sin sacarlo' (seven times without taking it out).The ritual when you drink it is to say 'arriba, a bajo, al centro, al dentro' (up, down, to the centre, down the hatch), and you must look the other person in the eye (otherwise you have 7 years bad sex).
Discretion prevents me from saying what happened next, except we didn't have very much of it, there was a shortage of unattached women, and I didn't fancy Matthias and he didn't fancy me, although I thought I did hear jungle noises in the bungalow next to mine at night (no I won't tell you who was in it although their initials started with A and R).
To finish up I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the jungle, took part in great activities (sloshing through the jungle in gumboots, hunting for caimans, wallowing in mud, swimming in a huge muddy river with piranhas, drinking aphrodisiac, etc), met some lovely people, caught up on some sleep, and it was a great change from everything I had previusly done.
Highly recommended for everyone.
ps:I'm sorry about the quality of some of the photos but it's very hard to take good photos in the jungle - it's very dark, the animals move all the time, it's wet, etc.
