PLEASE NOTE: We have no photos for this entry, as our camera was stolen two days later! Hope to get some pics from Pete, so will have them up shortly.
We'd barely touched ground after our marvellous 8-day cruise around the Galapagos, and we were off again... this time to the Amazon Basin. Having flown back from Baltra to Quito on Monday afternoon 12 December, we checked back into base, Casa Helbling, repacked our stuff yet again and took a little time out to cook ourselves a real South African braai for dinner (the hotel has an outside BBQ area).
On Tuesday morning, we got down to the bus terminal at the crack of dawn and hopped aboard the 6.30am bus to Coca. Phew, what a looong ride - we arrived 10 hours later, at 4.30pm - but totally worthwhile for the scenery. The winding route from Quito took us up into the mountains, to 4,000m, and then down to 250m in one sudden and dramatic drop. As the bus crept down the escarpment on a precarious road, we passed from windblown tundra through lush cloud forest, and into the humid heat, banana and coconut trees of the tropical lowlands. Amazing to think that all these environments are at the same latitude so close to the equator!
Our bus took the long route to Coca, via Lago Agrio, which, as we read in the guidebook while passing through town, is the most unstable region in Ecuador due to its proximity to Colombia. All the way, the road followed an oil pipeline - the Oriente (Ecuadorean Amazon) has been extensively tapped for oil and one cannot visit the region without spotting evidence of the oil industry.
The humidity hit us square between the eyes when we disembarked at Coca - it took some getting used to after the cool of high-altitude Quito - but we bravely embarked on the very important mission of sniffing out the few bottles of wine on sale in town. Jen and Pete cannot bear the thought of evenings without wine... we made damn sure we had enough to see us through, before settling down for a meal at a chicken joint. Poor Rich managed to order himself a feet-and-giblets soup!
On Wednesday morning at 9am we were picked up for the three-hour drive south to Rio Tinguino. The gravel road followed a pipeline all the way, and we passed workers' villages and small oil fields with burning chimneys in the middle of the green, endless rainforest. Quite a contradictory sight, and pretty disturbing when you imagine the damage this exploitation by international companies (Halliburton etc) can do/is doing to the environment and culture of the local people.
After a bumpy three-hour ride, we reached a bridge over the Rio Tinguino, where we were loaded into a metal canoe (very low & close to the water) to start the three-hour cruise downriver to Bataburo Lodge in the ancestral territory of the Hoaurani Indians. It turned out to be quite a white-knuckle ride as the river was very low, and the boatman had to execute some nifty maneuvres to get past sandbanks and massive fallen trees in the river. Along the way we spotted our first wildlife - plenty of parrots, a caiman (small croc) and a black creature resembling a large weasel, called a 'cabeza de mate'. And, of course, our passage down the narrow river was enveloped by wonderfully dense, emerald-green rainforest.
We arrived at the Lodge around 4pm where we were met by Gulio, our well-spoken guide and host as well as five Swiss whom we had met on our boat in the Galapagos. We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and checking out our surroundings - the lodge is a pretty but somewhat neglected wooden complex by the river, with comfy hammocks strung in the open-sided dining area and a tame caiman named Freddy, who lives in a small lake behind the dining area. After dark, the staff brought out some meat for Freddy - he came right up to the steps, and performed for his snack, raising himself right out of the water... great to have a close look at the creature!
Before dinner on the first evening at Bataburo, the four of us brought out the cards again, as we had done in Galapagos, for a few competitive games of Black Bitch. This became the evening routine for our four nights at the lodge... a few card games, dinner at 8pm, then more cards until the generator was switched off at 10am. On the second night we tried playing by torchlight after the lights went out, but had to quit within minutes when Peter and I were stung by a wasp! Another feature of our evenings were the bottles of wine we enjoyed with our meals, and after - Jen and Pete had carted them with great care in their suitcases from Quito and Coca.
Well, enough about evening entertainments, and on to our daytime activities. Every day started with breakfast at 8am, then a good long walk through the jungle. On the first morning, Thursday, we walked two hours or so to a saltlick or 'saladero', where animals come to replenish essential minerals. Unfortunately there were no animals around when we arrived at about 11.30am, but we stayed a while, watching the saltlick (a small cave in an embankment) then started the walk back. All along the walk, Gaime, our native guide, pointed out plants used by the Huaorani, and demonstrated the use of bamba trees as a form of forest communication (a bamba is any tree with large buttress roots, which are beaten like drums; the sound travels for many kilometers). We arrived back just as it started raining! Yes, this is the rainforest and it's emerald-green for a reason. Every day the humidity would be broken by at least one decent downpour.
In the afternoon, we were joined by two more guests, and did a shorter walk around the small oxbow lake behind the lodge. We spotted a troop of spider monkeys way up in the trees, making quite a racket but moving so quickly through the dense foliage that it was difficult to work out where they were!
Friday started with another walk, this time close to the river, past some impressive bamba trees and along to a very big tree with the remnants of a canopy viewing platform high up in its branches. The platform belonged to the lodge and apparently it had been operational until about two years ago... such a shame it's fallen into disrepair! It would have given magnificent views of the tree canopy. Well, this seems to be the story of Bataburo... very pleasant with excellent food and service, but the buildings and facilities are neglected. It is clear that Kempery, the owners, have not invested in it for a good while. The reason, we discovered, is that they were due to hand it over to the local Huaorani people early next year (it was originally built as a joint ownership scheme with the locals, and was to be handed over after 10 years). However the deal has fallen through and the lodge is now in need of some TLC. A pity, as the location is stunning.
After our walk, we headed upstream in the motorised canoe to a small lake where an anaconda is said to live. Apparently it is often seen sunning itself on the branches of dead trees in the water, but unfortunately there was no sign of the creature when we were there. On the way up the river, we stopped for a while to watch a troop of squirrel monkeys cross the river by swinging from branch to branch. It was a pretty precarious undertaking, as the gap between the tree branches on the two banks was quite wide, and we watched amusedly as several monkeys checked it out, got cold feet and turned back!
In the late afternoon, after the customary siesta in hammocks, it was all aboard the canoe again for a spot of piranha fishing. We cruised downstream and cast our hand-lines baited with beef... apart from a few bites, no-one caught any piranhas! There goes the myth that the rivers of the Amazon are teeming with the things. No wonder it's safe to swim in the river, as we had done the previous afternoon.
We did, however, catch something pretty amazing... a good look at a creature called a coati, which resembles an anteater but is actually a member of the raccoon family. It was around sunset and this little chap was up in a tree on the riverbank, just cruising around the branches, probably choosing his bed for the night. We watched him for a good half-hour, as it got dark, then started back upstream, with Gulio in front holding a strong torch in search of caiman... spotted a few small ones.
Early on Saturday morning, the Swiss guests departed and now there were only six of us left in the lodge. Gulio vowed to pull out all the stops in search of wildlife. After another wonderful jungle walk in the morning, we returned to the anaconda lake but found that, again, the big snake was not at home... but then again, he could have been right under our noses, hiding in the reeds, and we would not have seen him!
In the early afternoon, we all tried our hands, or at least our lips, at the traditional Amazon jungle weapon, the blowpipe. In the hands of a skilled hunter, the poisoned darts of this simple weapon can hit a monkey way up in a tree, and it is often necessary for the hunter to shimmy up the tree to retrieve his quarry, a skill our guide Gaime had demonstrated earlier that day.
In the late afternoon we climbed into a traditional dugout canoe for a quiet paddle up the oxbow lake near the lodge. What a tranquil experience! Gaime paddled us along at a gentle pace; we had plenty of time to marvel at the vegetation all around and enjoy the jungle sounds at dusk. We watched a troop of spider monkeys skillfully and quickly make their way through the branches, and shortly after a group of squirrel monkeys doing the same. And then, to our delight, we got a good look at a couple of toucans... high up in the trees but perfectly visible through binoculars. What a way to end our stay in the jungle.
At 6am the next morning, we started our boat journey back up the river to the bridge, and from there by bus to Coca airport. Though we had not seen very much by way of wildlife, we'd loved walking and exploring the plantlife of the forest... and besides, in such dense jungle one can never expect to see many animals. For Rich and I, it had been great to return to a rainforest environment after all the interesting times we'd had in the forests of Asia; for Jen and Pete, I think it was a wonderful introduction to a precious eco-system.
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