Iquitos

So at the end of July this year, from all the way down in southern Bolivia, I made my way up to Lima (in Peru), a total of around 36 hours travelling within about 2 days. The most concentrated bit of very long-distance travel I have ever and probably will ever do for a long time. Although this sounds like a horrific journey I was well used to long bus journeys by then and it wasn't actually that bad. A 30 hour bus ride no, doesn't sound that comfortable but I was lucky enough to have a nice Canadian guy sat next to me who I chatted to the whole way.

Once I got to Lima I spent a day basking in the delights of non bus-constricted freedom and the next day I took a flight to the jungle city of Iquitos. This was my first experience of the Amazon jungle and it is unlike anything I have ever seen before. That is no understatement - there is no way to prepare anyone for that first wave of heat and humidity and jungly-ness you can get in places very little travelled in the world. I feel priveliged to have been able to have even a tiny glimpse into their world and way of life. I had waay too little time there (less than a week) and it is definitely a big place on my to-go list in the future (I've already started planning my next South American adventures). Iquitos is just such a bizarre and unique place.

my first glimpse of the Amazon!

Iquitos' mototaxi madness

So as soon as I got there I booked myself onto a 4 day jungle trip and my first glimpse into jungle life was when we were about to get onto our boat - we saw a guy coming off his boat carrying two maaassive catfish and a baby crocodile and saying to his mates, "vamos a comer cocodrilo!" (We're going to eat crocodile!) So after the boat trip down the Amazon we arrived at our lodge - it's on stilts for when wet season comes and the river rises. It was such a basic place, but it totally got you into the jungle way of life!

The Amazon jungle

I love hammocks...

Our lodge

 The first day we went on a walk with our guide Pecho who showed us all these medicinal jungle plants that the locals still use to cure illnesses and pains. There is a tree there that produces poisonous sap that can blind you if it gets in your eyes or kill you if you consume it. They used to put it in their arrows to kill animals they shoot but it has since been made illegal because of people polluting rivers with it so as to kill the fish, which then killed a lot of other animals. We also saw rubber trees and garlic trees whose leaves smelt soo strongly of garlic! Apparently that's a good natural mosquito repellant - as well as rubbing termites all over you...Pecho told us loads of interesting information about the natives and what they do since they don't have any outside doctors come into their tribes. They use many different trees' bark to make teas/infusions to cure stomach aches, diahorrea, arthritis etc. There was even one that pregnant women drink in the last few months of pregnancy that is meant to make the birth go smoothly!

Bullfrog

In the evening we went looking for caimans after the sun had set. I had no idea how Pecho was spotting them in the complete pitch blackness but apparently he was looking for reflections off his headtorch of their eyes, which come up bright yellow when you shine the torch from really close to your eye. So he managed to capture (and then release of course) two small caimans, both 6 or 7 months old he said, and we held them and it was really scary having those teeth so close to my flesh haha!

On the second day we went pirahna fishing in the morning and then for lunch ate the catfish that we had caught ourselves made into ceviche - Peru's national dish (raw fish marinated in lime juice with onions and chillies). It was SO delicious. Ceviche has grown on me so much since I first tried it last year!!
Fishing was really fun and Pecho said we were possibly the best group in a long time, in terms of the variety of fish we caught - we got red pirahna, white pirahna, a sardine, a barracuda, and three different types of catfish!!

Our guide Pecho having just caught a huge catfish!

I caught a massive "barracuda" with huge teeth

All the fish we caught!!

Ceviche!

After we went fishing we had the opportunity to see some grey or pink river dolphins. Unfortunately we had to wait for ages and ages to see some since they are so timid and wouldn't come anywhere near us. We couldn't move towards them either because the roar from the boat's engine would scare them away and even if we moved closer to them then they would move back the same amount, always keeping the same distance away. But eventually they were relatively close to us and Pecho said we could get in the water if we wanted, to have a "shower". This must have been the most hilarious part of the whole jungle trip, it was soo funny! The three of us just casually jumped off a tiny wooden boat into the Amazon river, in amongst pink river dolphins and shampooed our hair. Oh how I wish I had a photo!! It was so much fun though and an experience that will stay in my mind for a very long time!

Pink river dolphin (top right corner)

 Later on that day we went to visit a local village in the surrounding area which was really interesting. All the houses are on stilts, of course, and you could see where last year's water had come up to. Apparently some years they have to raise the houses higher because otherwise they'd get flooded! There is no school for the children during the wet season either because it's too dangerous. During dry season (at the moment) they still have to get a boat a wee while along the river to the school which caters for the large surrounding area. We met Pecho's wife and three-month old son who is the cutest wee thing ever, little chubby Alex Junior! It's kinda strange though because all the girlfriends/wives seem to be really, really young in comparison to the men they are with. Pecho's wife looked only about 15 or 16 to me, and he must have been about 25. I think it's just a part of the tradition there though and us Westerners just aren't used to seeing it!

Local village

 That evening we went in our little boat looking for snakes in the trees by the river. Pecho managed to spot one boa constrictor, high up in the trees, so we all clambered out the boat onto the riverbank. It was so difficult to spot it was so well concealed!! I asked if we could maybe take it down since 'd seen photos of people holding snakes and I love snakes, but he said well yes, we could, but it could kill us, so...

2 metre long boa constrictor

The 3rd day we went on a boat trip looking for birds and monkeys and things. After a wee bit we got out and continued walking through the jungle which was so intense. Really hard work to get through all the undergrowth especially in such high temperatures and humidity. But it was amazing, we saw beautiful blue and yellow parrots called Guacamayos, the same ones that are in the film Rio!! Pecho also spotted a huge black bird with a red neck called a Horned Screamer on the riverbank, such a beautiful bird. We also managed to catch some glimpses of squirrel monkeys, there were looads of them in the trees right above our heads, all around us, they were so cute! It was so hard to get a pic of them since they moved about so much though. On the way back to the lodge we also saw a sloth in the trees, apparently this was really lucky because of course they are nocturnal and are always sleeping, and also it was rare to see one in a tree right by the edge of the river!!

Guacamayos

Guacamayos in their nest

Horned Screamer

Squirrel monkey (top left)

Sloth

After lunch on the 3rd day we set off to go camping. This was the most fun and most authentically jungly part of the trip....obviously!! We walked for a bit til we got to our campsite, basically just a bare area of ground with a few trees and next to a lake. Pecho and the other guide set to work finding branches and roots of specific types to hang up our hammocks while we stood feeling rather useless. It was amazing to see how they could construct a hammock frame between two trees - they took this type of root and stretched it high up between two trees, for the waterproof cover to hang over. Then tied the hammock up between the two trees and held it open using various straight branches so that the inside of the hammock was extremely spacious! It was so impressive, they were doing all this very fast and pitch blackness as well by this time, only using headtorches to find everything. The next challenge was to get a fire going. I have no idea how they did it but they managed to construct something resembling what Shrek used in the movie to roast some rats haha. We had such a delicious dinner of spaghetti and tomato sauce and boiled egg, I think I must've been starving because it can't have been as good as I remember haha! After dinner we went on a night walk looking for spiders and all things nasty. We saw a huge scorpion spider - apparently it was poisonous - and also a tarantula, both hiding in the giant roots of a massive tree. The roots themselves came up to about hip height! We also saw a few frogs and lots of scorpions, and a wee rodent thing up in the trees, it didn't hang around long though. Now I have to tell you about something that is so so horrible and that I really don't like having to write about again. So we knew Pecho looked for caimans and snakes and everything by looking for reflections from their eyes, so we set about with our torches looking for reflections on the ground and the trees and everywhere...and saw hundred and hundreds of tiny reflections, little pin prick dots that shine bright white or yellow or blue sometimes. Turns out they're all spiders. ALL of them. Millions and millions of spiders, anywhere you looked there were tiny dots that were the spiders' eyes!! Such a horrible thought thinking how many there were around us. Ewww. Disgusting! We tried to convince ourselves it was just water droplets though haha. After we got back from the night walk we just went straight to bed, not much else to do anyway! Had a very scary trip to the bathroom... Then got in my hammock which was so unbelievably cosy and soo comfortable. I slept so well that night!

Fan that Pecho made us out of reeds!

Our hammocks in the making

dinner cooking

Scorpion spider

Tarantula

One of the many scorpions

Bedtime!

The next morning we were woken very early by birds and monkeys and such making noises from the treetops, and we set off back to the lodge. Then we jumped into the river as soon as we could. It was actually one of the most amazing feelings, jumping into a river after having spent so long in a hot, humid, sweaty jungle. I must have felt the cleanest person ever after that (even though there were leaves and twigs and stuff in the river with us). The wee boy that lives at the lodge (or is there pretty much constantly anyway) came and joined us and was taking pictures with my camera (..which I took off him rather quickly, what with him being about 4 years old and in close proximity of water), hilarious. Then after lunch we headed back on the boat to Nauta where it was a bit of a nightmare since the boat ran out of fuel and we had to get a mototaxi from a random place by the riverside to where we waited for a car that would take us back to Iquitos, all a bit crazy and unorganised in the end. But then again that's just Peru for you!!

Genevieve, myself and Siobhan after arriving back from camping

"showering" in the river

arrival back to civilisation of some sort

Now I know I have talked and talked about the jungle and I do apologise but I just find it such an amazing and enthralling place to be. I wish I was back there right now, even amidst all the mosquitos! Sorry for all the blabbing and the mass of photos, WELL DONE for having got this far haha. Sorry also for the huuge delay in all my posts. I am almost done with everything now. Had to do it all in order y'know.

Will post the last one soon (aah, scary thinking it'll be the last). Mucho amor,

Heather xoxo