Welcome to the Jungle (July 28, 2010)

The river in the early morning is quite peaceful

            We got up before dawn for a 5:30 am breakfast then off to the boat for a visit to a local lake.  The river in the morning was beautiful, with the sun barely rising above the trees, the mist hovering over the water.  It was all so calm.  It is interesting being in the Amazon jungle.  There is beautiful wildlife here, a vast variety of trees and interesting insects.  The weather has been incredibly good and I love going to sleep to the sounds of the jungle.  I also discovered that a hammock is pretty nice.  Anyway, back to our boat trip.  We landed our boat at a point about 15 minutes up river, then walked to a lake, where we got onto a catamaran.  I made a couple of observations immediately.  First, when we sit on the boat in the river, wearing a life vest is mandatory, while there were no life vests on the catamaran.  Second, wearing a life vest on the catamaran was also not an option - because there were none.  Third, as we boarded the catamaran, one of the workers was bailing water.  I was not really interested in getting wet with or without a life vest - especially in a lake reportedly filled with cayman as long as six meters, and is the home of several species of pirana.  But, I just went with the flow.  (The bailing of water continued at various points during our lake trip, but . . . no worries.) 

Oxbow Lake, filled with pirana and cayman

One of the two cayman we spotted in Oxbow Lake

Some crazy birds that defecate as a defense mechanism

Maralea was the first to catch a non-flesh eating fish

I got one, too!

Ever seen a pirana up close?

            We saw some of the big cayman (which we were told “are afraid of humans and will not attack them” - right), but the most spectacular thing for me was fishing for pirana.  I could not believe that I might get a shot at hooking a pirana.  They gave us these sticks with about six feet of fishing line, with meat baited hooks at the end.  One of the workers would fish differently, tossing a line about 20 feet behind the boat.  A worker was the first to catch a fish: pirana.  We got to inspect it up close and personal.  They showed us its teeth and put a leaf into its mouth to demonstrate how the fish uses those teeth to devour.  It was impressive.  Maralea had a pole and was fishing next to me.  To her left was a woman from England trying her hand at it.  Within about 10 minutes, Maralea caught a fish and started screaming.  She pulling the fish out of the water and kind of whacked the woman from England with it.  I was a bit worried that she had just tossed a flesh eating fish onto a fellow fisher woman.  But, as it turns out, Maralea caught a lake sardine, which was virtually the same color as the pirana caught earlier, about the same length, just skinnier.  So, Maralea beat us all to the catch (as she usually does).  (Maralea and I went fishing once in Oregon, at Cougar Dam, where she beat me 17-1.  She even caught one by hooking onto a cut line and when we pulled it all in to clean up the tangled mess, there was a fish at the end of the cut line.)  I was the only other guest to catch a fish - but not a pirana.  It was of the same variety that Maralea caught.  (Royals 2, Everyone Else 0.)  We saw a family of Amazon otters, and a black eagle (a rare sighting), among other wildlife.  With all these man eating reptiles and fish in the water, I did not panic about riding on a slowly sinking catamaran with no life vest.  I knew we would make it safely.  We did.  (Whew!)

Video of one of the piranas caught and brought on board

So, after seeing cayman and pirana, how would you feel about the driver constantly bailing water from the boat?

             During our boat ride back to the lodge, I was enjoying an apple I had set aside in a cargo pants pocket when David asked: “Hey Dad, did you wash your hands before eating that?  I mean, you were handling fish and raw meat.”  Great.  Thanks for the reminder.  Suddenly, with a loss of appetite and inability to take another bite, I placed the half eaten apple in the muddy river water.  When we arrived back at the lodge at about 10:30 am, we took a much needed rest from the hike back.  It was hot.  We had some juice and a sandwich, at which point our tour guide said that we would be leaving on another hike in 10 minutes.  Maralea, David and I just looked at each other.  We knew where we were going to be in 10 minutes: in our open air room where we could shower, rest and just relax.  That felt so good.  We hung out until lunch, where we caught back up with our group.  Over lunch, there was more discussion with David about his mission, and with us about sending our other sons on missions.  We have had a great opportunity to discuss the missionary program of the Church to others on this trip, which has been wonderful. 

Oxbow Lake from our pirana catching spot

Had juice and hammocks waiting for us back at the lodge to dream of our pirana catch

 An Australian young woman in our group, Karen, heard me talking about my chronic cough and said: “Would you like a cough lolly?”  I had no idea what she was saying.  There is another Australian gentleman named Chris who was standing by and acted like what she had just stated was quite normal.  I asked her to repeat it three times until we both realized I was having trouble with the word “lolly.”  Karen said: “In Australia, we figured out that a lolly pop does as much good for a cough than a could drop, so we just refer to cough drops as cough lollies.”  (We have two others in our group from England: Sandra and Amanda, sisters who are in the middle of an 11 month traveling binge.  They are very funny, easy going and fun to talk with.)  Our trip to the botanical medicine area got me thinking about Alma 46:40, where Mormon writes of the people living in this part of the world anciently:

“And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year were very frequent in the land; but not so much with fevers because of the many plants and roots which God had prepared to remove the cause of diseases, to which men were subject by the nature of the climate.”

Maralea with plant medicine paint

David's face paint made him dopey

Mine made me CRAZY!

Another beautiful Amazon sunset

Tarantula near our sleeping quarters - sweet

             We took advantage of the evening limited electricity hours to charge up our batteries (we only get electricity here four hours a day).  After dinner, we went on a night hike to find tarantulas.  That was fun.  We got to meet three of them, and got a few pictures - not great ones, but not bad, either.  It was a bit creepy walking out in the dark, dense forest of the Amazon in search of tarantulas.  Plus, the cheep batteries we bought for our cheep flashlights in Cuzco lasted all of about four hours total, so we were running low on light. (We have plenty of great flashlights at home, but forgot to toss any in our bags.  So far, though, that is about the only thing we forgot.)  We returned to the lodge area at about 9:00 p.m., just in time to say goodnight to our group as the lights of the entire camp went out.  There we stood, in the Amazon jungle in pitch darkness, with only our flashlights to show us the way to our room.  But, we made it, got ready for bed, and will hit the ground running tomorrow, as we fly out of Puerto Maldonado for Lima at 11:00 a.m.  This part of our journey to Peru has been really fun.  We stayed in a nice place in Cuzco, but we did so much running around there without leaving much time for relaxation or to even get used to the altitude.  We took more time to just relax here, which is something we needed.  As I write tonight, David and Maralea are asleep in their own mosquito nets.  I am sitting in my mosquito net protected bed, listing to guys snoring in rooms on both sides of us, as the open side of our room brings in the noises of the jungle.  It is pretty amazing.  And the night sky here is beautiful.

David needed help with his mosquito net to keep the tarantulas out

            I think we are all pretty excited to get home.  This trip has been fun, and a bit challenging.  I am not sure what we would do differently, other than to perhaps leave a thing or two out so we could build in more time for relaxation.  Still, it has been fun to get out and meet a lot of different people.  We did a lot of that here in our Amazon visit.  I think David is quite anxious to get home as well.  Tomorrow will be the beginning of what will amount to about 26 hours of travel (counting layovers) before we arrive home.  It is hard to believe we have reached this point.