Wow! Well. We survived the Amazon Rainforest, and am I ever glad we went. It was (at least so far) my absolute favorite part of the trip.

We went with a group and our tour guide was wonderful. Really young, exceptionally smart, and remarkably good at spotting animals and birds and insects. There were only two other people on our trip, an Irish couple both of whom are scientists, and they were really interesting.

We saw so many amazing things that it is hard for me to think where to begin, but I´m going to try. Bear with me if it is all over the place! It may get long, as we saw so much and I want to tell you it all (no pressure to read it all)! As we were driving to our first lodge our guide would sporadically and (it seemed to us-randomly) tell the bus driver to stop. We´d all pile out and the guide would point out one amazing thing after another. The first really exciting bird we saw was a Quetzal (happens to be the national bird of Guatemala). This bird is the most gorgeous tropical bird you could hope to see. With absolutely stunningly bright turquoise feathers, and quite large, it caused quite a lot of excitement. Our guide had a really high powered scope which allowed us to see the bird up close and really get to see the colors. Then a little ways along we saw the ¨cock of the rock¨. This is the national bird of Peru! Bright bright red with funny plumage on it´s top. We saw about 10 or 15 of them in this one spot and it was really special.

The lodges we stayed at throughout the whole trip were really funny. They were super basic bungalows on stilts, all covered with mosquito netting (very necessary). None of them had full walls so all the jungle sounds could seep in as you drifted off to sleep. And the jungle is LOUD! The first night it was hard to get to sleep for all the strange noises- the way some find it hard to sleep in the city. Honking cars and garbage trucks I´ll sleep through no problem, but squawking birds and REALLY loud cicadas. Forget it!

Starting the second day we traveled everywhere on boat. We were on the Manu river, which becomes the Amazon elsewhere. There are all sorts of scary things in the water, but it is really muddy so you can´t see anything. But just knowing that somewhere under us were crocodiles and piranhas and electric eels, and sting rays, and really poisonous water snakes. Well, it adds some adventure to it all!

That night we went on a ¨night walk¨. Well let me tell you, if the noises of the jungle sound scary when you are tucked in a bed covered in layers of mosquito netting, then you better BET it is scary when you are walking through the jungle. We got all covered up and doused ourselves in insect repellent and set off after our trusty guide. Ok, let me tell you- there are A LOT of scary stinging, biting, flying, creeping, crawling things in the jungle. We saw more HUGE spiders then I can count. The one which particularly scared me was the one named ¨jumping spider¨. It is really big, and our guide never really explained quite how far he could jump. I kept a wide birth of them! Every time our guide stopped to point out another insect or bug we´d ask if it was poisonous and 3 out of 5 times the answer would be ¨very poisonous yes¨. We saw the biggest moths I can imagine, and an amazing variety of crickets. We saw some really small, beautiful (poisonous) frogs, and the furriest (also poisonous) caterpillar in the world. It was about 6 inches long, and it´s fur was about 3 inches tall! It was an amazing color too. BUT the thing which scared me most this night was something called a Bullet Ant. Now this ant has, apparently, the single most painful bite ever in the insect kingdom. It is so painful, that your body practically goes into shock, and you run a really high fever and can´t do anything but be in pain for 24 hours. So something this awful you´d think it would be really rare, but we saw about 20 of them in our mere 5 day trip! Luckily, none of us got bitten. On another night walk we saw THE BIGGEST spider ever. It was super hairy and really just a nightmare to look at. Our guide explained that it is the male, and the female is even bigger. Well about two minutes later we run into a female, who is about twice as big! Ugh. We also saw an insect which the locals call half spider half scorpion. Aptly named as it is also huge, has eight legs, but the body and head of a scorpion. Seriously you need to see it to believe it.

Ok, so very very early in the morning we woke up to go to a ¨parrot clay lick¨. This is as bizarre as it sounds. Apparently parrots eat so much fruit, some of which is so highly acidic that it is toxic, that they need to balance out their systems by licking clay. So every morning parrots from all over the jungle converge to lick clay. They have built this platform thing that is covered with plants so the birds don´t see us. Right after we arrived flocks and flocks of these small green parrots started arriving (slightly bigger then slimer for those who know him). There were hundreds of them. They all converged in the trees for a while and then slowly made it down to the clay wall, and just started eating clay! That was amazing, but what was really exciting was when two giant red and green macaws flew by (those are the really ¨typical¨parrot for those who don´t know. very colorful) They were so big! and Their color was amazing. I thought that was just the best. But then over the next hour hundreds more macaws showed up! They were almost always in pairs, because Macaw´s mate for life. If their spouse dies they go into mourning and spend the rest of their life alone. Which is really sad to think about when you see one flying by them self. All the others did everything together. Anyway. Watching hundreds of these beautiful birds all munching away about 100 feet from us was really special.

And as if that wasn´t enough, that afternoon we saw about 3 different kinds of monkeys! Which I, obviously, loved. So, where we were staying there was about a 2 minute walk down a jungle path to get to the main dining hut and all that. We got our wake up call at about 5 am the next day so it was still pitch dark outside. Steve and I are walking to where we are going to meet up with our guide with head lamps on, and all of a sudden Steve stops and says words that I have dreaded to hear this whole time: "is that a snake". I look over and there is a 3 or 4 foot snake RIGHT NEXT TO US. Well I scream yell and panic, and jump back. Steve, ever the gentleman doesn´t come and rescue me in my distress but takes out a video camera to capture this guy on film as he slowly so slowly winds his way back into his hole in the dirt. Once he is well and truly gone I´m able to continue on our way, but I tell you my hear was racing! After some consultation of the footage we realize he was a rainbow boa constrictor. Not poisonous, but scary enough!

The day does improve from there though: We next did my favorite thing yet. We went to a lake and got on a make shift catamaran, (two canoes attached with a big plank we could walk around on). As soon as we got there we saw a whole family of giant river otters. They were so playful and amazing coming up quite close to the boat, and showing off the fish they were eating for us. We continued around the lake and saw some of the most beautiful birds, most of which I had never heard of. Giant birds called ¨stinky bird¨ by the locals because they smell so bad they have no predators, even though they are super awkward and can barely fly, or walk. But what they lack in grace they make up for in beauty. They have sky blue feathers all around their eyes and are a gorgeous deep red color. We also saw some toucans!!!! That was really exciting. And then we saw a whole family of howler monkeys asleep in a tree. Well, all asleep except the baby who was climbing around and playing and being just too cute for words. We were the only ones on the lake, and it was a row boat with no motor so it was just so peaceful and idyllic and the animals were so captivating. It was an amazing morning.

AND THEN! Believe it or not, there is more. That afternoon we were staying at a bungalow run by a family. They have a sort of farm near by that we went to visit. No electricity or plumbing or anything like that. But the best part was, that there is a whole clan of squirrel monkeys that live there (about 40 or 50 travel together because they are so small...about the size of a squirrel). And because they live so close to humans they are really used to us, and we were able to feed them bananas. They would come and take the banana right out of our hands, with their tiny little hands. SO cute!!!

After all that stimulation we welcomed the long boat and bus ride (13 hours) home the next day...and then Steve and I hopped right on another bus to take us to Puno (arriving at 5 in the morning. a 24 hour trip!) Which is where we are now. Very happy, but very cold (hat, scarf, gloves, long underwear cold- big change after the swealtering jungle).

It was an amazing adventure, and I´m really glad we went. I think we were very lucky to have such a great guide, and also such nice travel companions. I´m leaving out many things (the village soccer game we saw, the baby wild boar made pet, and the incredible flocks of the most beautiful butterflies). But they will have to wait. Steve is almost done with his all important fantasy football draft (hence us spending 3 hours in an Internet cafe!) My latest cup of coca tea (it helps with the altitude) is wearing off, and bed is soon.

We are home Sept 5th, and I look forward to hearing all of your news and seeing you!

Love
Alaina