Jungle report

Man oh man! Got out of the jungle a couple of days ago. After a 6 hour bus ride from Quito on mostly dirt roads and two puke bags later I arrived in the town of Tena, Ecuador, in the Amazon basin. Tena was the launching site for the jungle trek. I went with an American couple I met at the hostel back in Quito. They were really cool, from upstate NY. He is a rafting guide back home and she is a professional photographer. We were also joined by a Swiss woman we met the day we arrived in Tena. She just happened to be walking while we had lunch with our guide and stopped to ask for directions.

We began by getting fitted for knee high rubber wading boots, hiking boots would do you no good because of the many river crossings we did. And we were given big rain ponchos. Tis the rainforest after all. Although the boots were knee high, we still managed to flood them. On the first day we waked into the jungle for 45 minutes to the their lodge on the Napo river. On the way we stopped and saw petroglifts (ancient carvings in rocks) of monkeys. They were thousands of years old.

They said accomodations were rustic, and they weren´t kidding. Rustic is one thing, but my pillow smelled so moldy I couldn´t put my head down on it. The bed was a bunch of bamboo slats with a 2 inch foam mattress and a wool blanket. Oh well, we sucked it up. Fortunately, each bed had a mosquito net.

That evening our host family, a local indiginous tribe of Ketchwas (sp?) indians performed a ritual dance for us...it was their kids dressed up in grass skirts. They were cute. We then got blessing from a Shamin (Sally, I totally thought of you). Although he was making me nervous because his blessings were for fertility. Almost everywhere I´ve gone, folks here can NOT fathom that I do not have a husband or children. It´s simply something they do not comprehend. Even the Swiss woman, who is married but with no children raised eyebrows too.

After a light meal of rice and scrambled eggs we went off to bed. There was no electricity or running water, the toilets did flush...after you poured a bucket of water into it. The next morning, after cool face painting done by the Shamon with plant extracts and head dresses made out of palm leaves, we donned our rain ponchos and headed off into the jungle in the pouring rain. We hiked 4 hours, sometimes on a path, and other times bushwacking, litterally...our shamon guide cut paths with his machette. We saw iquanna eggs, they were small and white, not much larger than bird eggs. He was a great guide. We stopped often to be shown amazing plants and fruits, trees and animal traps (guinea pig is a delicacy here) and a snake trap too. Thankfully the traps were empty. He could cut bark from trees for us to smell or taste and explained the many medicinal purposes. We crossed the river multiple times until we arrived at our accomodations for the night. A cave! The cave wasn´t very deep, but wide. We slept on hammocks with mosquito nets. The roof of the mouth of the cave was covered... in spider nests....oh God, they made my skin crawl! I only saw one monster spider and shooed it away from my backpack...just in time. Note to self, always, always keep everything zipped up. We watched a flock of parrots squak at us at dusk. We stayed dry, but man oh man. I can confidently say, I´m all set with nature for a while. At one point while hiking in the rain I recalled a scene in that movie Private Benjamin, with Goldie Hawn. She´s marching outside in the rain, in the dark, crying. I tell yah what, the Holiday Inn never looked so good. Dinner was prepared over an open fire. They said they provided drinking water, but we were a little annoyed because it was river water with a little bit of bleach thrown in for good measure. The problem was that our water bottles smelled strongly of bleach. Not cool.

At the cave we met another guide, who was adorable. He is the son of the shamon and he was sweet on me...and truth be told, me him. The next day we hiked back to the lodge. On the way we stopped and fished a while...because of all the rain the river was running swiftly and we didn´t have much luck. Our guide was successful though. Back at the lodge we jumped in the river and enjoyed the rope swing. Later that afternoon we made bracelets out of local seeds and twine.

The next day we treked out of the jungle and after jumping in the back of a pick up we arrived on another river. We got into a motorized canoe, we figured it to be 30 feet long for a ride down the river. Because of the motor we didn´t really see any wild life. We did stop at an amazing animal refuge founded by a Swiss woman about 10 years ago. It´s for animals rescued from smugglers or otherwise injured that they are trying to reintroduce into nature. Monkeys roamed the park freely, we saw amazing birds and large cats. Just beautiful. Unfortunately due to all the moisture my freaking camera crapped out on me for most of the trek. It now seems to have come back to life.

After staying in Tena an extra day to hang out with my new friend, Nixon. I arrived yesterday in the town of Banos. Nixon was very sad to see me leave and wanted to come with me. But seeing as he doesn´t speak a lick of English and my Spanish, although improving isn´t steller, I said adios. There are volcanoes nearby and 3 bath houses with thermally heated water. I´ll make my way to soak in some mineral water later today. I really like it here in Banos. It´s surrounded by mountains the temp is cool and it´s misty and rainy. I have a neat room, with my own bath and a small private balconey. There is a fireplace in the lobby. Have found some great restuarants with book swaps. The book swaps have been my life line. I´m blazing through 2 -3 books a week. Last night I met up with the Swiss woman, from the jungle, and we had pad thai for dinner in a cool little restaurant. I went back there this morning for some cappucino. I´m having my very nasty laundry done now, with a washing machine and dryer no less. That´s a special treat. Most of the rural villagers do their laundry in the rivers and streams.

Well amigos...adios for now. I think I´ll stick around in Banos for a few days and enjoy the mountainous scenery for a while.

Adios...and love to everyone!