The Amazon Experience

This blog is super late, considering I returned from the Amazon three days ago. I just got the pictures on my computer, and I didn't want to post anything without them! Anyway, here's the story:

We got up early Friday morning for our flight to Puerto Maldonado, which is east of Cusco, close to the border of Bolivia. As soon as we got there, our tour guide loaded us up in the combi. We drove to a small dock on the Tambopata River, then rode three hours down the river in a long, skinny motorboat to our camp's port. As soon as we arrived, a few of us walked around the camp's medicinal garden, which had all sorts of neat plants, including coca, garlic, and ayahuasca (a potent hallucinogen....http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayahuasca). That night, we re-boarded the boat to search for caimens, a species closely related to aligators. Honestly, the caimens were cool, but the stars were as beautiful as I had ever seen.

The next morning we woke up at 5 for a nice little 10K walk to a lake bordering the camp. Our tour guide equipped us with rain boots, which were much needed (At one point, the trail turned into a pretty deep creek...it really reminded me of my old cross-country days at Dodredge County. Who knew those water-wading skills would come in so handy?) We saw lots of neat animals on the hike, including two species of monkies, funky-looking spiders (see picture), otters, giant guinea pigs (bigger than my dog), tree frogs, tropical birds, and lizards (oh, and LOTS of mosquitoes). We also ran into some plants that I had only seen in my bio books (there were these trees with roots at least six feet above the ground!)

Funny story about a plant-- about halfway through the hike, our tour guide whipped out his pocket knife and cut a few leaves from a little twiggy thing. "Try this," he said, handing each of us a leaf. We all shrugged our shoulders and started chewing. All of the sudden, this extremely bitter, minty taste overwhelmed my entire mouth and I couldn't stop drooling. Soon after, my mouth turned completely numb and spit was literally dripping from my droopy lips. We all started freaking out, spitting out the leaves, frantically rubbing our tounges, and wondering aloud what the hell we were just chewing on. Our guide laughed and told us that it was just a natural anaesthetic. "Used for toothaches!" he said. "It will go away in five minutes."

When we got back, we relaxed in our beds under mosquito nets. When it turned dark, we lit our candles (the camp had no electricity) and told scary stories. It really felt like we were little girls trying to freak one another out at a slumber party...I had't had that feeling in a long time. Anyway, I digress.

Thinking back on it, all I can say is that it was a great experience, especially for a bio geek like me. Next stop: Galapagos Islands! Who's with me?