The Jungle

Our replacement credit/debit cards arrived today (thank you Raymond and Helen).  As much as we love Cusco, we`re getting far too comfortable here and it´s time to move on.  We headed straight to the main bus terminal to purchase our tickets for the onward journey to Nazca.  We leave tomorrow on an overnight bus.

I got suckered into buying some knitted finger puppets - a monkey, giraffe and zebra.  They`re pretty cute, but entirely useless.  The kid selling them impressed us because, on asking where we were from, he reeled off the names of the last four UK prime ministers - Gordon Brown, Tony Blair, John Major and Margaret Thatcher, then the last two Australian ones (including the new one - Kevin Rudd). Hope I got that right.  This is a kid of about 9 years old who sells finger puppets made by his mum on the street- three for about 70p.

About our jungle `adventure`.....the journey to Puerto Maldonado, the town on the fringe of the jungle from where we were to start our tour was an adventure in itself.  A teeth-chattering `17 hour` journey (actually ended up being 20) along a dirt track road on a bus with semi-reclining seats and (for a reason that my Spanish isn´t good enough to understand) no toilet onboard.  We managed to convince the people loading the bus to put our backpacks in the holds underneath the bus, and not on the rack on top, covered with tarpaulin.  We were the only gringos on the bus and it was absolutely full.  Knowing that there were no toilets, I stopped drinking any liquids a couple of hours before getting on the bus, but I´d challenge anyone to hold on for 20 hours.  There were various stops where the whole bus emptied, with babies and toddlers left lying crying on blankets in the aisles while their mother went to the loo.  There were no lights on the road, but, by the lights of the bus you could make out people urinating all around the bus, women squatting.  I don´t know if I was more concerned about being exposed in public or having someone inadvertently pee on me.  Wearing flip-flops wasn´t the best idea.  The first time I tried I just couldn't bring myself to do it - my body refused despite needing to go.  Men have it so easy!  Mum, I could have done with that ´She-Wee´ contraption you tried to get me!  We got a dinner - the standard chicken and rice, which was pretty good actually.  The drink (sweetened coca tea) came in what can only be described as a condom with a knot in it.

We got to Puerto Maldonado and were immediately aware of the change in climate - despite being early in the morning this was a sticky hot place.  With no tour booked, we walked around the main square but found no tour agencies.  Heading to the local airport, we chanced upon a guide greeting arriving passengers and managed to negotiate a discounted price to join that group, seeing as they were a few people short.

The tour was for 4 days and 3 nights.  The company, called Wasai, had a lodge in Puerto Maldonado and another further into the jungle, a mere 5 hours by boat.  The long distance implied that we would be experiencing some of the more untouched areas of the Madre de Dios region, but was pretty tedious, particularly on uncomfortable seats, wearing very bulky life jackets and having been on an overnight bus.  Our companions on the tour were the guide (whose English wasn´t fantastic, but he had the knack for spotting and pointing out wildlife from an impressive distance), an American couple from Oregon, and a bloke from Ohio who usually eats a 75% raw diet(!) This is obviously impossible to maintain whilst travelling - he ate all the food provided without complaint.

The rivers here are wide and brown with the occasional floating log to avoid.  The scenery is quite unchanging.  We were lulled to sleep many a time on boat journeys.  We saw macaws and parrots, various other birds (including those of prey) and turtles along the rivers.

At the lodge in the jungle we stayed in a hut on stilts with wooden floorboards, a thatched roof, and nets lining the ceiling and windows.  There was a bathroom with shower (not heated, but not missed here), running water and a flushing toilet.  Not too bad.  The beds had mosquito nets.  There was electricity from 6-10pm.  With no glass in the windows, you go to sleep with all the noises of the jungle around you - bugs, insects, birds, even the occasional owl.

Despite the nets over the ceiling and windows, we had a few unwelcome guests on returning to our hut for sleep over the two nights we stayed there - a lizard, a (big) spider (which Brad wouldn´t consider being in the company of and exterminated while I cringed with my hands over my ears, and a cockroach (in my bed).

We went for a night-time walk, using only our flashlights for illumination and taking care to be quiet.  We saw spiders, a monkey, various insects and were shown a tree whose bark smells really strongly of garlic.  In bed by 9pm, we set off in the boat at 5.30 the next morning at sunrise to watch macaws (big brightly coloured parrots) eating clay in droves from the sides of the river which helps detoxify the substances in the berries they eat.

One night after dusk we set off in the boat in search for caimans (alligators), more easily spotted at night from the red glow of their eyes.  It was pitch-black and training your eyes to search in the roving light of the spotlight was tiring......I soon fell asleep, lulled by the movement of the boat.  We only found one baby caiman, which was a little disappointing.

From listening to others who had done jungle tours, and reading the guide book, we certainly weren´t expecting to see a huge variety of wildlife- but the amount of interesting stuff we saw was a little lacking.  Our guide apologised because we didn´t see more, but it wasn´t his fault.  Spotting a group of monkeys whilst in a canoe on a lake at dusk was a highlight.  They jumped from tree to tree just above our heads.  Some had babies on their backs, which was cute.  At that moment it seemed the mosquitoes relented and gave us a moment´s peace, or maybe we were just too distracted.

We went to the jungle armed with strong insect repellent and anti-histamine tablets and cream, but nothing could have prepared us the the sheer number of mosquitoes in the jungle.  Despite the sweltering heat, we always wore trousers and long sleeves with wellies (I even wore a scarf wrapped round my head for good measure).  Difficult to concentrate on what the guide is pointing out because you can see and hear swarms of mossies around you and you just want to keep moving. We got bitten loads.  We were even bitten through clothes.  You can put up with water constantly oozing out of your pores and feeling filthy because you know you can always shower later, but the bites make you miserable.  I´ve ended up with huge bites all over my thighs and bum which are so incredibly itchy.

The funny thing is that the best wildlife we saw on the trip was in the lodge back in Puerto Maldonado, in the morning of our return to Cusco.  There was a resident sloth in one of the trees.  I love sloths!  All they do is eat and sleep, which sounds like heaven to me.  Despite being only two months old it was a fair size and only about a metre from us.  You could actually touch it.  Made it all worth while.

It was such a pleasure to return to a cooler and less muggy climate in Cusco by plane (we had the return flight booked as part of our round the world ticket) albeit slightly more frazzled than when we left, with numerous bites and tons of laundry.

We don´t regret having visited the jungle, but we probably won´t do it again, not unless we´re guaranteed wall-to-wall lions and tigers and bears and we can wear one of those bee-keeper outfits to keep out the bugs.