Rurrenabaque
BOLIVIA
Jungle Love
By LYNDI
Sunday, January 25, 2009
So with Aaron on his way back to work in Cuzco, I went off to play in the jungle. I’d heard that the Bolivian pampas were one of the best places in the Amazon to view wildlife. As you can imagine, in the thick of the rainforest, all those pesky trees and different layers of canopy make it quite easy for the animals to hide. But in the pampas it is mostly grassland. So these same animals jump from tree to tree and mosey down to the water for all to admire. While looking for a tour operator while in La Paz, it came as no surprise that everyone sold the same product for the same price. So I eventually looked up the company that is the most eco-friendly and puts money back into the local communities – Madidi Travel. When I went to their offices, they informed me they were closed for the entire month of January. Why, you ask? That would be because there is such a high chance of dengue. You know – that man-killing mosquito-born plague. Seeing as how this was a great inconvenience, I asked if they knew of any environmentally friendly companies who had total disregard for dengue that I should go with. They told me I shouldn’t go, but upon insistence, they recommended Indigena Tours, who I eventually booked with.
And I was off! I took a flight to Rurrenabaque on Monday morning and arrived in the sweltering little jungle town around 8am. I arrived at the local Indigena Tours office in town to meet my other travel mates – a group of 5 Irish and 2 English. So we all crowded into the Jeep that would take us 3 hours out of town via a pot-holed, unpaved road to the Rio Beni. All things considered, the Jeep ride wasn’t too bad. I was sitting in the middle seat up front next to the driver, so I think most of the dust that was pouring in through the windows went straight behind me. But in return, I had to awkwardly re-position myself every time the driver wanted to switch gears, considering I was straddling the console. Kept me on my toes though.
We arrived at the river just in time for a huge rainstorm to pommel us. Luckily, rainforest rainstorms are strong, but brief. So within 30 minutes of the 3 hour boat ride, the sky had cleared again.
With my new job as a tour leader, I get to go to the Amazon rainforest in southern Peru for nearly ever tour. But in the 3 hours we were on that boat on the way to our lodge, I have never seen so much wildlife in Peru combined! Not only were there 100 hoatzil birds, but capybaras, the most enormous white birds I’ve ever seen (can’t remember their names, but surely it was “pterodactyl”), spider monkeys, howler monkeys, coatis (giant raccoony things) and pink river dolphins. I felt like I was on the Jungle Boat Ride at Disneyland – minus the attacking hippopotamii. Our lodge was really nice as well. Everyone slept in one large cabin with mosquito nets over the beds, and there was a large common area for eating and swinging on hammocks.
When we first got to the lodge, our cook had a snack ready for us – popcorn and Teddy Grahams! The Irish and British couldn’t understand why I was so excited about a little bear shaped cookie, but when I explained I hadn’t seen Teddy Grahams in nearly a decade and that the commercials had teddy bears playing guitar – I think they came over to my side. We had some free time after our snack to read, shower, or play in the water, and then reboarded the boat for a ride to the nearby Sunset Bar. Other groups staying at different lodges had gathered there too, so we all sipped warm beer as we watched the sunset over the pampas. On the way back to the lodge, we all pulled out our flashlights and went in search of caimans (largest member of the alligator family). Basically, you can spot them quite easily in the dark because their eyes glow red when you flash a light at them. We saw quite a few, but really all you can see is their eyes and snouts. When we returned to the lodge, an enormous and delicious dinner was waiting for us, so we stuffed ourselves and went to bed.
The next morning after breakfast, we left for our pampas walking tour. Just past the lodge there is an enormous field of wetlands where you can supposedly find anacondas – although Madidi Tours also told me that anacondas are very difficult to spot in the wet season – nearly impossible. However, not wanting to be Debbie Downer, I didn’t mention this to my excited, snake-hunting fellow trekkers. So our guide had us all split up and walk through the pampas in about 4 groups, as there is a much better chance of sighting an anaconda. We were given rubber boots that nearly come up to your knees, but nonetheless, I still found myself walking around in water-filled boots due to the depth of the wetlands swamps.
I didn’t like to think of what came in with the water. After a really long time searching in vain for an anaconda, we started heading back to the lodge that now looked like a little speck on the horizon. At one point, the two others I was with looked around and discovered we couldn’t see any of our other travelers. The grass is high – but only to about waist level. Finally we saw someone’s head peak above the grass. They all seemed to be huddled around something on the ground – an anaconda!! We all raced out there, unaware that water logged boots could move so fast, and found the “bambino” anaconda in a little marsh. It was only about 5 feet or so – not yet full grown – but still. It was found. We could return triumphant.
When we finally got back to the lodge, all of us were sticky, stinky, sweaty, muddy, exhausted, and mosquitoey (hopefully the non-denguey ones). To my absolute delight, I found a rope swing at the lodge, and it didn’t take me long to change into a bathing suit and jump in. Water has never felt so good in my entire life. Most others followed suit, but we didn’t linger in the water too long. Even though the guide promised there were no caimans or other man-eating things in the water, a 12 foot caiman wandered out from the exact place we had been swimming the following morning. We had a delicious lunch and then set off in the boat to swim with the local pink river dolphins. We saw a ton of dolphins on the way, but by the time we jumped in the water with them, they just sort of scattered. Some would come close, but they didn’t play with us or anything. But again, it was just nice to be wet and out of the sun. The strangest thing about the water was that there were cool and warm patches – except the warm patches were really hot. Like, hot tubbish. So we played in the water, trying to avoid the little hot tubs everywhere.
When we got back to the lodge again, I decided to give the others in my group a break and take a shower. Now, taking a shower in the jungle is quite tricky. Because you’re using an outdoor shower, and as soon as you take off your clothes, your un-mosquito repellented places are immediately susceptible to attack. I tried to move quick in and out of the water, but it still takes a bit of time to dry off and put mosquito repellent back on, and the mosquitoes moved even quicker. As a result, I had some lovely scratchy parts in some inconvenient locations. But it was worth it to be clean. I was the last in my group to shower, and as soon as I was out, people were loading back into the boat to return to the sunset bar. I hopped in just in time and we watched the sun set again from atop a rickety old bar. This time all the different groups there got to compare horror stories about walking in the pampas, finding anacondas, and mosquito bite counts.
We woke up early on the third day to enjoy the sunrise over the jungle. We boarded the boat at about 5:30 and slowly floated down the river listening to the howls of the howler monkeys and the screeching of the pterodactyls. It was probably my favorite part of the whole trip. After breakfast we got back onto the boats and went piranha fishing. Naturally, no one caught anything, but we did get to see the dolphins in action. Our guide threw an empty water bottle into the river by a dolphin, and it was quickly grabbed. Every once in awhile, we’d see the bottle pop up in the air and some other dolphin would grab it and take it back under again. They played this game for a long time until they tired of it, so the guide retrieved the bottle and we went back to the lodge.
Only to find our new 12 foot pet. The caiman was enormous and just sort of hung out at the lodge. He obviously didn’t climb any stairs onto the walkways or anything, we just had to be mindful so that we didn’t walk off the boardwalks. There was free time for swimming or reading, but seeing the giant man-eater next to us – we all opted for a good read. Around noon we carefully climbed into the boat and headed back to Rurrenabaque.
The jungle was great – I’ve never seen so many different types of animals – but it was gonna be nice to not have to bathe in mosquito repellent every 30 minutes. When we got back into town I found a room at a local hostel in town and met up with our group for dinner that night at the Monkey Bar – who for some reason played Chumbawumba every fourth or fifth song. I had a flight scheduled for the next morning, but that night I woke up to the loudest thunder I’d ever heard in my life, and knew I wasn’t going anywhere. The Rurrenabaque airport is unpaved – it is in fact a giant grassy field – and flights are notoriously cancelled due to the large oversight on the part of the airport planning committee. So, to no surprise, my flight the next morning was cancelled, and instead of putting me on an afternoon flight, they put me on the following day’s flight.
And so. I spent 24 hours in the sleepy town of Rurrenabaque, finished a book, lounged in hammocks, caught up on the internet, and prayed that I could leave the next day before I bored myself to death. All went well and my flight took off Friday morning – back to the mountainous, crowded, and delightfully cold La Paz.
