Final Day at Otorongo ~ December 29, 2010

12/29
My Birthday! From the get-go I had planned a memorable day to console myself on this yearly occasion commemorating the regrettable fact that I have completely used up another of my finite number of years. WaaaaaaaH!

As a consolation prize, I had wanted to be able to say, "I spent my 67th birthday on the Amazon River!" And so I did!

But first things first: a trip to Jajun Cañon was in the offing. I was a little puzzled at the name "Cañon" because it translates to "canyon," and to me that denotes a deep cleft in the earth. How deep can you go with the water table a couple of feet down? And in the Google Earth flyover I made with Daniel before I left home, I hadn't noticed any mountains in the vicinity of the Oran River between which one could travel, as in a canyon. Hmmmm..... well, we would see.

Okay, now. Pretend you are charged with propelling a boat up a river without hitting any submerged logs. Now pretend that at the same time you are also charged with finding sloths for the guests you are escorting. This was the task of our boatmen, and time after time they pointed out sloths in the trees alongside the river.
Can you see the sloth in the image at left? Because that's the view the boatman has. Okay, click on it and see if you can spot it. That's a binocular view, and with that you can probably see the sloth-blob ~ but the boatmen don't have binoculars. My hat is off to their sharp eyes!

They also pointed out a troop of monkeys passing through the jungley mass at right. I saw an occasional moving black form but I'd never have been able to identify them. Anis (a large black bird with a honky beak), kingfishers, egrets and hawks were all over the place, and Osmar was jubilant when we passed under a huge tree decorated profusely with the hanging nests of oropendulas ~ right in the midst of two big mud ant nests and at least two large wasp nests. He had just been reading that these birds often seek out the protection of ants and wasps which become accustomed to them but attack unfamiliar outsiders (how smart is that!). And here was a perfect example. Be sure to look at both images. Red arrows point to wasp nests, yellow point to ant nests, and purple arrows point to the bird nests.

I think my favorite sighting, though, was a pair of turkey-sized, black Horned Screamers, Anhima cornuta, perched in the very top of a large tree (alas, we didn't hear any screams). Apparently these huge birds sometimes soar like vultures, high in the air. What a sight that must be!

At length, after a very satisfying outing, we returned for the last time to the lodge so that we could eat lunch and finish our packing. In the end, I was still confused about where the name Jajun Cañon comes from (I should have asked).

During lunch, Anthony discovered that Osmar and I had not found, during our Christmas frog hunt, the local celebrity, a poison frog as yet unnamed and found only at Otorongo (as far as anyone knows). He donned his rubber boots and went out to find one, returning awhile later with the most delightful little amphibian I had ever seen ~ it looked like a red frog immersed in a blue-green bubble bath. (In fact, it looks a lot like the Red-backed Poison Frog, Dendrobates reticulatus, but with much less red area and greener bubbles.)

What a beauty! It was irresistible to sketch. And what a cherry on the birthday cake of my last day at Otorongo!

I spent the last few minutes on the porch saying goodbye to Anthony, the staff, and that rascal Tio Juan, then we all trekked down to the dock and set off upriver toward Iquitos in the launch.

The weather was sunny at first, but as we chugged our way upriver toward the west, the fluffy clouds turned black underneath, and for part of the trip we rolled down the clear plastic curtains you can see along the boat's sides in the image below.

Here are some of the sights we saw: eroding banks on both sides, sometimes with big trees fallen into the water ~ this is a normal, seasonal occurrence as the river floods and recedes; a family crossing the river with an umbrella (good for sun or rain!); a river bus named Titanic III (any guesses as to what happened to Titanic I and II?)







We came upon a multi-decker tugboat ~ looking more like a wedding cake than a working boat ~ shepherding a raft of logs downriver. It didn't look very stable to me, but it must be capable or it wouldn't last long on this wild river.

Finally we began to see more and more mud steps leading up the bank, and we passed the community of Santa Isabel ~ which I only know because they had hung a sign on a tree at the foot of the mud steps. A large cluster of thatch-roofed homes announced the outskirts of Iquitos, and finally the dock, where most of the river traffic noses into Iquitos, appeared.

I was filled with real sorrow to see my Amazon River journey end, but there was still the prospect of one more exciting ride through Iquitos on the Motokars to look forward to.

Then, after some touristy shopping for trinkets along the Boulevard and a long chat with Osmar on a park bench in Plaza de Armas, I made my sad goodbyes to Osmar and Ivy and caught a taxi to the airport.

I would take this journey and stay at Otorongo again in a heartbeat.

But the less said about the 30-hr trip home, the better. It wasn't as bad as it might have been, though. When we were in the air over northern California, the pilot announced that there was dense fog at the Medford airport and we might have to fly on to Portland (oh no! Not another night sleeping on airport chairs!), but it lifted enough for us to land and you could probably hear the cheers from the passengers clear back in Iquitos. We landed at 11pm and my Daniel was there to meet me, wanting to hear about my adventures, glad I was home. A perfect ending for my Amazing Amazon Journey.

Here's to your own journey into the unknown!
May you have the determination and persistence
to do what your heart desires,
no matter how impossible it may seem at first.
Bon Voyage!

Darkest Peru at Last ~ Dec. 20-21, 2010

12/20
Everything was so busy with the Christmas rush at El Remanso that Adri and Dani had to work hard to carve out some time to talk with me about the map and trail guide art they want me to do for El Remanso, taken from my journal entries. I am really excited about the project, and have a bunch of ideas for it ~ after I finish blogging my trip.

December 20th was my last day at El Remanso, and it started out with more unseasonal rains ~ global warming has made the weather just about anywhere on earth unpredictable these days. In fact, it had rained so hard one day that week that vehicles couldn't ford one of the rivers between Puerto Jimenez and El Remanso, and guests had to wade across in water up to their thighs to catch a ride on the the lodge side (with a terrific vacation tale to tell when they got home).

I just hoped I would get out in time to catch my plane. As it happened, the rain tapered off and there was no problem. Alternate plans had been to leave early and have a taxi pick me up on the other side if there were a problem. I had dressed this last morning in my prettiest underwear in case I should have occasion to wade. I really didn't want to fly to Peru in wet pants!.

I caught my plane in San José that evening, and flew to Colombia where we were offloaded onto a bus, trotted through the airport, then onto another bus which took us to our next plane ~ a finely orchestrated minuet of people-moving. I had a long layover in Lima in the middle of the night, and I was DELIGHTED with my new hoodie rain jacket which pulled down over my eyes and my blankie-cum-throw which opened out into a nice warm cover so that I could sleep on three chairs in the brightly lit Lima airport (in the photo at left, taken at home, I have unfolded it to show how big it is. Perfect.).

12/21
Then, finally, over the Andes (in the dark) to Iquitos. Next time, I swear I will shedule my flights better so that I cross over land portions in daylight. What a waste of good sight-seeing to travel the red-eye flights in the dark, even if it is cheaper. I mean, I didn't even SEE the Andes! Here's my first sight of the Amazon, coming down into Iquitos shortly after dawn.

I was met by Ivy (pronounced "Evie") from Otorongo Lodge at the Iquitos airport, and after checking into my digs at Hospedaje "La Pascana" and pausing with Ivy for a cup of excellent coffee and a lovely long chat at Dawn on the Amazon Cafe overlooking the Amazon River, I was whirled into my Amazon adventure.

Ivy introduced me to Osmar, who would be my guide during my entire Amazon stay. We looked each other over. Osmar must have seen a middle-aged (or over) gringo woman with a big smile. I saw a Peruvian boy-man about my size with clear eyes and a shy smile. We shook hands with a "Mucho gusto" greeting, and Ivy sent us down to the bank so I could convert my cash to make the final payment for my tour with Otorongo Lodge.

While changing my American dollars to Peruvian nuevos soles, I discovered to my dismay that an American bill with even the slightest tear or wear is not considered legal tender ~ even at a state bank (take a look at this useless $100 bill). So, $100 poorer, since I couldn't use it, we stopped by the Otorongo office to take care of business, then we took off on foot to visit the famous Belén Market at the south end of town.

Iquitos is a fantastic place! The sights, the sounds, and the aromas of life swept around me in a rush of people and motokars, the major form of transportation in this river town without any roads to the outside world. Then we reached the market, which, when the water is high, is navigated by canoe. This wasn't high water season, so we didn't have that pleasure. But it was amazing anyway.

Osmar remarked that Belen Market was especially busy since people were buying Christmas presents, and it was indeed aswirl with people and an incredible variety of things, from dishes and fancy clothing to bananas and pig heads (I almost got sideswiped by a passing pig-half slung over a burly man's shoulder~ Osmar pulled me out of the way). You could buy anything here: food ~ either raw or prepared on plates, dried gourd halves (to hold anything from soup to, well, whatever you'd want to put into a gourd), to powdered bark in cellophane bags for headaches, to lively armored catfish for dinner. And a million things in between.

I really wanted to ride in one of those motokars, so Osmar suggested a trip to Pilpintuwasi, the Butterfly Farm & Amazon Animal Orphanage. The motokar trip was a wild ride, sometimes three-abreast on a two-way street, but with courtesy and skill on the part of the drivers. There were also motorcycles for hire, and the occasional car, truck or bus in the mix. I didn't see a single accident, but the diesel fumes were pretty potent.

In the marina at the north end of town we hired a peka-peka (a thatch-roofed boat with a motor that goes "peka-peka-peka" ~ at the dock in the image above) to take us up the Nanay River to the Butterfly Farm landing ~ a pleasant ten-minute ride ~ and at the landing we caught another motokar up to the farm. They raise butterflies there for release, and we were shown eggs, caterpillars, pupae and recently hatched butterflies.

Here are some scenes from there, and I hope you'll excuse my fuzzy photo of the pink uakari monkey ~ it was running free and grabbing things, like that mosquito repellent bottle in its hand, from the visitors, and we were not interested in sticking around to be vandalized! Osmar was responsible for seeing that I remained in one piece, a responsibility he took very seriously. BTW, that's a capybara in the center picture, a rodent the size of a spaniel. After an hour or two, we hailed a motokar to return to Iquitos.

Osmar and I started to get acquainted on our motokar rides, exchanging information and Osmar pointing out interesting things to me and sharing his knowledge of Iquitos. He showed me the street up which his family lives, and with his fair English and my poor Spanish I think we managed to understand most of what we tried to say. He said he was 22 and lives at home between guiding stints at Otorongo Lodge, where we'd head the next morning.

Now he delivered me to my room at La Pascana, and I went back out by myself onto the Boulevard above the Amazon to see the sights for the afternoon and evening. It was a great experience, and I met and talked with vendors and people I met on the street, bought a macrame bottle holder for 6 nuevos soles (the equivalent of $2), purchased some spare batteries and a snack in a corner store, admired the colonial architecture, and ate dinner at a restaurant overlooking the Amazon. The Iquitos people are the friendliest people I have ever met. Many speak a little English, and I speak a little Spanish, and it was fun to try to make myself understood.

For instance, I was examining a large beetle I had found on the sidewalk when an Iquitos man came over and explained in fairly good English that this was edible in its pupal form, and that its larvae could be found on a nearby tree. The discussion shifted to other Peruvian customs, and he showed me his portfolio which he was carrying. We must have chatted for half an hour. He took the photo of me holding the beetle, above.

Over dinner I got into conversations with an ex-pat at the next table and with an old lady vendor selling kekes (cakes) up and down the Boulevard. I had a wonderful time experimenting with the few Spanish words and phrases I know. Finally, exhausted and filled to overflowing with new sights, sounds and experiences, I walked back to my hostel and crawled into bed.

What a fine collection of experiences on my first Peruvian day!