Riders of the Storm

From Lago Agrio we went directly to the small town of Tena. Our night bus stopped shortly after midnight, because we reached a patch of deep mud. We had to wait for sunrise and a bulldozer to help us across!

Tena is also situated in the jungle, but the jungle in this area is entirely different from our trip to the Cuyabeno. The terrain is much more mountainous, there are incredible volcanoes jutting out of the lush jungles, waterfalls crashing down deep ravines, absolutely beautiful!

Our reason for coming to Tena is the fact that it is the undisputed capital of river rafting in Ecuador. We booked a tour with River People, a very cool family business, which I can definitely recommend. Our previous experience with rafting in Arequipa left us hungering for more. We wanted a longer, harder, faster and more dangerous trip filled with testosterone and adrenaline... And we got it.

We went off to the river at 9h. It was just us and the two guides, Alex and Tim. It was a bit of a hike through some nasty slippery clay down to the river. The trip is a full day on the river, rafting two contrasting rivers. The first is a difficult and technical river with small fast level 3 rapids and LOTS of obstacles. The second is a raging river with lots of big waves, level 4 rapids and some serious whitewater. Lloyd, me and Alex took a small 4 man raft and Tim took a kayak for support, taking photos and just playing around! From the word go it was just an incredibly exciting ride through some of the most beautiful scenery of the whole trip. The canyon walls towered above us covered with insane jungle growth and waterfalls crashing down everywhere.

the river canyon

one of the many beautiful waterfalls

serious splashing

We took about 4 hours to get to the other river where we stopped for lunch. There we were absolutely ravaged by sand flies, I have more than a 100 bites and Lloyd is looking just as bad! Sand flies are worse than mosquitos, they get in everywhere, and if they bite you it starts bleeding and it itches like hell! Today it´s absolute torture...

another big rapid

The rest of the river was just as exciting culminating with the HUGE waffle maker. A mean rapid where we did really well not to tip! Along the way we had lots of fun swinging on lianas, swimming some of the smaller rivers and goofing around.

bombs away!

the wild man just got wilder...

taking a break

All in all, it was a great experience and something I would definitely do again and again! Anyone game for the Zambezi?

Neil

Heart of Darkness

Finally we have come to one of the wildest, unpassable places on earth. The mighty Amazon.

The part we visited is in a protected park called the Cuyabeno Reserve. This vast reserve sits on the borders of Peru, Columbia and Brazil and is one of the most bio-diverse areas in the world. The park is one of the most remote places in Ecuador. To get there we had to take a 4x4 for 3h to get to the park entrance. From there it was another 3h by motorized canoe to base camp. We spent four days exploring this amazing region with our extremely charming and knowledgeable guide Lenny, Glenn and Tam (Australia) and Claudia (Germany).

(from the left) Claudia, Lenny, Lloyd, Glenn, Tam, me

Day 1:

Our trip with the canoe was extremely cool. It is currently almost the end of the rainy season, but the rivers are still swollen and creates easy pathways between the trees to navigate. We saw quite a few animals on the way to the camp, including some rare river dolphins, monkeys, toucans and hoatzins (a weird almost prehistoric bird).

two white-hand monkeys

the mysterious hoatzin or as locals refer to them, stinky turkeys

The lodge was basically a couple of thatched roof buildings with the sleeping area consisting of matresses covered by mosquito nets. Very basic, but very authentic and more than enough!

the dining room

After sunset we went for a short night walk to see what types of creepy crawleys we could find. Within a few metres, we have stumbled upon several big, scary spiders and all sorts of bugs. After the walk he took us to see the BIG spiders. Two gigantic (as big as my hand) tarantulas right above our heads in the dining area! Luckily they are not aggresive and we sat and watched how they caught their prey. Really cool!

nice little tarantula

After that it was a noisy night in the jungle. The jungle feels to me like a massive single entity, and it does not like to be infiltrated by mere men. It is quite intimidating being so far away from civilization in this dark and mysterious place. I did not sleep to well that first night...

Day 2:

We got up as the sun rose at 6h and after breakfast it was into the surrounding forest for a 3h walk. Lenny told us about the different animals we could see and the plants and their medicinal properties. We tried out quite a few. We even ate some ants called lemon ants. They taste like lemons! Although the walk was interesting, the heat and humidty was extreme and the mosquitos attacked us with relish undeterred by our repellent. I racked up more than 50 bites...

Lloyd of the Jungle

frog on leaf

We arrived back at base at about 12h and immediately went for a swim in the river. So refreshing I almost felt clean!

The afternoon we were joined by three French people and a short, but severe tropical rainstorm and went downstream by canoe to a nearby Siona village. The Sionas are the natives who still live in the forest. There we met Aurora, one of the local woman and she showed us the secret of making manioc "pancake". Manioc is a root we´ve eaten quite a few times on our travels. We went out into the forest to go and dig some out and then went through the process of skinning, grating, drying and sifting it into a fine meal. The drying was particulary interesting. They weave palmleaves into a piece they call the anaconda. The grated manioc is wrapped in the anaconda and then they wring out all the water. After we made the meal it is placed on a hot plate and baked to form a type of cake. It was really good, although it could use some salt or tomato sauce!

Aurora operating the anaconda

the finished product

After that it was back to camp for dinner and rest. We were tired and had no trouble falling asleep!

Day 3:

We got up early for some bird watching by canoe. Very nice and relaxing. We saw quite a few interesting birds and monkeys before we returned to camp for breakfast.

a snake bird

After that it was off to a big lagoon about 1h30´s canoe trip away. It is very impressive and you can see how high the water is because the top of some bushes stick out a few inches above the water! It a very unique experience driving through trees with the canoe. We stopped on an island and went for another 3h hike.

the forest in the lake

Aurora joined us again and showed us many of secrets of jungle existence. She showed us which plants were for healing and which plants for pain. We saw the plants used for curare (famous Amazon poison) and some halluciogenic vines. We tried a root that is used for anaesthetic purposes and it left our tongues and lips numb and tingly! Another cool plant was paperleaf. Paperleaf stains after pressure is applied on it. You scratch your message on the leaf and in a few seconds they start appearing in dark brown.

origin of the species

Aurora weaving a backpack

Getting back to the canoe we had some lunch and rest. During that time a caiman (crocodile family) appeared close to the canoe and we lured him closer with some fish. Quite impressive!

looking for lunch

After this fun it was off to the middle of the lake for some swimming. The water was wonderfully warm and some river dolphins swam close by for an unforgettable experience.

swimming

Next was the art of piranha fishing. We drove into the roots of the trees and sat there waiting for the bites. They are difficult to catch as they take tiny bites and don´t swallow the hook. I was the only one to catch one but ended up accidentally flicking him into the boat next to Glenn! Luckily Lenny quickly caught the little bastard and showed off his teeth!

fishing for piranha

my catch! look at those teeth...

We rode out into the middle of the lake again for the sunset and then headed back in the dark watching the fisher bats dipping and diving around us.

ANOTHER sunset photo

We were exhausted, but we had a great day!

Day 4:

The last day we had breakfast and then it was the long way back to the reserve gate. We were lucky on the way back and saw lots of animals including the elusive red howler monkey and a two-toed sloth!

Neil

Puerto Lopez

Puerto Lopez is a dusty little coastal town with little going on except relaxing. Their one claim to fame, much the same as Hermanus (South Africa), is the whales. Being out of whale season we spent our middays there lying around in hammocks to get out of the fierce equatorial sun and spent our nights and mornings exploring the surroundings and sampling the local dishes.

Puerto Lopez

relaxing in aforementioned hammocks

The food here is incredible! We tried deep fried prawns, calamari, cooked some fresh fish ourselves, made fruit salad and created some very smooth smoothies. Our first day was spent doing nothing at all. The second day doing virtually nothing. But the third day we went on a boat trip to the Isla de la Plata (Silver Island, a popular pirate legend) for some scuba diving (FINALLY). And it was awesome... The vis was not particulary good, similar to the Cape, but the water was nice and warm (21 degrees) and the marine life incredible! We did two dives at two points of the island while the others in the group explored the island. The first we averaged at about 12m and dived along coral and volcanic rock. The second dive was shallower but featured a lot more coral. We saw many big moray eels, puffer fish, vibrant tropical fish, big game fish, trumpet fish, pipe fish, a sea turtle and some sea snakes! To crown it all a school of devil rays passed close to the boat jumping clean out of the water! It was expensive, but definitely worth it.

the barren wave battered Isla de la Plata

approaching the island

me, smiling for the camera

a big friendly looking moray

Mr. Turtle

a venomous sea snake

trumpet fish with other fish

another moray

The whole area is part of the Machalilla National Park, the only coastal reserve in Ecuador. It includes Isla de la Plata, many hectares of tropical dry forest and some parts of rainforest. We spent our last day in the tropical dry forest. It's dry, humid and VERY hot, but the beaches are incredible! Miles of totally deserted, beautiful swimming beaches. We stopped at a lookout on top of a cliff for a panoramic view of the area and lunch. A whole spit-roasted chicken that we tore to pieces with our bare hands. Hmmm...

Lloyd resting a bit

the crabs make the little balls of sand

Machalilla Park

the almost deserted Los Frailes beach

Last night we caught an reasonably uncomfortable bus to Quito (11h), the capital of Ecuador. Here we will stay today to sort out flight details. Tomorrow it's off to the jungle... Neil

Surfing Peru

After our experience with the protests we decided that we could do with a few days of rest and unwinding.

We went to the little town of Huanchaco. This is a great surfing spot on the coast, 12km from the hectic city of Trujillo. We spent two days there just relaxing and soaking up the atmosphere. It felt a lot like the West Coast of South Africa. Not everybody that went there enjoyed, because it is so quiet and deserted, but this suited us just fine! We did try some surfing, but the waves were pretty messy and it was VERY hard work. We were pretty sore and banged up by the end of the day!

camouflaged crustacean

From there we were off to Mancora. This is a little coastal resort, seen as THE surf spot in Peru. It was quite a mission to get there! There were no direct buses going before 19h and we didn´t want to wait the whole day in Trujillo, so we hopped from little town to little town in local buses, finally getting there late the evening. There we once again met up with Holly. We spent the night just chilling a bit and got some great cocktails at a beautiful cabana styled bar on the beach.

the creature from the deep

Mancora is a great place if you´re a surfer. It is a bit touristy, but still the water is great (nice and warm), the waves consistent and the prices reasonable. We headed out early for some surfing (it is a lot harder than it looked). It was a beautiful sunny day with good waves. It was incredible paddling around surrounded by pelicans who seem utterly unafraid of humans! We did get a few good runs, and we do manage to occasionally get on the board. But it seems that Sunday is the day the locals spend surfing and the competition is pretty fierce. The waves become really crowded as the waves are only good in a small area and some of the locals are incredibly rude and aggresive. I actually got slapped by a local! He cut in in front of me and I saw him too late and could not bail and hit him with my board. He totally freaked out and started swearing at me, although I was apologising profusely in English and Spanish. Then suddenly out of nowhere he slapped me. I talked to other travellers who got the same treatment! After that incident the surfing sort of lost some of its luster for me... Anyway, we had to stop, because we were burned to a crisp! It is now several days later and the backs of our legs still hurt like hell. That night we spent some time with some Americans we met on the beach watching the paradaisical sunset, me perhaps drinking maybe a little bit too much rum...

a bird of carrion waiting for our sunburnt bodies to stop twitching...

The next morning we were up early to catch the bus (no need, the bus was two hours late) to Guayaquil, Ecuador, a much longer than anticipated ride, but without any major incidents (4 passport checks and a detour because the bus was too heavy to cross the bridge into Guayaquil). We finally arrived in Guayaquil at 21h and got on another bus to Manta at 22h15. We arrived in Manta at 01h45 and just crashed at the first hotel we could find. This morning we caught another bus to Puerto Lopez where we´ll be staying for about three nights. This is a lovely, quiet little dirt road fishing village. We stay in a rustic wood and bamboo lodge with a nice garden and some welcome hammocks in the shade. Ecuador is quite a change from the coldish conditions we experienced in Peru. We are now only 1 degree south of the equator and it is swelteringly hot... They also use American dollars, because of a total collapse of the Ecuadorian currency. OK, off for some more seafood! Neil

A Terrifying Experience

WOW...

Our last four days have been absolutely jam-packed with action!

We started in Nazca. Nazca is a little hole in the middle of nowhere that has no reason whatsoever to exist. Except for one of the great mysteries on earth. Right up there with Stonehenge. The Nazca-lines. The lines are MASSIVE shapes formed by taking away rocks in the desert. They are complex, depict animals, plants, were created more than a thousand years ago, and incidentally, can only be seen from a plane... Sort of makes you wonder...

Anyway, to appreciate them, we got into a small cessna, my first small aircraft. A pretty interesting experience, although the extreme banking made my stomach lurch quite a bit! The two girls sharing the plane with us, did in fact manage to throw up in a mostly feminine way into the little plastic bags provided! The tour guide was very annoying with his never-ending stream of "on your right, on your right, look down, look down, the monkey, the monkey".

co-pilot Lloyd

the monkey, the monkey...

We viewed ten of the more prominent figures, the most impressive being the detailed afore-mentioned monkey (90m) and the condor (wing-span 130m). After the flight we searched for something to do, but to no avail. We spent the rest of the day reading, sleeping and eating.

the astronaut

the hummingbird

From Nazca it was off to Ica, another town in the increasingly impressive desert (one of the dryest in the world). Interestingly enough, Ica is a wine district of some note. The whole area is desert dunes dotted with tiny little spots of lush green oasis.

Our final destination was the little resort of Huacachina, 4km from Ica. A picturesque laguna surrounded by palms in the middle of some impressive looking dunes. Our hostel, Casa de Arena, looked pretty nice (even though a bit dilapidated)! A swimming pool, surrounded by deck chairs, hammocks and a well stocked pool-side bar. We immediately grabbed some sand-boards and climbed the closest high dune. It was rather unsuccessful. After a few attempts it was back to base for a shower, beer and a bit of reading. That night we joined a barbeque. R45 for unlimited Pisco Sours, Cuba Libres (1h30 time limit) and LOTS of chicken, hamburgers and a salad bar. Nice...

Huacachina

the hostel courtyard

The next morning we booked a trip for a dune-buggy ride. It was INCREDIBLE! More than two tours cruising the endless dunes at high speed and crazy angles! We did stop for some dune boarding that went a lot better with waxed-up boards and a lift to the top. We started on some small dunes and then gradually worked our way up to a MASSIVE dune for the grand finale. By then we decided the best and fastest way to go down was on our stomachs. We smoked down the slopes at blistering speeds and then unfortunately had to head back.

buggering around (sorry, bad pun...)

Dune

Lloyd of Arabia

Back at the hostel we had enough time for a quick swim and an ice cold coke before heading back to Ica and leaving on what was to become the longest journey...

I came to South America looking for an authentic experience. Well, I got my wish, but it was not quite what I had in mind.

The first part of the road was from Ica to Lima (5 hours). We arrived in Lima at 17h and then had to wait for 22h30 for our bus to Trujillo, a city 570km north of Lima. It is normally an 8h bus trip.

At about 03h00 the first of our troubles began. The bus simply stopped. We were informed (in Spanish) that we could not go on, because of protesters blocking the roads. After 4 hours of waiting we were off again. Unfortunately that wasn't the worst of it. We were stopped again for four more hours at the town of Chimbote. Because the queues of cars were so long, we didn't see any of the protests. By the time we got there the roads were half-cleared (they blocked the roads with rocks, trees and sacks of sand) and police were standing with guns and riot gear. After this we thought that we have finally passed the worst. Once in town we were blocked once more. When we finally started going again it was already getting dark. On the outskirts of town the first rocks hit the side of the bus. We were ordered by the stewardess to get down and close the curtains. The next 30 minutes we sat in the pitch dark on the floor of the bus not knowing what was going to happen. Luckily we got through the danger area without too much further going wrong. Nontheless, I was quite shaken. This was not a pleasant experience. We finally arrived in Trujillo after a tense 23 hour trip, burned out and hungry (no food on the way).

From Trujillo we jumped on a taxi to the nearby coastal town of Huanchaco. This tranquil little town will be our rest stop for the next few days. Lazy days of surfing, swimming, hammocks and seafood!

Neil