Tarzan Goes to the Jungle

Tuesday October 26.

Mark and I were on our way by 7:00am. The bus picked us up and took us to the airport. It was raining hard and flights were delayed, so, we waited for awhile. At the airport, we met John and Saobhan from Ireland, who are making their way home; Richard, my dinner date in Lima, who was also heading to the jungle but a different lodge and Nicholas, from the cloud forest, who was also off to the jungle. It is a small world out here.

Finally left on our 35 minute flight over the Andes to Peurto Maldonado. Loaded onto a tourist mini bus for a half hour and then because the roads were under construction and very muddy, they took us to the river earlier than usual and we had a two hour cruise upon a motorized canoe upstream to the Pasada Amazonas Lodge on the Tambopata River. The river is full of sediment and is a reddy brown colour. Ate our lunch on the boat, that's chinese fried rice in a banana leaf! We saw two black cayman en route. Arrived about five pm.

We had a meeting about the facility, the rules, and the activities we'd be part of. Then it was dinner time. Food was good, pumpkin soup and lasagna. After a short mingling time we headed off to bed, as we have to get up by 4:00! When we got to the room, we found we had three walls and one totally open to the jungle. The jungle is incredibly loud, what with frogs, insects, birds and animals all call to each other. Amazing racket. Slept under mosquitos nets.

Tried to turn on my computer to write my journal for the blog later (there is no wi-fi here obviously), but it wouldn't work. It powers up but says I need to start it remotely and do a hard disc scan. Very frustrating and scary, because there is stuff on it I don't want to loose!

This lodge is run by a company called Rainforest Expeditions Peru. They are trying to get the local indigenous people to protect and respect the environment. The company takes 40% of the money we pay and gives the other 60% to the community of Infierno. They hire and train the locals as employees to run the facility, from cooks, guides, maids, gardeners, etc. Our guide, Ruli, told us that so far, since 1990 that money has bought the community a clean drinking water system, provided electricity and helped with education for the children of the community. The aim of the company is to have the community totally run the lodge and the ecotourism business by 2016. It's nice to see and be part of an effort like this. The locals in the area are involved in three industries that are harmful to the area: farming, logging and brazil nut harvesting. Ecotourism is becoming an ever increasingly important business here and through the Amazon.