Last week, after having my flights cancelled two days in a row (Grrrrrr!) I finally made it to Rurrenabaque in northern Bolivia which is the stepping point into the spectacular Madidi National Park and the Pampas (which are savannah swamp land with lots of wildlife to see). I went on a 3 day trip to the Pampas first. I was traveling with a couple from Canberra who kept me highly amused as they were so over enthusiastic about everything - After every little thing we did, they would turn to the guide and say in a really thick Aussie accent: "Gee, thanks Robin!!! That was sooooooooooooooo fantastic!!! Yeah... Really really GREAT!"... Was quite funny and imitating them has been keeping me and my other guides fairly well amused!
It was stinking hot there, the waters were infested with aligators, black kayman and very very hungry pihrañas so there was nowhere to swim and no shade which made me enjoy the experience a lot less. On the first day we arrived after a long and dusty three hour car ride and then we went out on the river where we got to see hundreds of aligators, kaymans, capybaras (which I am so sick of seeing that I call them big fat guinea pigs...) and birds... In the night some squirel monkeys came to feast on the papaya ripening on the tree.
The next day we went to see the pink dolphins in the river... We were told that we could swim with them but I was quite a little bit put off but the hundreds of big black kaymans circling the boat and the opaque colour of the water. We arrived back at the camp in time for lunch with a small case of sun stroke... In the afternoon we went fishing for pihrañas which was good fun! On the way there was a couple of ducks swimming with their 7 or so chicks, when they saw the boat coming they flipped out, the parents flew away leaving the chicks to fend for themselves, who ducked under the water, and only 3 of them came back up again (I presume they were eaten by kaymans lurking under the surface) :( Once we got to the fishing spot I dropped a large steak in the water to see how long it would take them to devour it - about 2 minutes! I caught two pihrañas and we got to eat them for dinner - vicious little buggers with damn sharp teeth... But very tasty once cooked! In the night I was woken up by my guide who showed me a gorgeous Brazilian porcupine feasting on the flowers of a tree at the camp.
On the last day before leaving I begged my guide to take me to find some anacondas... We walked me 3 hours in the blistering heat with no luck, when finally we found a nest with two of them in there! I got to hold it which was good fun... Then on the way back we saw another 2 or 3 of them and some cobra anacondas which are very venomous (didnt try man handle them!). But for me was the best part of the trip!
When we got back we headed back to Rurrenabaque, happy to be leaving the heat and mosquitos...
The next day I headed off on a 6 hour boat ride into the heart of Madidi national park to the Chalalan ecolodge which is owned by a community up river... The boat ride was really quite spectacular and enjoyable... We saw countless macaws flying above our heads... Once we got there it was a 30 minute walk to the lodge from the river, getting a taste of what was yet to come with snakes slithering past. The lodge is set on a jewel like lake in the middle of the jungle...
After having a great lunch we set off on the lake in canoe to wait for a tapir which had come for the lat 2 nights... We had no luck there so came back in time to enjoy a traditional celebration for the last night of one of the groups and the birthday of one of the workers in the lodge. Before eating, a giant black tarantulla jumped into the dinning hall from the door frame and had the whole room standing on tables screaming as it proceeded to jump around freaking us all out! was quite funny! After eating, we had music, dancing, "baby Puma milk" (which was some kind of strong alcoholic concoction) and coca leaves to chew on... I decided to give the leaves a try as I heard that they really didnt have much effect whatsoever... So after going outside to made an offering to "Pacha Mama" (mother earth) I got my little chewy coca parcel which has leaves mixed with a special kind of root and some bicarb soda. After chewing for about 10 minutes my whole face had pretty much gone to sleep as if it had been aneithitised by a dentist - was so strange!
After the party my guide and me went for a night walk to see if we could find some roaming nocturnal animals... We saw a featherland snake which is one the the most poisonous snakes on the continent, then we went to sit on a bridge in the dark to wait and see of anything would come... I turned on my torch briefly to find a line of bullet ants about 3cm big with pincers bigger than any other ant I have ever seen, coming dangerously close to my bottom... That was enough to loose my enthusiasm for the night walk!
The next day we set out at 7am to do a day walk to a river where we were hoping to see some animals... We walked 6km and then heard the call of the spider monkeys in the distance so we went cross country to find them which I regretted a little after as I was picking ticks of my body for the next 3 days... After having lunch and a swim at the river, we headed back to the lodge. By the time that I got to the lake I was so hot and bothered that I jumped in and swam all the way to the other side!
We went out to see if the tapir would come again but again we had no luck... So just headed back for dinner and bed...
That night there was a huge storm... It was still raining heavily when we got up in the morning so that sort of spoiled our plans but I decided to go out walking in the rain anyways, hoping to see some snakes which apparently like to come out in that kind of weather... But again no luck. We saw some Peccaries (wild native pigs) but I was a little put off as I had freshly read an article in the Nat Geo about the park where they mentioned that peccaries can be very agressive and have been known to kill people... After lunch we went off to the lookout which was a little disappointing as it was very cloudy so could not see all that much. At night after dinner, we went out on the lake, looking for boa constrictors... after floating around for about 2 hours with a torch, I got bored and decided that we should head back, when we heard a ruffle in the bushes... To our amazment, a giant tapir waddled out and jumped in the water for a swim, came about 1 meter from the boat and them swam off and went back into the bushes... So that is how the jungle works! You always find something when you are looking for something else! Full of surprises...
Sadly the next day we had to leave at 6am to go back to Rurrenabaque... We were a little worried that the flights would be cancelled due to the recent rain but it all worked out ok, and made it back to La Paz alive and scratching from all the mosquitos!
