Amazon Jungle 9 March 2012

We were collected from our hotel in Iquitos in the Explorama bus because it was raining they had put the windows in but there were no windscreen wipers so the front window just stays open.

Arrived at the dock and loaded on to the Amazon River Queen (a boat just like The African River Queen boat in the Humphrey Bogart movie) surprisingly we where the only passengers, but because they had to deliver a lot of supplies on our way down the river they took the big boat. When we arrived we discovered there were only 2 other people staying in the lodge.

 We spent a great few hours travelling 80km down the Amazon to the Explorama Lodge. The lodge is in a very small tributary so we had to disembark on the river bank and get on a smaller boat to take us the last 200 metres, this involved stepping on to a table then a chair that had been placed on the riverbank so we didn’t have to jump the 5ft or so.

Arrived just in time for lunch consisting of salad, fried fish, fried manioc (a white yam that is a bit like potato), rice and lentils, followed by fruit and cake – I think have to learn to like fish.

Travelling down the Amazon

Dining Room

 The accommodation pictures need little description but was as expected. Cold showers, no windows, the only lighting in the rooms is by oil lamp and we sleep under mosquito nets. The McCaws and other Green Parrots regularly visit us and the parrots are actually bilingual speaking both Spanish and English because of the tourists that speak to them.

 This afternoon we were taken by boat to a lake area where we spotted sloths, iguanas, hawks, vultures and numerous other birds. We also saw the most amazing lily pads measuring about 1 metre across.

Sloth

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Dinner was at 7pm and with little else today we were in bed by 9pm.