The Heart of Darkness..sort of.
Trip Start
Jun 18, 2005
1
24
26
Trip End
Ongoing
Coca, Ecuador
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Equipped with wellies and plenty of deet, we climbed into our motorised canoe for the five-hour trip down the Rio Napo to our lodge - Yuturi.
En route, with thick jungle on both banks, we got caught in an amazing thunderstorm during which we could barely open our eyes to see the huge forks of lightning.
Our home was a bamboo hut with private bathroom, beds and mosquito nets - as we discovered later, as much to protect us from the bats as the bloodsucking insects.
Our guides, Juan Carlos (called Juan Ca´ by the other staff - ha ha ha!) and the cheeky Indigenous Medardo took us on a night walk to hunt for scary insects, snakes etc. But we were told not to worry about the snakes as if you're bitten they electrocute you to break up the poison! As well as crickets, centipedes and caterpillars, we found two hairy tarantulas, and saw amazing glowing fungus.
After a peaceful trip in a flat-bottomed canoe before breakfast the next morning, to listen to the dawn chorus, we paddled out again to begin walking deeper in the forest.
Just some of the amazing insects, plants etc which we found, were: 1) bullet ants - they have a bite more painful than a wasp and some native tribes have to place their hands inside a glove into which 100s of these nasty little guys are sewn before they officially enter manhood.
2)a poison dart frog
3)army ants - if you are bleeding in the jungle and they find you, they eat you alive!
4)tiny, lemon-flavoured ants - we ate THEM alive - like mini lemon sherbets!
5)a palm frond which Medardo turned into a rucksack in five mintues
6)minty tree roots which you chew to combat toothache
That night we hunted for caimans - but although the trip was serene and beautiful on the black lagoon, we saw only distant flashes of their red eyes in our torch beams.
The next day in the jungle we saw amazing butterflies, and tamarind monkeys, on the way to the house of a native man called Rafael. We shared a bowl of chicha - thick alcoholic local brew - and he gave us an unenthusiastic performance of traditional wedding music on a pipe made of eagle bone.
On the way back, Lee ATE A BEETLE GRUB! He actually pulled it live out of a tree stump, pulled off its head and chewed it up!
Blowpipes are much bigger than I thought, and even hitting an orange at ten paces is tough. But it amused the guides to watch gringos puffing away pointlessly.
Later, we paddled off again to pirhana fish in the same lagoon I had been swimming in hours earlier. Between eight of us, we caught five for dinner - jungle boy Lee getting three of these. Despite tugging like a lunatic I caught nothing - though in my enthusiasm I almost gave Lee an unexpected piercing.
After dinner, Medardo bought out his pet scorpion for us to gawp at, luckily dozy after three days in a box. Not to be outdone, Juan Carlos went into the jungle and came back with a tarantula which we all held. Apparently they rarely bite - which was lucky as at one point she ended up on Juan Carlos´s crotch.
Then the lucky winner of the blowpipe competition was given a luminous bug in a piece of tissue - so bright you could hardly believe it was real.
We raced back down the river the next morning for our flight back to Quito, after running aground on a sand bank, making it with 30 mins to spare.
Amazing stuff - I loved every minute. We´re now back in Quito with time to visit the equator, chill and shop before we come home. Both of us can´t wait to get back. Merry Christmas everybody! See you in four days!
