Still in the jungle...
Trip Start
Oct 12, 2006
1
12
17
Trip End
Nov 12, 2006
Asuncion, Bolivia
Monday, October 30, 2006
Who would´ve thought a one night camp for 2 people would involve so much staff coming along? We had our 2 cooks, our guide, the boat driver, the boat man at the front who keeps us from hitting bottom in shallow water, and a few kids who we think were related to the cooks and just seemed to enjoy the ride and some fishing. We some nice birds along the way, such as about 27 red and blue macaws in flight (according to one of Mark´s photos).
Allison was unfortunately still being affected by the mystery food illness, and got sick again before we left the village. But being the trooper she is, she came along anyways and hoped things would improve soon. We think we´ve pinned down what the upsetting food was: yucca, a vegetable that´s longer than a potato and quite a staple food around here, but has it´s own distinctive flavour that we just aren´t used to. Allison now keeps refering to the food as translating to: ´yuck - a´, and memories of being sick will keep her away from yucca for a long, long time. The cooks prepared a medicinal tea made from a specific tree bark for her to drink, which is believed to help with stomach illnesses and diarrhea. As you would expect, the locals have many different plant medicines that they use for every ailment possible. Unfortunately, medical intervention is far away and two of Erwin´s brothers died from flu-like illnesses in the last 3 years.
Our camp consisted of a large two-story hut, with numerous bed frames upstairs, and a side hut with only a roof for cooking over the fire. The guides brought everything: thin mattresses which they quickly set up for us to rest on before lunch, tents, towels, sheets, and plenty of food in coolers. We felt a bit bad seeing everyone else scurrying around preparing things for us, while we sat on the mattresses. Of course we still had an excuse as Allison was still not feeling well, and wasn´t able to keep her minimal lunch down either. We even had a few other friends to keep us company: the bats hanging just above us and the many cucarachas scurrying about (we preferred using the Spanish version of ´cockroach´, since it sounds like a happy song).
In the afternoon, we left the cooks behind at camp and again took a breezy boat ride (the boat trips were quickly becoming our favourite part, since they offered such a nice cool breeze which wasn´t found in the jungle) to a clearwater waterfall feeding into the Rio Beni where Mark took a dip in the refreshingly cool water. Our guide also brought out his bow and arrow and attempted to harpoon a catfish we saw swimming around in the clear creek. He made a few attempts, but to no avail. Fishing is an important part of the Moseten culture and so we tried not to judge this being in such a wild environment. We continued upstream past a steep-sided canyon where the guides showed us a cave where we would later sit beside waiting for a very rare noturnal bird, much like a nightjar but larger (Mark is still trying to work on identifying this and many other birds seen). The jungle and remoteness of this area was quite stunning, and in contrast even with the areas where people lived. There seemed to be more shy birds, like colourful toucans and a glimpse at a beautiful white and black king vulture (beautiful despite it´s red skinhead). We stopped in several places to try some fishing, coming up empty, but Mark had fun trying to launch the bait as far as possible, after one funny episode throwing the bait onto the roof of the boat (when the waters are clear in the dry season the people use a bow-and-arrow). Hearing the sounds of the jungle was definitely eery and exciting while on the water. By 6:00 we waited and waited by the high cave opening, hearing the creepy, gurgling bird squawks that seemed to be more gremlin than bird-like. Finally they started flying out and quickly our guides spotted them with their flashlights as the swooped around us while they drank water before their night journeys looking for fruit. Our guides managed to get back to the camp in the dark and found the small dirt path where our camp was with surprising ease.
Upon our return, the cooks took pity on Allison and were sweet enough to prepare some soup especially for her, which Mark was jealous of. Mark had some fish and other delicacies. We slept in a small, steamy tent which only felt comfortable by morning, like most sleeps in the jungle for us. 9:00 feels like bedtime in the jungle, so this is when we seemed to retire, but we didn´t get up before 7 at least.
The next day we went for a long walk up to a lookout point, with the hopes of finding monkeys further in (which were not around our camp at all, probably due to the locals hunting any mammals they can eat). Unfortunately, this hike was a strenuous one during the middle of the day, with lots of hills and a dangerous mix of jungle heat, dehydration, and low energy which proved too much for Allison who was still feeling a bit sick, and an hour into the hike, she turned back to the boat with one of the two guides. Mark trekked on, uphill and managed to see a large peccary, which is like a boar and can be found in large packs. Erwin is a master of the animal calls: easily mimicking the call of a young pheasant which caused a nearby adult to squack and fly about in excitement. He also could mimick the sounds of a spider monkey, the most common in the area, that had found a tree with ripe fruit (which sounded like the stereotypical native-Indian savage call in North America). The monkeys responded and sounded like they might be heading over. The look-out turned out to be just a brief glimpse of the Rio Beni as trees has closed up the former opening, and Mark was a bit uninspired by the wildlife he had seen to this point, having been spoiled in a few other jungles he had seen. But on the way down we ran into a large troupe of spider monkeys which crashed through the forest as they lept from tree to tree, seemingly unconcerned with missing any potential landing. There were some close glimpses and some fun thrashing branches about below and seeing them respond to the threat with equal thrashing above. Another monkey was spotted further down as they crossed under the ´tail-end´of another troupe. We had no more water by this point as we had given most to Allison, and so Mark picked up the pace back after 3 hours getting drenched in the jungle. Poor Allison was waiting for over an hour near the river´s edge and felt the wrath of the many ´buggies´as we affectionately called them, although she had a makeshift fan to keep them at bay.
In a cruel twist of fate, with Allison feeling 100% better by that evening, Mark fell ill a few hours after eating our innocuous looking supper. With both of us having gotten sick from something in the food, the rest of our meals at the lodge were unfornately shadowed by an air of worry and extreme cautiousness. The food tasted good, and we can´t put our finger on what caused us to get sick (the suscpicious meals involved completely different foods). Perhaps it was the heat, perhaps it was dehydration, who knows? All we know is we longed for normal food the rest of the time at the lodge.
