Saturday, July 12, 2014

Hiking through the Amazon


 

 

So first and foremost I must apologize for the lack of blog posts. Life here has been beautiful but work has been slightly monotonous, so not too much to blog about… well at least not much until we this jungle tour of the amazon!

It all began on Friday morning when we met at 7am to catch our van to take us two hours south to the Peruvian border. This two hour ride though, became the longest ride of my life… First and foremost the entire ride was off road, and with no seatbelts my 9 peers and I were like popcorn bouncing around the van on every bump we hit. One of these bumps even resulted in a flat tire in which we were stranded on the side of the road for a little while (and my tire changing skills were of no help since they don’t use jacks here…). Once we got back on the road I proceeded to get extremely car sick but luckily a short FIVE HOURS LATER we arrived at our jungle spot.

We arrived just in time for it to torrentially downpour for a solid hour… our first leg of the tour was supposed to be by boat so we decided to wait out the rain (let me disclaim that our tour guide said we were waiting just because he finds people usually don’t enjoy boat rides when it is pouring rain and not because of the safety factors…I found this to be quite alarming…). As impatient as 10 American 20 year olds are, we couldn’t sit and just watch the rain, so we (I have no idea why I am including myself in this because I was in no way apart of this…) convinced our guide to let us start the boat tour in the rain. 10 minutes later we found ourselves drenched and sitting in a boat on a river in the middle of the jungle with rain smashing us in the face… I have to admit, by this time I was not the biggest fan of this day.

Finally the rain cleared up though, and the waterfalls all around us were unveiled. Everywhere you looked there was a cascada—big, little…they were all so gorgeous! After an hour boat ride on the river we reached our hiking spot. The hike was 6 km through the jungle and amidst this labyrinth of rocks. We trudged through mud and swung on vines, completely engulfed by the jungle. Whatever you imagine the jungle to be, I can assure you the reality is far superior. Some of the plants are so crazy I can’t help but think God was just letting his creativity out when he created them! The only bummer was that we didn’t really see many animals. No monkeys, but we definitely saw some weird bugs, and the spider that was as big as my hand definitely takes the cake. (I tried my best to stay calm in that situation…but I was not very successful).

After the hike we were extremely muddy, but before we could go wash off in a waterfall we went to visit a community of people that live in the middle of the rainforest, the Shuar. The Shuar are the indigenous people of the Amazon Rainforest, and are known specifically for their shrunken head rituals and use of hallucinogens (don’t worry we did not participate nor inquire about either of these). Our guide introduced us to a Shuar family and we were invited into their home to meet them. It is particularly interesting in some of the areas where we work, because there is little distinction between indigenous people and “modern” communities. Especially when we are in the campo, sometimes I expect loin clothes and war paint, but there is little differentiation because the clothing has become so modern.

Our final leg of our tour was to the Cascada del Dios, the most magnificent waterfall I have ever seen!  It is believed that if you bathe in this waterfall you will have good luck (I opted out of this one because I was so hungry…for reasons which I will now explain). We were told that we would be provided lunch on our tour and to only bring snacks. Well, after our five hour car ride all of my snacks were gone and I was ready for lunch. Little did I know though, that lunch was going to take place after our tour… so by the time we got to the waterfall at 6pm I was not the most pleasant character (if you know me, you know that lack of food makes me the worst person ever). We finally got our LUNCH around 7pm, but with fresh fish from the river there was nothing to complain about.

The two hour trip back only took three hours this time, so 16 hours after we left for our tour we finally arrived back home… EXHAUSTED. Riding a boat, hiking, and wading in a waterfall in the rainforest was definitely one of the most memorable experiences I have ever had, and even after all the obstacles, it was so incredible. So far in this trip I have hike the Andes in Cuenca, a volcano in Pulingui, and now through the Amazon… this trip is so crazy!!

Lots of love from Ecuador,

Jen














 

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