Welcome to the Jungle!

We arrived in Puerto Maldonado airport a couple of days after the Inca Trail for a 2 day visit to the Amazon Jungle.  The temperature was around 10 degrees hotter than Lima and we finally returned to sea level after 6 days at altitude....we were now out of breath due to the heat!

After a bus ride we transferred to a boat for a 2 hour trip up the river (technically not the Amazon river but hey its close enough!).  We were also given a chicken lunch which was a bonus.

This was our view for most of the trip, very impressive contrasts and colours.

We also stopped off when our amazing guide Ronald spotted something, even when it was on the other side of the river!  Here are some Macaw Parrotts (yes they are eating the rockface, apparently it has minerals)...

and a Capybara having a rest with insignificant bird...

Boat trip over, we reached our lodge which was pretty nice, including running water! No WIFI in the jungle though......  :)



After the boat trip there was some time to relax, the hammock was a big favourite.

 

Before dinner we were taken for a guided walk of the jungle.  As it was dark we only had a flash light which was pretty creepy with the amount of noise coming from the mainly small creatures.  On our walk we encountered a lot of them.  Please look away now if you have a nervous disposition.

Small snake spotted by Christine, his body went on forever!

A small tree frog

Spider!

A slightly less scary butterfly

Millipede

10 points for anyone who can spot the tarantula!

Some massive ants working as a team!

More frog

Bullet ant (please see the bottom of post for more on this one!)

A massive cricket...or was it a grasshopper....

 

A massive grasshopper...or is it a cricket....

Amazing owl butterfly

End of day 1 and it was time to retreat to our room, there were precautions against mosquitos including these fancy nets!  Is that a ghost in the left one?

Day 2 started with a another jungle walk where we were shown mainly trees and fauna.  The massive snail below was one of the best finds, we were tempted to pick him up and move him in the direction he was going as he wasn´t making much progress on his own!

Our guide spotted this owl in the trees, he was very very excited as we don´t think they are easy to spot!

Here is one of those trees we mentioned, some of them were hundreds of years old.

Inside the tree (yes you can climb inside!) we found some bats hiding out...

Then we realised why it is called a rainforest!  We all look very glamorous!

After our walk we had some free time to explore, including seeing this guy lurking around our lodge.

and the house parrot who was called Homer....The Simpsons gets everywhere.

Then in the evening we went looking for Caimans which are a type of small alligator which can be over 5 metres long.  It was pitch black outside and the river spans around a hundred metres, yet our guide managed to find 7 of these only using a flashlight and looking for their eyes.  Christine also spotted one on the way back, however we don´t have a photo despite it being the biggest of all of them.  Here are the best pics we took....

See you later alligator!

On our final morning this guy turned up looking for food, he received 3 bananas and the staff wondered why he kept coming back!  We think he is an Amazon raccoon.

Then back to the boat again to go back to the airport, fantastic weather and tremendous views the whole way back.

Here is our ´group´, for some reason they decided we would be seperate from the big group which suited us fine as we had the best guide and only had 1 other couple who we had done the Inca Trail with and we got on really well with (hopefully they feel the same!).

Save the best photo till last, taken from the boat and captures the different colours really well (yes the water is really that colour, and the sky was almost that blue!)

 

Thats about it for the Amazon, except to mention that Rob almost had a near lethal encounter (painful at least) with a bullet ant at dinner, the guide said their sting is like 30 wasp stings at the same time.  Thankfully it was removed with a table spoon.  Although it was a short trip it was fantastic to see this side of South America and it was a shame to leave.