We spent 5 days in the Amazon rainforest in the Manu national park and had an absolutely brilliant time. First we went through the Cloud Forest where we saw the Peruvian national bird, Cock-of-the-Rock. No good pictures so you will have to look it up - a very funny looking thing which did a dance to impress its mate.
On the next day we took a 7 hour boat trip down the river to get to the beautiful lodge where we were stayed for the rest of the trip. From here we saw the Macaw and Parrot clay-lick - hundreds of birds munching a clay wall to help their digestion. So many birds it looks like it´s set up for tourists! On the way there, we narrowly missed seeing a Jaguar by only a minute - thankfully the boat in front of us got an amazing photo so we can kind of claim we saw it.
The pattern of missing large mammals continued when we sat waiting for a cow-sized tapir to arrive for 5 hours, but it didn´t come. Although a lizard did make it in to our mosquito net, and Anna proved herself to be a true jungle explorer by screaming and leaping out. Ben obviously stayed and was very manly. Also, a trip to see giant otters in an ox-bow lake was similarly unsucessful. On a more positive note, we saw lots of beautiful birds which our brilliant guide Kike knew all the names and calls of. Kike also found us lots of insects and stuck a stick down a hole to coax out a giant tarantula and all its babies. Not Anna´s favourite moment!
Still with Anna´s parents which has been so much fun. Now back in Cuzco for one more day before heading to Lima for our last few days in South America.
No comments:
Post a Comment