Amazon - Into the Wild

One of our activities was a hike through the jungle. We went through some areas where the guide had to hack the way through with a machete. New respect for early jungle explorers.

We were there in the dry season. Had it been the wet season, we would have wandered through this same area in a boat.

In the day time, the forest is really all about plants and bugs.

The huge Kapok tree.

Remember the scenes in Hunger Games where the good guys are saved by tapping water from a tree, well it works. Here's Evie getting some refreshing water from a tree in the jungle.  (And looking just like the water is saving her life!)

A handy thing to know if you're ever lost in the jungle. The key is picking the right tree, as the other trees are poisonous. 

Pretty red mushrooms on the jungle floor. They are also poisonous.

The leaf cutter ant. It really doesn't eat the leaf, but brings it back to its place under the jungle floor were the leaves are pressed together. The ants eat the juice from the leaves. 

We saw a lot of these, carrying pieces of leaves over incredibly long and intricate routes through the trees.

These are not leaves eaten by ants or anything else. Rather, the leaves grow with holes in them so as to provide light to the leaves below (the Amazon ecosystem is complicated).

This is the Amazon millipede. It is the centipede, which is also in the Amazon, that is poisonous.

We had tied up the boat on the river bank while we hiked around in the forest. When we came back we found hundreds of butterflies around the boat and our stuff. Look carefully. The green and black butterflies landed on the green and black backpack, while the orange butterflies were on the life vests.

A short video clip. Floating down the river in the midst of numerous butterflies, all color coordinated to items in our boat, was truly magical!

During the day time, there really is not much animal life on the jungle floor. Rather, it is in the trees. We were, however, in their natural habitat, not a zoo or a sanctuary where the animals easier to find and see. Here it was a bit like a large wilderness area, where although there animals there, it isn't so easy to find them in their natural habitat.  So we and our guide went "hunting" for them (that is to see them). The best chance is from a boat looking up at the jungle canopy. We saw all of the following, although these are not our pictures. I gave up trying to get pictures with my phone.

Titi monkeys. We saw a large family on the move through the trees.

Squirrel monkeys. We saw a large group of these, not too far from the Titi monkeys.

This is a sloth. We saw several, usually hanging upside down in the tops of the trees. The sloth really is pretty lazy, doesn't do much more than hang from tree most of its life. Every now then it comes down to poop.  Sometimes it will drop directly into the river. The sloth is slow on the land, but a very fast swimmer.

The birds in the Amazon were the most spectacular and there were always so many.  It was amazing to go down or up the river in our boat, and to see huge flocks of birds take to the sky as we floated along.  These are just a few of what we saw. 

This is the Amazon hawk.  We saw them "floating" above us or perched in trees along the river.

Heron

Egret

Macaw

The lodge offered several sport fishing expeditions for large bass, catfish, etc. We didn't do that, but while we were out looking for birds and monkeys we stopped for a few minutes to fish for the famous flesh eating Amazon piranha. I managed to catch the smallest piranha in the river, but I also was the only one who caught any (two). Yes, they do have very, very sharp teeth and are aggressive. Care is required when removing the hook; we threw them back in the water.

The piranha feed by smell, because the water is not clear enough for them to see. I was told that as long as you are not bleeding and do not pee, the piranha will not be a problem if you're in the water.  Hint, when swimming in the Amazon, don't pee.

The action in the jungle is in the tree canopy or at night. The best advice for human beings in the Amazon is to stay inside at night. Nonetheless, we went on a night walk around our lodge to see what's out there. This is a poison frog, which the natives use to make the lethal poisonous darts. The poison is on the outside skin. The poisonous frogs are also the most brightly colored. Their defense mechanism is to assure by their bright colors that predators don't mistake them for another frog which might not be lethal to eat!

We also went out in the boat at night in search of caiman (crocodiles) and snakes. They can be very difficult to find, but at night when they are out looking for prey you can see sometimes see the reflection from their eyes with a flashlight (at least the guide could).

This is juvenile caiman we found among the plants in the river. Although I'm holding it, the guide managed to just grab it in the water and I still have't figured out quite how he did it. Again, you need to be careful about the jaws. 

This is what it will look like when all grown up.

High up in the canopy at night, the guide saw the eyes of one of these, a tree boa, waiting for an unsuspecting bat, bird or monkey to pass by. We eventually got it down to check it out, although I forgot to get a picture, but it looked a lot like this one. The anaconda lays around on the ground; near the river, looking like large root or stick, waiting for a passing animal on its way to get a drink.