First day in the Puerto Maldonado jungle

7:40 am 

"Once we got our rooms settled in, we showered and changed out of our travel clothes. Each 'room' has a bathroom with a shower that uses water from a big water tower, so it is only warm some of the time but it is very refreshing in the heat of the jungle. We were taken by our guide Carlos, the owner of 'Carlos Expeditions,' for a botanical walk through the jungle surrounding our lodge. I forgot to mention, there are five rooms along a covered porch, with hammocks between the roof supports and along the deck. 

On our walk, we learned about the trees, plants, and animals around us. There is a tree known as a 'strangler ficus' that grows around another tree and strangles the life out of it. We saw one with a big hole in the trunk where a palm tree once grew.

A 'walking palm' that puts down new roots to move itself when other trees block its sunlight!

Strangler Ficus! See where the old palm tree once grew?

Sweating and loving the jungle.

Travis shows us how the root system on this massive tree works: there is a man-sized hole!

8:30 am

We also saw some tarantula holes, and Carlos coaxed one out of his hole with a thin stick. He wiggled the stick in the dirt outside the hole, and the spider thought it was a bug, so as Carlos pulled the stick away, the spider followed! He was close the the size of our guide's hand!

We came back to the lodge for a short rest, then got back in the boat and headed for 'Monkey's Island' across the river. We walked along a muddy beach and entered the forest through some chest-high grasses. The jungle here felt really 'jungley' and looked like the forest in Disney's Tarzan. It was a neat experience. I took a video trying to capture the feeling of being surrounded by the greenery, with the sounds of the birds and monkeys, but it does not do the place justice.

We walked through this heavy forest for about ten minutes before we heard the monkeys. We got to a small clearing and saw about seven small monkeys up in the trees! One was on the ground along the jungle path, but our guide said they can become very aggressive so he ushered it into the trees with a stick. The cries that came from that little tan monkey sounded like an angry banshee.

We looked at and filmed/photographed the monkeys for about fifteen minutes. At one point, Marla stuck something in her pocket and a small, dark monkey saw her do it. He was then incredibly intent on getting to her because he thought she had stuck food in her pocket. He shimmied down some vines and jumped from tree to tree, following. 

Our guide told us that a long time ago, there used to be a big market for monkeys that were shipped out of the country as exotic pets. A few years ago (perhaps the 60s) they reintroduced monkeys to the island and their population grew. For this reason, the monkeys get very close to the people who visit the island.

^Here is a huge tree!^

1:30 pm

We walked around Monkey's Island for about an hour, then headed back to the beach as the sun was setting. Once we got back on the boat, night had set in but it was still bright due to an almost full moon. We then started our search for Caimans. 

Caimans are a type of alligator that live in this region. Along the Rio de Madre, there are mostly white caiman, which can reach up to three meters in length. We were 'caiman spotting' with a huge flashlight along the dark river. Caimans have yellow or red eyes that glow in the light of the flashlight. We only saw a few for a very short time and it was not very exciting. However, after a bit longer we saw a bigger one along the shore and there was talk of catching one. After a few attempts, our guides caught a small caiman, about the size of a cat with a long, thick tail."

Carlos holding the caiman.

Katie holding the caiman!