It is our first day of exploration in the jungle, and in this zone of South America it’s currently the rainy season. It does not rain every day, it pours quickly and then it is gone – what starts with rain ends with a glorious sun. We woke up early to be able to see from wildlife from our ship, then breakfast and after, we were ready to go!
We disembarked in a little community called Casual where some local people were waiting for us and ready to show us some of the creatures they know pretty well from the jungle. They come with our local guides and they go off of the main trail to find some frogs, tarantulas, spiders, toads, snakes or other animals. They live here, so they know the area like the palm of their hands. Some of these frogs we found are venomous, but only if you have them in your hands. The walk took us inland and our guides explained everything about natural medicinal trees and plants; the jungle is the biggest pharmacy of this planet.
After the walk we came back on board and we moved to our next destination, a tributary of the Marañòn River named Yanayacu! At 4:00 p.m. we took our skiffs to ride and explore Yanayacu. The nature here is astonishing! We saw many types of wildlife, many gray dolphins fishing and playing in the meeting of two waters, the main river is a light brown color, and the nutrient-rich one that comes from the minor tributaries high in the Andes Mountains is black. Terns, flycatchers, caciques, tanagers, and hawks, just were few of the many birds we saw. At the end of the stream we found a lagoon covered by green floating aquatic plants, soar of sea lettuce, so when we passed by on our skiffs it was fantastic, it gave us the sensation we were driving along a golf course, but on water.
Little by little our eyes became more adapted to the jungle, here the key for these animals to survive is to imitate the colors of nature, here the survival of the fittest does not apply. It’s the most intelligent and better camouflaged one that makes it at the end of the day, otherwise they perish.
Dusk came quickly, in this area of the world close to Equator line the sun sets fast, with the very last ray of the day we arrived to our ship. It was a very productive day, our local expert guides are masters in finding any kind of animal and sharing them with our avid explorers. Marvelous day in the upper amazon!
