This morning I woke up at 6:30am and spent about an hour in my room reading and doing push-ups. At about 8am we had breakfast in the main lodge and at 9am Fernando, the Canadian couple, their guide, and another helper rode a couple hours by boat along the Blanca River to Frog Valley.
About Fernando:
- He’s 27 years old and has been guiding in the Amazon since he was 19 years old
- He specializes in survivalist tours, where he lives out in the Amazon with his clients and the bare minimum supplies and uses the natural environment to survive
- He mentioned that he and an Israeli client survived out in the remote Amazon for one month
- He grew up in an Amazon River community and is the only person in his village that can speak English. He speaks four languages
Once at Frog Valley, we walked around for a couple hours and Fernando pointed out four different species of frogs, pointed out survivalist and indigenous uses for dozens of tree species, showed me how to use an animal trap and a bird trap, and explained how to navigate through the dense jungle using the position of the sun.
After a couple of hours of hiking and eating lunch, we headed back to the lodge and then relaxed for an hour. At 5pm we headed back out onto the river with a canoe and navigated through the river and the igapo. We noticed a large group of monkeys jumping around a few trees and enjoyed the sight for a few minutes. After, we enjoyed the sunset and paddled towards the lodge. After it got dark, we paddled through the flooded are behind the lodge for another hour but weren’t able to find any notable wildlife. Regardless, it was still nice to cruise along the water and to hear the jungle sounds.
After dinner, I relaxed for a couple of hours in the WiFi room, lodge, and guest room, and am now going to bed around 11pm to wake up at 5:30am for our 6am bird watching excursion.
Link to today’s photos: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1LDlDimNXVWHqKrC26k68EAiKUKrOc568