Super Duro

Welcome to the Jungle

Shannon and I are truly fortunate and very lucky. We tell each other this every week. When we first decided to go to an international school we were prepared to go without truly knowing where we would end up. We were fortunate enough to end up in a place that has some of the most unique locations on the planet to visit.

In the past 9 months we have hiked through cloud forests. We have swam with sea lions in the Galapagos Islands. We have hiked up volcanoes and slept at the foot of giant snow-capped

mountains. And now we can add another truly remarkable trip to that list.

Chocolate Leaves

Last weekend, Shannon and I spent out three day weekend in the Amazon Rainforest. THE AMAZON RAINFOREST. As in, the very same one that centered your elementary school science units. The most famous collection of wilderness and animals and plants the world has to offer. I still can’t believe we are afforded that opportunity whenever we want. Anyway, here is a brief account of our experiences.

We woke up early on Friday, intent on getting to the lodge as early as possible. The drive was projected to be about four hours. I have detailed before that while the country is small, our location in the middle of the mountains and the necessity to drive winding mountain roads leads to long drives. In an effort to keep this post interesting but still accurate I’m going to zoom through the next bit. We got turned around on the road and added two hours to our journey there. There may have been a frustrated meltdown or two but the point is we got there.

Quechua Yucca Potions 

When we arrived to our destination, we still had a way to go. That sounds weird but let me clarify. When you are going on a trip to most lodges in the Amazon you have to get there by motorized canoe. There are no roads that lead into the jungle or parking spaces. So we parked our car at a public lot and paid a canoe driver ten dollars to take us a half hour up the river to our lodge. Unfortunately the actual Amazon River does not go through Ecuador so while we were in the Amazon Rainforest, we were on the Napo River. The Napo River is either the largest or the second largest tributary river to the Amazon but I digress.

The river looked exactly as all rivers in the Amazon look on tv. It is dirty, murky, and dark but in a very natural way. As we took our private 30 foot long canoe to our lodge, Shannon and I discussed the creatures that potentially lurked just below us and strategies for escape if the boat capsized. The gist of that conversation is that I would have saved her but she would have used her swimming coach techniques to leave me in the vicious jaws of the first critter to approach. I understood…it was a tough drive.

Caiman Snack Time

When we got to the lodge, we were greeted with an incredible lunch and cold beer. We had heard about the lodge through some friends and it was all inclusive in terms of our excursions, meals, and lodging. After finishing our lunch we were taken by our guide Cesar on a short hike through the jungle. Cesar spoke only Spanish so we were able to practice our Spanish while taking the tour which was nice.

Along our trail, we came across a cinnamon tree and ate the leaves. We came across a giant garlic tree and ate the leaves. We came across a variety of flowers and antibiotic trees that were used for pharmacy pills…and we ate the leaves. Had we not been served lunch I might have been getting skeptical of this whole “all meals included” thing.

Leaf Cutter Ants

The hike was a pretty genuine Amazon experience. Cesar had a machete that he used to cut a path through the thick foliage in some spots. At one point he surprised us all by smacking the back of his machete against a tree. The tree made a loud bang like it was made of steel. “Super Duro!”  he laughed at us meaning super strong. He seemed to have just as much fun as we did.

While we were walking Shannon pointed out that a whole colony of leaf cutter ants were forming a convoy across our path and sure enough, thousands of the little red dudes were going from the river across the path and up a tree. It was almost as if we were in a movie seeing all of the “Amazon scenes.”

Almost Ready!

Towards the end of our walk we found a small caiman, which is like a fresh water jungle crocodile. Cesar threw him a bit of meat and he lackadaisically chomped on it while giving us some serious side eye.

Ready for the Hike

After we saw the animals, we went to the home of a local Quechua family chatted with a woman who lived there. She made us a local drink made of ground up yucca and hot water. She made us some natural chocolate and fed it to us on a leaf. Her hospitality was incredible and her kindness was truly moving.

Then we went outside to do what all Quechua people must learn to do, we fired blow guns! Cesar set up a target for us and we took turns firing wooden darts down an eight foot barrel at a piece of wood. When I shot mine it came out of the blow gun with the velocity and ferocity of a jungle warrior…then took a left turn, missed the target, and nearly killed one of the woman’s pet chickens. My second attempt was no better. Shannon however, fired a strike straight into the center of the target. I suppose I should keep her on my side when we go for hikes.

Conga Ant aka Bullet Ant

When we returned to the lodge that night we were met by more delicious non leaf foods and shared dinner with some of the other travelers who happened to be staying there as well.

The next morning we woke up early for a canoe ride deeper into the Amazon and took another canoe ride to a remote island area. As we got off of our canoe, Cesar decided that he wanted to take a local fruit and paint our faces like local tribes people. It was a little touristy but hey…that’s what we were.

Cesar and Us in the Jungle

We went on a hike and saw a dangerous Conga Ant crawling near Cesar’s hand. According to the internet, which is never wrong, the Conga Ant has dangerous neurotoxin venom in its stinger that causes the most painful sting of any animal in the world. It is supposedly more painful than any scorpion, wasp, hornet, or any other stinging animal.

After avoiding that we found ourselves in some quicksand. We actually got caught in quicksand. Granted, we only sank up to our shins and were never in any real danger but WE SANK IN QUICKSAND!!!

Quicksand!!

After ducking through a few spider webs and seeing some cool birds and insects, we made it up to the top of a hill where Cesar made Shannon a fern crown and declared her the Queen of the Amazon. We took a few nice pictures overlooking a nice part of the jungle and hiked our way back to the canoe.

On our way, Cesar spotted a somewhat swollen branch and climbed up the tree, cut the branch, sliced it open and out came a colony of ants. He suggested we eat them and when we did, they tasted like lemon! Lemon flavored bugs! I could get used to this.

When we got back to the canoe, we got changed and hopped into some tubes to go tubing down the Napo River. We all exchanged some side glances since Cesar himself told us that the river had Caimans and Anacondas but that they probably wouldn’t bother us. The owner of the lodge also assured me that the dreaded Candiru fish USUALLY didn't come that far up the river to where we were going. Some endorsement… That’s the one that…well, click here if you want to be completely horrified.

Howler Monkeys

While we were a tiny bit freaked out, we floated along the Napo for about twenty minutes, through some fast moving water and slower lazy river type stuff. We relaxed while staring above us into the tops of the massive trees wondering what other jungle secrets lied in obscurity.

The Queen and I

After the lazy river float, we climbed back into the canoe and went a little bit further into the jungle. All of the sudden our guide cut the engine and Cesar started making a whooping sound. None of us knew what he was doing or what was going on until we spotted them. A family of howler monkeys inched towards us on the branches and ended up about 20 feet from our boat looking at us with confused expressions. I guess they weren't very used to humans. One of them stared at us with a seriously grumpy face and without moving another muscle, started flexing his brow. It was the strangest thing. I don’t know if it was a friendly gesture or an aggressive one but after a few pictures and looking at them for a while we left.

The Good Life

When we got back to the lodge we spent a nice late afternoon napping and reading on the hammock before dinner, which again was incredible. We ended up packing up early on Sunday and enjoying the lazy but beautiful ride back, which we made in less than four hours. We hiked through the jungle, saw some dangerous insects, fed a caiman, got mean mugged by some howler monkeys, ate jungle food, shot blow guns, got our faces painted with natural fruit dye, and one of us was crowned royalty. It was a “Super Duro” way to spend our three day weekend.