Not wanting to waste any time after the Inca trail, we left for the Amazon the next morning. It was a bit of an early start; 5am we hopped on the bus and headed to Manu a national reserve in the Amazon. Our first stop after our 8hr bus ride was at the cloud forest where we were to spend the night. The forest here was really dense and dark green in colour and has amazing orchids. We managed to spot Peru´s national bird the cock of the rock. A red bird, that doesn´t really look like it has a beak.
The next day we reached the river we would spend many days on during the following week. We did get some exercise in with some rafting down the river. The rafting was kept pretty simple our only command was paddle, there weren´t huge rapids but it was great to get a different perspective of the forest. Floating down the river was quite relaxing, we had been assured earlier that their were no piranhas or caiman in this part of the river!!! With that news, we all jumped in for a swim. No one got bitten by anything which was a relief.
We had great accomodation at a lodge in the bush. We had been envisaging camping in the jungle, instead we had great little cabins. Some of the lodges we went to were just lit by candle light, others had generators but it was very cool being in the great outdoors.
The next day we started the day by getting a different perspective of the forest with a canopy tour. It was alot of of fun zooming along the ziplines. The longest line we went along was 110 metres, so we got a taste of what it might feel like to be a monkey up in the canopy. Afterwards we headed further upriver, doing some wildlife spotting along the way. We managed to spot black and white caiman, lots of turtles, parrots, maccaws and the biggest rodent in the world the capybara.
We started early the next morning as dawn is the best time to see the animals as we headed down the river to the Manu reserve. There was heaps of bird life, not just the bright coloured birds that you imagine but herons, wood peckers, humming birds, falcons, eagles etc. On our night walks it was a bit harder to spot the wildlife but we did come across the bullet ant whose bite apparently ensures that you will be in agony for 24 hours. The bamboo rat that barks like a dog and the leaf ants that actually farm fungus to eat.
The wildlife in the Manu reserve was definitely more abundent. We managed to see the giant otter which lives in the Salvador lake in the reserve. They about the size of a small seal and catch approximately 5kg of fish a day each to survive. We had fun watching them catch their breakfast before the caiman came looking for a snack.
We also visited a local village where Phil tried his hand with a bow and arrow. He had some good shots but the accuracy wasn´t quite there for a William Tell shot. That day we visited some of the mature forest where the trees were just massive, almost wall like. As we walked through the jungle we were surround by monkeys in the trees above. We were lucky enought to see squirral monkeys, capaucin monkeys, wooley monkeys and the howler monkeys. It was so cool seeing them swing about in the trees, they weren´t nearly as graceful as I imagined they would be.
On our trip back from the reserve we all had our eyes peeled to see the elusive Jaguer. We had spotted a few prints along the way but sadly that was the closest we would come. We did have a very near citing though. We spotted capybara and were all very focused on the large rodent which as it turned out, so to was the Jaguer across the river. By the time we realised the Jaguar was gone and it was just it footprints that remained. Our boat driver saw it but none of the tourists did. The locals are amazing at spotting animals.
The last day we spent in Manu, we visited a clay lick where the parrots go to eat clay to neutralise the acid from the food they eat from the jungle. It was really amazing to see as they don´t go onto the clay one at a time they wait till there is a large group of them before they go to the claylick. It was really cool seeing all the brightly coloured parrots on their way to the claylick.
It was then time for us to take the long journey back to Cusco. The journey takes a bit longer up river as the river level is quite low so at times we had to push the boat. Or I should say Phil and the other boys would get out and push the boat. As our guide would only let the boys push the boat, proving there are some good types of discrimination!!!
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