Activity Summary
Wednesday 13th September - Day 344 (continued)
Travel to Iquitos, Peru
Flight to Lima
Flight to Iquitos
Prepare for Amazon trip
Thursday 14th September - Day 345
Day 1 Amazon tour
Travel to lodge
Boat trip along the Amazon river
Jungle walk 1
Monkey island
Jungle night walk 1
Cayman watching night boat excursion - San Rafael
Friday 15th September - Day 346
Day 2 Amazon tour
River dolphin sunrise boat trip
Jungle walk 2 - Santa Maria de Fatima
Scenic boat ride along the Yanayacu river
Saturday 16th September - Day 347
Day 3 Amazon tour
Monkey island part 2
Local walk around the lodge
Night walk 2
Sunday 17th September - Day 348
Day 4 Amazon tour
Piranha fishing
Yahua tribe
Travel back to Iquitos
Decompress from the comfort of our hotel
Monday 18th September - Day 349
Travel to Lima
Summary
Iquitos
An interesting city compared to where we had been previously. It was more like being back in SE Asia in parts, full of tuk tuks and busy roads but not a whole lot else.
Base for getting to the Amazon.
Amazon jungle and river
Pretty amazing place.
The river was huge (despite being dry season) and you could not see 5cm through the dirt filled water. Piranhas and an undisclosed number of different animals made us not want to jump in for a swim but the river dolphins were cool.
Jungle is jungle to be honest. It doesn’t make for particularly exciting walking in Luke’s opinion given the environment doesn’t change all that much and especially being wam, humid and mozzie infested. But the potential of seeing wildlife in the most bio diverse place on earth was exciting.
Great experience despite the permanent discomfort of sweat and deet.
Transport
Iquitos
Flight from Lima to Iquitos
Tuk tuk to hotel
Amazon
Car pickup from hotel to Amazon Experience office
Car shuttle to port
Boat across the Amazon river to Dolphin Lodge
Vice versa back
All transport throughout the trip involved a boat trip across the Amazon river, walk and then potentially more boats.
Accommodation
Iquitos part 1 - Otorongo Guest House
Number of nights - 1
Price per night per person - £5
Positives:
Cheap as chips
Close to the airport
Negatives:
Rude and incomprehensible owner
Hot as hell room
Fan sucked
Shared bathroom
Rubbish breakfast
Recommend?
Fine for a quick stopover
Iquitos part 2 - Nativo Hotel
Number of nights - 1
Price per night per person - £18
Positives:
Super comfortable
Aircon
Big room
Clean and tidy
Great shower
Nice wall mounted tv with Netflix
Rooftop pool
Negatives:
None really
Recommend?
Yes
Amazon - Dolphin Lodge
Number of nights - 3
Price per night per person - £n/a
An enjoyable place in the jungle and we were super happy to be in a lodge with a private room and bathroom.
The common area could’ve been more comfortable in terms of seating but it was spacious and air rated as best it could be.
Enjoyed the time here and most of the negatives were more to do with the jungle, bar the old owner that was grumpy as hell and could have done without his sass.
Diary
Wednesday 13th September - Day 344 (continued)
Once again we rode some luck on our flight and made use of the entire free row Nicola occupied. Luke was pretty sure the only reason Nicola invited him over was because others were eying up the space, otherwise she would have happily gone full spread eagle.
The flight was fine and the basic crisps and biscuits snack did a lot of appease Luke’s weak stomach. He did however start to feel somewhat worse as time went on and by the time the flight had landed he was at full headache and pretty run down.
To top off that stellar feeling we then found out that our bags, although having the all important Latam ‘transit’ tag, needed to be collected at the bag drop and rechecked in from international to domestic flights. We had a little over 2 hours until our flight departed and an hour until boarding.
We were not particularly happy or looking forward to the shuffle.
Once landed in Lima it took an age to get off the plane and then onto a bus across the runway which nearly had a head on collision with another reckless airport worker and had the most ridiculous route across paths of reversing planes. Not a well constructed airport.
Thankfully passport control was rapido so despite basically running there, it would have been fine if we had been caught in some of the people traffic we had burned on the bus.
Bag drop was less optimal. Luke’s was out pretty quickly so Nicola sent him on his merry way to find cash and get in the queue for bag drop. Nicola’s bag however was ‘lost’ and required assistance from a lady to go and track it down. Thankfully it was easy enough to find and Nicola made it safe and sound into the Latam check in queue.
Luke however was nowhere to be seen. He had followed the signs to departures with the hope he would stumble on the check in desks but this turned out to be fruitless. He did however manage to pick up some Soles before being reunited with Nicola who, quite rightly, was a little perplexed.
With our bags dropped we then had a very brisk shuffle, in Nicola’s case basically running and leaving Luke behind, to get to our gate that was supposedly boarding imminently. Again, security was leagues quicker than UK airports so there was no drama there and we were at the gate on time.
Of course the flight was late boarding and taking off but you never know. We grabbed some croissants from a nearby and reasonably priced cafe before waiting for the flight.
Sensing he should eat something, the ham cheese croissant was consumed by Luke which turned out to be a huge mistake. Once settled from the run he went from passable to pretty bad.
A flight was probably the last place Luke should have been but there was little choice at this point. Once boarded and taken off, there was a fair amount of turbulence that seemed to shake him up at a time when he didn’t need it, head in hands on the seat in front with his stomach crying out in pain and now getting the full washing machine treatment.
So for the first time in his life (that he can remember) he joined the mile high club of vomcanos. Fortunately he was close to the back of the plane, it was so early since setting off that no one was in the cubicle and the airhosts kindly got straight out of the way so he could dry heave for about 2 minutes before finally dredging out the remnants of the croissant that had tipped him over the edge. Damn that thing had no moisture.
Luke’s a particularly loud vommer so apologies to all that had to be witness to what could only sound like a pig being slaughtered in a flight toilet cubicle.
The airhosts were super nice about it, gave him water and some tea which hilariously came with a tag saying ‘good luck’.
After about 20 minutes (Nicola did check up on him) he returned feeling a lot better but he could not stop burping as a melting pot of gases couldn’t escape from his asshole as a result of an Imodium blockade the likes the protesting French would be proud of. Sadly for the poor woman next to him and for Nicola, Luke’s burping had the rancid undertones as if he was essentially farting through his oesophagus. The lady next to him offered some medicinal vapour rub type thing which was very kind but was clearly using it to bypass whatever smells Luke was releasing.
All in all, Luke’s very sorry to a variety of people.
Thankfully the flight was only a few hours long and Iquitos was an easy airport to get in and out.
Nicola had arranged for a guy to pick us up in a Tuk Tuk who naturally turned up a little late but not ridiculously so. She wasn’t happy about putting the big bags in the ‘boot’ of the vehicle but they stayed put along the reasonably well paved road, the 3 of us including the pick up dude in the back.
The hostel was about 10 minutes away and once there we had the displeasure of trying to communicate with the owner who seemingly didn’t speak legible Spanish. After mumbling our way into our room after paying we then had another awkward exchange of miscommunication about a tour to the Amazon, us thinking she was selling one but it could have turned out that she was saying we were getting picked up by ours at 8.10am. Eventually she left us alone, us thinking she got the hint we didn’t need a tour and her clearly thinking we understood what she was saying.
After packing for our 4D3N amazon trip, which was a lot of effort for Luke, we crashed out happy that the day was over. Maybe not so happy that our room for the evening was a sauna and the fan was awful.
Thursday 14th September - Day 345
Despite the furnace, Luke slept alright. Nicola less so as she was kind enough to give Luke free rein of the big sheet while she had her sleeping bag liner.
Still had some stomach issues but Imodium helped shore everything up and would be the last time he required such measures. So he got pretty lucky with the timing of his illness, starting to abate just before the rather expensive £300 Amazon experience excluding the equally expensive flights there. It did take him a few days to get back to 100% energy levels however.
We were up and ready a lot earlier than the 9am time we were initially told as the pick up time but we didn’t enjoy the rude hurrying from the owner about a supposed 8.10am collection making it out like it was our fault. If she had told us it was an earlier pick up time, why the fudge was she the one doing it and in such a crap complicated manner. The driver was outside our hostel for 30 minutes before he decided to say anything. We were baffled, the driver was confused and it was all a pretty bad start to our trip.
Once at the office, a measly 15 minute drive away, we ended up being the only ones there anyway so it made the 8.10 start seem absolutely ridiculous.
Here we met Samuel, our local Amazonian tour guide and would be with us for the 4 days, and Charlotte and James who were paramedics from the UK (the latter an Aussie) on holiday who were great crack throughout the trip. We were quite lucky to have others with us who we got on with and were easy to speak to as there were others who seemed less fun and spending all this time on our own would have been quite long. So all in all very thankful.
In Luke’s perspective, Samuel was great. He was pretty fearless, was chill and looked after us well. Luke thoroughly enjoyed his decision to speak and try to teach us Spanish throughout the trip, despite us sucking. The biggest compliment Luke received was that Sam could understand him speaking Spanish which made him beam ear to ear - especially when he’s had tour guides say they don’t understand a word of his English (yes still bitter).
Samuel needs to learn to carry more water, of which we made him very aware he needed to do, and his timings in terms of length of activities was hella questionable but he always meant well and just wanted us to see exciting things.
The first leg was to drive to the port and admire some of the local wares on offer. The grubs were phat and the cayman was just odd.
From the port we got into the new ‘fast boat’ that took us to the campsite in 50 minutes and was the first of o so many boat rides on various parts of the Amazon river. James was particularly good at spotting the grey and pink river dolphins where nobody else could.
Once at the lodge we were straight out of the door on a walk. The constant go go go approach of the tour became evident very early doors…
The walk in the jungle / selva around the back of the lodge was good fun. Sam led with his machete in hand, being told that it was necessary should he need to fight vicious poison snakes that jump 5m at people when encountered (legit has happened to him countless times), the path was open and it was a nice introduction.
Sam showed us that a specific type of terminate made for great mosquito / zancudo repellent. James was definitely the ‘I’ll do it’ guy of the group. Charlotte was the ‘I’m terrified of most things’ one but then again coming into the jungle with a spider fear was hella brave - there are fucking loads of these things and a lot are super poisonous.
We had a great introduction to the famous bullet ant, famed for having a bite that feels like getting shot so naturally Sam decided to try and pick the thing up. He failed, got bit and then lied to us that he had but did say it’s happened so much it only hurts for 5 hours for him. For us gringos apparently it would be 24. Not about that life.
Once back at the lodge we were served the first of our all inclusive school dinners. The food slapped and was exactly what we both needed, let alone for Luke and his stomach. Each meal was an array of carb, veg and fruit which was right what we wanted. And there was plenty of it. Mealtimes were defo a highlight.
The lodge itself was pretty basic. The common area was large with some fans that were sometimes used and had a resident old man who seemed to be the owner but was a grumpy sod. The man chopped wood in his boxers, swam in the stand-alone adult paddling pool and then sat around doing nothing all day, so he was a little odd.
Our room was pretty big, with perforated windows to allow air in and keep mozzies out, who were frikin huge in the jungle. The fan and lights went out when the solar was gone but it wasn’t so bad in the evening once the sun had gone. Cold showers helped a lot.
The afternoon activity would be one of the best of the experience. We had a short boat ride across the Amazon river which was a prime spot to have a quick photo shoot.
Monkey island was amazing. There was a refuge centre on the island that rescued monkeys kept as pets, trafficked for personal gain or needed help. There were loads of different types of monkeys around the complex and loved carefree in a large jungle space and only recent additions to the centre were in a cage before growing older to be released or were too aggressive with everyone (people and monkeys) at the centre.
The monkeys that we saw were:
Woolly monkeys:
These guys were the main stars of the show and were everywhere. Everyone needed to wash off the bug repellent and suncream as some of these guys got super friendly and turned out they loved to lick the salty sweat off of tourists. James in particular one of the monkeys called Nichollosa took a keen interest too.
All these monkeys were all great. They’d just half follow, half play with each other and it was all just a wholesome experience watching them go.
A few did jump on Luke for a short while but their focus was James and Charlotte for the most part.
Some would just stick out their hand and expect you to hold yours out for something to climb up or hold on to. George, a particular woolly, was a big fan of the casual hand hold and walk.
Saki Monkey
A cool looking guy, covered in long black fur with the wise face of a tamarin but normal sized. This guy was semi friendly, but a bit skittish with bigger groups.
Titi Monkey
There were a couple of these small guys in a cage as they settled before being released. The sound they made was melt your heart cute, and seemingly just wanted to run around and play with everyone.
The red Titi monkeys in the tree were much larger but super cool.
Howler Monkey
Only saw one of these guys but he was so unfazed by us and just walked off. Loud AF in the wild however.
Tamarins
Nicola’s favourites. These cute little wise men were pretty skittish and preferred to be in the upper parts of trees. Our revisit in a few days had us stand and watch these guys for about half an hour which meant they got pretty settled and came super close to us.
Marmosets
The smallest monkey in the world, referred to as the pocket or finger monkeys. We managed to see a few of these guys high up in some big trees due to the great eyes of our guide. They are teeny.
Having Nicholasa chill on James’ head for a good 20/30 minutes as we walked around for the marmosets was a particular highlight. Monkeys run pretty hot and this was additional heat he apparently didn’t need but she refused to leave.
It was a great experience and once finished we walked back to the boat and were at the lodge before sunset. There was an offer of a swim in the Amazon but none of us took it, partly because it was pretty late in the day and the other part because we were terrified of piranhas, penis fish and other bitey things.
Prior to dinner Luke was pretty gassed to see a massive firefly trundle across the view of the bedroom window, its massive orange butt glowing like an inferno.
Post dinner we all went for what was expected to be an easy and low key night hike. This turned out to be a bit of a mammoth affair, starting with a walk through the jungle but predominantly through wide paths that didn’t feel terrifying.
We did see:
Anaconda - hilariously Sam would run around shouting Anita and that he had food for her in Spanish. Took us a while to work out what he was doing given our bad Spanish.
Frogs - one yellow one was super poisonous which was jokes to learn.
Two small non-venomous snakes - once again James was dead keen to take them up on the offer to pick them up. Initially the two guides were a bit confused about whether they would kill us or not and that gave us no confidence they were right when they changed their mind…
What we didn’t expect was a sketchy boat ride through a swamp in the pitch black. The boat itself was one of the super low riding local boats and as we all saw it everyone was said ‘nope’ … but then subsequently got in anyway.
The next hour or so had a local and Sam rowing us through the swamp looking for Cayman. They were quite small and hidden in the undergrowth so the closest we got was when the local guy fished one out with his hands which was pretty jokes.
There was a lovely thunderstorm in the backdrop of our excursion that had picture perfect lightning bolts ripping through the sky.
The water skipping spiders that were hitching a ride did nothing for Charlotte’s fears and increased the risk tenfold of us capsizing, or at the very best her going for a self bin. Nicola did very well to calm her down and stop the standing and running approach she kept trying to adopt.
It was a shorter walk back where we got the boat across the river in the pitch black. Eerie and kind of impressive the boat guy managed to navigate us home.
We were absolutely pooped by the time we were back and in bed for 10pm and it was supposed to be a half day.
Friday 15th September - Day 346
It was a 5.30am start in order to catch sunrise and go river dolphin spotting. Luke fared pretty badly with this early rise, clearly still needing sleep to recover from his illness and therefore took every opportunity throughout the day to fall asleep on things. So on the boat ride out and back, he couldn’t help passing out and Nicola was kind enough to take a picture of him. But the positive was his requirement of Imodium was finished.
Sunrise was non-existent but the dolphins were out to play. Apparently there are two types, grey and pink, and we were lucky enough to see some nice pink underbellies of those that jumped in front of our boat. Having only the four of us in the group made dolphin watching from the prime parts of the boat so much easier, we did see a packed tourist boat and it looked shite.
We both went for naps when back at the lodge, Luke on nap number 3, before breakfast at 8am and then were out for our activity at 9am.
The mid morning activity was another jungle walk, starting in Santa Maria de Fatima and continuing into the jungle for about 4km before turning around.
The walk from the village was pretty simple, flat and although there were plenty of trees and an interesting jungle landscape, we didn’t see any overly exciting animals along the way. Samuel leading with his machete was always a sight to behold and he loved a good call out to Anita (anaconda) or anything else that was listening and offering us up as food. Sammy was kind enough to give Luke a stick however to fend off such snakes - it actually worked really well to clear spiders / cobwebs from trees at our head height that was considerably taller than our guide.
Once the large walking part was done we reached our first boat crossing. We had to wait around a little for the guy to turn up with the tow boat but there was an incredible display of butterflies that were huge, pretty and looked like kites. The slow mo video in particular was quality.
The boat ride was quite cool. The swamp ish water had a number of mangroves trees lining the sides and there were some cool swimming stick insects in the water. Luke did offer to help paddle but Sammy didn’t let on he needed help.
Once on the other side it was a short walk and another boat ride across the pond. The large dragonflies were the interesting element this time.
There was one more sketchy route through dense jungle looking for god knows what and then we were at the viewing platform. It had a nice view on top of the tree line but it wasn’t anything crazy special.
Luke took the opportunity for a required team jungle photo.
The journey back wasn’t nearly as long but everyone was pretty hot and tired by the time we made it back to the lodge. Lunch was immediately served and everyone had a nap before heading out for the afternoon activity. Luke’s total naps for the day were 4 as he deemed it insensible to have one later before dinner.
The boat ride from the lodge took us to San Juan de Huashalado and it took a long time to get there. The boat was going against the river flow and once reaching the inlet we needed to go up, the channel narrowed massively with steep clay mud walls and incredibly fast flowing water. At full pelt, the boat crawled up the river to our stopping point and we were all a bit surprised it made it. There were some lovely views of herons and much more lowland jungle foliage.
Once parked up we had a short 20 minute walk to Yanayacu where we were provided another boat to go up and down the Yanayacu river. It had started raining at this point but we all welcomed this with open arms, James fully embracing the get wet ethos.
It was a really nice scenic boat ride. The river was calm and although the engine naturally ruined a lot of the tranquillity, we were able to appreciate the jungle life kicking off around us. The birds in particular when settling down for the night gave us a good crescendo. We just sat and watched for an hour or so and even spotted the allegedly ‘elusive’ black-collared hawk.
The diminishing light was really beautiful over the river.
The main boat back to the lodge fared a lot better with the flow but as dusk settled the mozzies came out to play and hit everyone. Luke naturally the worst with his count of 4 to the back. There was a very nice sunset however with clouds that formed what looked like a dragon.
It had been a fair amount of welly walking throughout the day so our feet were pretty wrecked. With an expected big walking day the next day again we sacked off the night walk and it sounded like we didn’t miss much. Luke was crashed out by 9pm anyway.
Saturday 16th September - Day 347
It was nice to have a chance to sleep and recover from what had felt like two very intense days. Our morning breakfast was made a little more exciting when Nicola managed to spot a 3m snake moving around the trees outside the lodge.
As part of the 4D3N package, our day was supposed to be another trip to Yanayacu, a walk around the area and lunch with the village. Given we had visited the place the prior day, it was super warm and sunny (compared to being largely overcast the previous days) and Nicola’s feet were feeling the effects of the poor boot quality; she really didn’t want to do the scheduled activities.
So after discussing with Sam and suggesting a nice easier day of revisiting monkey island with an afternoon local walk, our plans were changed for the better.
Monkey part 2 was even better than the first visit. Without James and Charlotte there (who were doing the day shorter experience so had differing activities today) and it being earlier than other tourists would arrive, we were the sole focus of the woolly monkeys and we lapped it up.
Nicholasa, who absolutely favoured James over Luke, had no choice now and had to settle for his sweaty self which Clearly meant Nicola was less moist. This was all going swimmingly until the monkey managed to turn on Luke’s head and start licking his eye and required some intervention from the guide.
Nicola got some great attention also.
Two of the younger monkeys decided to form part of our entourage and in between play fighting amongst themselves, would then gnaw on us as well. Completely harmless but it did take some getting used to.
At one point Luke ended up with all three hanging off him like a tree. It was great fun.
With our guided tour of the monkey island reserve nearing the end we had some couple photos and then Luke ended up with one of the younger ones curled up in his arms like a sleeping baby. It was pretty adorable.
Deciding that we didn’t want to leave yet we then just had a walk around the reserve by ourselves / with Sammy and got some of the best viewings of the other types of monkeys while the Woolleys found new friends in a larger group of tourists that had arrived.
The red titi monkeys and even smaller tamarins were out in full force so got a great showing, videos and pictures of these more elusive guys.
We did go for a walk in the nearby forested area looking for pocket monkeys but we quickly realised we would be hopeless and turned around.
We loved this place and were so happy with our decision to change plans.
Post a nice relaxing lodge lunch it was time to say goodbye to James and Charlotte who had been great company throughout our jungle trip and were really thankful to a) have decent people and b) just to have others with us. There was a couple who arrived the day after and we could not have fathomed spending 3 days with those guys who seemed to stick their nose up at everything.
The afternoon adventure was a chilled walk nearby. We didn’t see anything exciting and Nicola did have to rein in Sammys desire to walk for 3 hours but it was enjoyable.
It was so eerie to be the only people staying in the lodge on our last night and didn’t enjoy it much at all.
The last night's walk was a recreation of what the other guys did the night before, a much more narrow bush whacking affair under a closed canopy with head torches lighting up very little. After a while, when left alone with your thoughts, this gets a little nerve wracking and especially when finding some of the creatures of the night.
The worst was by far a very poisonous spider, hidden in a tree trunk with what looked like a mangled white sponge for an abdomen. Grim and large.
The walk lasted about an hour and while interesting, what absolutely nailed the day for Luke was the 10/10 incredible night sky. The backdrop of the jungle with stars and the milky way in full force.
By complete fluke Luke managed to capture a shooting star in transit. He was so gassed.
We would have stayed out for ages had we not already been chased by numerous biting insects and the fear of snakes.
Sunday 17th September - Day 348
The day started as usual and the first activity was a spot of fishing on the Amazon river. Both of us have next to no experience doing this so were naturally not great to begin with, but it also turned out there was a knack to it.
We weren’t a big fan of skewering raw beef onto the line but the thrill of success was fun while also knowing that all this fish was getting eaten by those at the lodge. Once the line was in the water and a tug was felt, the action of pulling the line out of the water would be the mechanics for attaching line to a fish.
Specifically we were fishing for piranhas, and when that failed the sardines near the surface would have to suffice. This in itself was pretty cool and we were both successful in catching both types of fish.
Luke fared somewhat better, ending with 3 piranha and 2 sardines, Nicola 1 and 1 while Sammy and Freddo (the boat driver) was solo with just the one.
The last activity was, in Luke’s opinion, the worst part of the trip. We were taken to a local Yahua tribe who had settled post canoeing 3 months up the river some time ago and showcased some dances, the blow pipe and some of the wares for sale. We declined the 24 hour ‘mature by spit’ alcohol that was offered.
Luke hated every minute of this experience, being the only gringos there at the time and we’re brought up to dance around a pole with the tribe. Thankfully a 30 strong group turned up and we were forgotten about.
The blow pipe was the best part however.
We did try and buy a bullet ant encased in a clear amber style setting but they didn’t have change and Luke didn’t appreciate the chief asking for money as we left. All seemed strange that the adventure package didn’t include any payment for us to do this but this kind of thing makes us both squirm. Thankfully it was short.
We had our last lunch at the lodge and were back on the boat to Iquitos. As a nice little goodbye fuck you, Luke got bitten for his approximately 15th time in 4 days. The deet definitely helped but this guy cannot go somewhere where getting bitten = disease death. He won’t make it.
The ride back to Iquitos was long, we were then picked up in a car back to town and after paying the second half of the fee (we had to remind them) we partied ways with Sammy and were at our much more comfortable airconned hotel with a pool.
After a little time on the rooftop pool we went for dinner nearby at Le Petit Chat Noir for distinctly average food and then Nicola spent all evening in bed weeping at the new season of Virgin River that was so nicely placed on a wall mounted TV with Netflix.
Monday 18th September - Day 349
It was Nicola’s turn with a dodgy stomach, which came as a bit of a surprise but hey, that’s travelling.
Luke spent the morning going to various banks to try and find a remotely reasonable withdrawal limit and fee bank with no avail (currently Interbank has the cheapest effective interest rate at 4.75%)
At 12pm we checked out and got a hotel ordered taxi to the airport. Sky airlines didn’t allow us to check in online but thankfully this made no difference at the airport. It wasn’t pleasant standing in a hot humid queue for 30 minutes waiting for the booths to open however.
Nicola picked up a small and expensive sandwich (seemed to be nothing near our hotel in Iquitos), went through security and after a minor worry they were going to charge us for our backpacks lucked out and had the guy just come over and tag the bags without putting through the check box.
Off to Lima we go. We did have a cracking view of the jungle and Amazon river from the air as a nice parting gift.
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