Rurrenabaque & The Jungle
Well we´re back from the jungle in one piece and not a snake to been seen.
The flight to Rurrenabaque was brilliant and we had a 19 seater aircraft to ourselves. The initial section was quite bumpy as we flew over the Andes but the views more than made up for it.
We descended into Rurrenabaque airport to be met by steaming temperatures of over 30 degrees. A real shock after the cool altitude of La Paz. The airport was extremely basic with a single building acting as check in and departures and the baggage collection being off a trolley at the gate. This was when our troubles began, yet again! Although we had checked in 20 bags only 5 had traveled with us on the flight. As the airline only ran 4 flights a day to Rurrenabaque it seemed unlikely the rest would arrive so we headed off to the town.
Rurrenabaque is a frontier town if ever there was one with a combination of basic local services and tacky tourist shops. All our bags eventually arrived the next day at 10:30 and we boarded our jeeps for the 3 hour bumpy and dusty ride to the Pampas Park. The roads were unpaved tracks and it was a really uncomfortable ride but we all arrived safely and in one piece and boarded 2 dug out canoes for the 30 minute ride into the Pampas to our camp.
The views were breath taking with wild life all around. We saw numerous different species of bird including heron and eagles, not to mention turtles and pink dolphins. Once we arrived at the camp, which was two basic buildings in a clearing on the edge of the river, we had lunch and returned to the boats to go swimming with the dolphins.
Two thirds of the group swam with the dolphins and although they didn´t come any closer than 5 metres it was still a magical experience for all. As the sun dipped we quickly returned to the camp for dinner and the cover up from the dreaded mossies!
That evening we returned to the boats once again to travel further into the Pampas and view Alligators by torch light. The noise was incredible with so much wildlife and insects moving around in the dark. My boat was lucky enough to see an alligator emerge from the river a few metres from the boat.
The next day we set out again in the blazing sun for a 4 hour river journey to see more wildlife. Unfortunately the wind got up and it clouded over and we soon regretted only bringing shorts and T-Shirts. How could it be so cold we were in the jungle for crying out loud. The highlight of the trip was a visit to a monkey colony where they came right up to the boats and the entire team must have taken thousands of photos.
We quickly headed back to the camp to avoid the rain and had lunch before heading out on a jungle walk around our camp in the afternoon. By this time it was freezing and all were dressed up as if out for a day in the hills in the UK in the autumn. Very strange.
We learnt lots about the different types of plants including their medicinal properties, before having to take part in the usual termite eating. Something as leader it was impossible for me to avoid. Having said that after having eaten part of a garlic tree they only tasted of garlic so weren´t too bad.
That night it started to rain and a couple of the team went down with food poisoning. The rain continued all night and the planned 5am start to view the dawn and hear the dawn corous was binned. As the rain continued the anaconda and cobra hunt was also binned, much to my delight and we whiled away the remaining hours playing cards while out guides made good luck charms for us.
After lunch we returned to the road head for the ride back to Rurrenabaque. The dusty dirt track had now turned into a mud bath and it was a long slow drive back to the town lasting nearly 5 hours. We all swore we didn´t want to see another jeep as long as we lived.
Numerous members of the group had stomach upsets of differing levels so the evening was very subdued. In the morning we browsed around Rurrenabaque before heading to the airport for our return flights to La Paz. This time we were split across two flights and I took one for the team and opted to fly with the second group. This mean´t a 2 hour wait in the airport from hell, second only to Miami and that’s because the scenery was better.
It was great to be back in La Paz which we were all increasingly referring to as home. The jungle and pampas tour was fantastic and one of the highlights of the trip, although the jeep journey is not recommended!
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