Welcome to the jungle!

I have so much to tell you about my wonderful trip to the Amazon River and Rainforest. Our accommodation was located about 35km from the city of Iquitos. It was called Cumaceba Lodge, there was no electricity so a little adventure for 4 days and 3 nights! First day we arrived it was so hot, I had a headache because of the heat and lack of water. We visited an animal shelter near our lodge, we visited it again on the last day because we requested. My camera emptied itself in the end of the second day, I lost over 300 photos :( I cried but luckily I got Juhos photos that he had taken so I have a lot of memories and pictures of myself also. He took about 900 photos so I have a lot to show when I travel back to Finland.

Our room.

In the end of the first and second day we went to the lagoon for some night canoeing, it was pitch black and we only used flash lights. We wanted to see alligators but managed to see only shiny eyes from the land, they did hide when we went closer to see. It was amazing to hear the night sounds of the jungle. Far away from the noisy million capital Lima. The tour also included night walk searching for insects like spiders. I saw a huge tarantula and many other creatures. We had 3 meals a day. I tasted Catfish, Piranha and Alligator (all delicious).

On the second day we explored the jungle, our guides had machetes with them and showed us the way through the bushes. The trees and plants were so big that it is hard to explain. Our jungle guide taught us how to use different plants to different diseases and how to survive if you ever get lost there. The third day we went fishing and I got one quite big Piranha and a small catfish. I got the eat my Piranha at dinner, it tasted a lot like the Finnish Kampela, very salty and tasty :)  Niina and Juho got Piranhas too, team Finland got the biggest! Many of the guests left after one or two nights so on the third evening we got a private tour to a small city nearby, La Petrolera (3000 recidents). I got the chance to feed Piranhas and the biggest fishes in the Amazon river (Arapaima).

The boat was stuck many times because the water is really low this time of the year.

Our guide, Armando, said that it is almost impossible to see dolphins this time of the year but we were lucky seeing grey and pink dolphins! Pink dolphins lives only in the amazon river.

La Petrolera

Sunset at the Amazon

We visited a tribe called Yagua, they accepted me as their guest when they painted my face. I was invited to dance by the chief.

This trip included three most scaring nights of my life. Every night I woke up about 1am and heard some weird noises from the jungle, drumming for example (maybe a tribe far away). Also something or someone circling the lodge and under our room. It sounded that some animal were searching for something right outside our room, our room had only tree walls and the fourth one was almost just mosquito net so it is easy to break in :D One of the jungle guides told stories from the jungle, that between 12-1am the spirits of the jungle are most active and if you want to see some weird things you should go out at that time. One time an American couple had visited the lodge, the boyfriend was playing cards with the staff and the girlfriend was alone in their room. All of a sudden they heard the girl screaming in a panic attack about 100m from the lodge, they ran there and one of the staff ran to the nearest village to get an witch doctor to help to find out what is wrong with the girl. After a moment the girl told that she had heard a knock on the door and it was her boyfriend wanting to take a walk (the actual boyfriend was playing cards meanwhile). After walking a while the guy said that wait here I’m going to catch some fireflies, and then it got pitch black and the girl was left alone. Our jungle guide told us that this all happened because the girl had earlier said that the Devil of the Jungle could come get her and laughed because she did not believe in it. If you do not respect the Jungle spirits, God and Devil they will punish you. This is just one of the weird things that have happened, the guide did not want to tell more stories because he noticed how scared I was and couldn’t sleep well, even though I wanted to hear more! He said that if you hear someone knock on the door twice at night, do not open or react in any way. The history of the jungle gods go way back, people still gives gifts to the Gods before entering the deepest jungle. Gifts like a bottle of alcohol and a packet of cigarettes. They still believe in this mythology and I started also to believe in it after hearing all the noises at night. If some of you are interested in this subject, you should watch the tv-show THE RIVER, so you know what happens if you don’t respect the jungle.