Rod and I led our annual Galapagos and Machu Picchu trip in November 2008. This year when we said farewell to the participants, we rendez- vous-ed with some friends and went exploring into the Amazon (Peruvian) and Pantanal (Brasil), canoeing the rivers and hunting down wild-life - amazing stuff with lots and lots of birds, caimans and monkeys to photograph. We heard the most extraordinary frogs in Brasil that sounded like Formula 1 racing cars at Albert Park - they raced all night !
Before setting off, Rod left his appendix in Quito (unplanned)
We had fun with a taxi driver on the way to Lima airport where our luggage was locked in his boot for over an hour with the driver unable to release it. After trying a gemmy and then a hack-saw he finally used a hand drill !! to go through the lock (it's South America after all). Pity that the plane had already left.
All in all, the whole trip was great with only one afternoon's rain in 7 weeks. We were so happy that we donned our swimming costumes and danced in the downpour.
Galapagos and Machu Picchu highlights .
the appearance of the snow-capped active Ecuadorian volcano Antisana (usually shrouded in cloud), - humming birds pollinating Angel’s trumpets, fuchsia and Russelia, (very hard to photograph)
- a warm welcome from Lonesome George at the Charles Darwin Research Station (the only survivor of his race of tortoises),
- an insider’s look at the Herbarium at the Charles Darwin Research Station (they have dried slivers of cactus on herbarium sheets),
- lots and lots of mating turtles (almost everywhere you looked or didn’t look), .
- close encounters of the baby sea lion kind ( wow!),
- amazing fish and birds,
alpacas with dread locks (seriously curly-haired breed), - communing with the Inca gods in Machu Picchu (sun, moon, thunder),
- spending time in Carol’s garden (Inca herbs and flowers have been wanting to do that for ages).
To see some of the Galapagos photos click here.
Amazon and Pantanal highlights
- despite the rumours, the Amazon is still there,
- red howler monkeys marking territory (they sound like a jet taking off)
fast and elusive squirrel monkeys - red and blue macaws at the clay lick (seriously good) and hyacinth macaws (in love with each other),
- birds, birds and lots more birds, like this Hoatzin with the crazy hair-do!
- a tarantula eating a frog (a bit vicarious really), . fabulous colourful fungi like ‘dead man’s fingers’,
- Brasil nuts falling from a Brasil nut tree and eating them fresh (tasted like coconut),
- Wadee’s Thai banquet in the frontier town of Puerto Maldonado (who could have imagined that?)
- tasting new things, like cashew fruit juice and cupuasu fruit (yum)
- yellow vanilla plant in flower,
- catching piranha and seeing piranha teeth (very sharp, a bit scary),
- meeting gorgeous guides like Percy (Amazon), Marcelo (Pantanal) and Carlos (Iguacu Falls) and tapping into their amazing knowledge of the wild-life.
To see some of the Amazon photos click here.
In 2009 and beyond we’ll definitely be offering our participants a chance to have some adventure in the Peruvian Amazon. It was soooo good.