Ecuador – Part 4 - Amazon Basin

After an incredible week in the Galapagos, Wendy & Amber headed back to the US while Tobey & I ventured on to the Amazon basin. We flew into Coca then took a boat up the Napo River to La Selva Lodge.

http://www.rei.com/adventures/trips/latin/galapagos.html
We arrived at La Selva where we were issued knee-high boots for our hikes through the rain forest. It didn’t rain – thank goodness – but there was deep mud to slog through!  We could participate in as many of the nature-led hikes and talks as we wanted to, or relax at the lodge.
   
Our huts had no electricity – and when the sun goes down it gets VERY dark! During dinner every night, however, the staff took a lit kerosene lantern to our huts so we didn’t have to come home to a dark house! Nice!
Tobey enjoyed swimming in the lake and I tried my hand at fishing … I caught 5 piranhas in the same water Tobey was swimming in!

Gosh they have an ugly kisser (the fish – not Tobey)!     They don’t have much meat on them, but the kitchen staff cooked them up for lunch for us!  
On one of our hikes  our guide Effy spotted this poison dart frog among the bushes on the ground! How he saw him is beyond me … then he caught it and held it for all of us to take pictures.

Effy also saw a tree that had a spider web over an opening in the trunk. He took a stick & poked into the hole & the bird-eating spider came out!

 
Our other guide, Kuindi, caught an anaconda and Tobey was brave enough to hold it! I was nervous just taking the picture!

Our 4 night/5 day rainforest trek was over before we knew it, but the memories are still with us!