Tag 147: Cuyabeno Nature Reserve

It's 6 o'clock in the morning. We enter the terrace of a small restaurant completely exhausted. The last eight hours we spent more or less sleeping in a very uncomfortable bus. We are in Lago Agrio, a small city at the gates of the Ecuadorian jungle and still have three hours until we are picked up. Not much has happened in the past few weeks. We traveled along the coast by bus and camped for a few days in various sleepy fishing villages. Three days ago we arrived in Quito, the capital of Ecuador. Besides taking a walk through the beautiful old town of Quito, we spent the days planning our Amazon trip. It's now 9 o'clock, we just had breakfast and are being picked up on time by a van. When I say 'we', I mean Sabrina, myself, Lutz (another German we met in Quito) and Katrina (a Canadian). A manageable group. After a two-hour bus ride, we finally arrive at the entrance of the Cuyabeno Nature Reserve and meet our guide. We get into a motorized canoe and drive two hours through the incredible jungle to our accommodation. On the way, we see various monkeys and birds and can't stop marveling. Our accommodation, also called 'Caiman Lodge', is very beautiful, spacious, tidy, and more luxurious than I imagined. Sabrina and I get our own room with a private bathroom. We have a few hours to rest and settle in. Then it finally starts. Our first exploration tour of the Amazon takes place in a canoe. We drive around the river a bit and admire the landscape before making a stop at the shore of a neighboring lodge. Our guide wants to show us something. Immediately next to the pier we are standing on, there is a two-meter-long caiman in the water. It is not bothered by us. With an impressive calmness, we are ignored by this deadly beautiful animal. We take our time to admire and photograph the reptile from all sides before continuing. In the middle of the river, where it is the calmest and deepest, we stop to enjoy the beautiful colors that the sunset offers us here. We are allowed to go for a swim if we want to. Lutz doesn't hesitate and jumps into the dark lake, Sabrina shakes her head decisively. I feel a bit uncomfortable at the thought, especially after our guide has told us for two hours which animals live in these waters. Snakes, caimans, piranhas, and predator fish the size of a shark. But I can't pass up the opportunity. I undress and jump in after Lutz. The moment is unique. I swim in a huge river in the middle of the Amazon, the sun is low and paints a picture in pink in the blue sky, around me only jungle and beneath me - I don't want to know. I go back to the boat, sit next to Sabrina again, and enjoy the moment with a cigarette. We drive back. After dinner, our exploration tour continues. This time on foot. Armed with flashlights, we follow our guide through the dark and noisy jungle. We are supposed to look for small red reflections, as behind them there is usually a reptile or a spider. It's a bit creepy to walk through the densely overgrown jungle in the dark, considering how many animals and insects can easily kill you with one wrong step. But our guide is good and the trip was worth it. We see various spiders, frogs, opossums, and more. Still somewhat intoxicated by our first day in the jungle, we go to bed and quickly fall asleep.