The Long Awaited Rain Forest Post

When I got the email from the study abroad organization asking if I would like to spend extra money to visit the Peruvian Amazon, I asked, "Will we be visiting la Isla de los Monos?" "Yes," they replied. I was sold by Monkey Island, the place where multiple breeds of monkeys saved from poaching dwell. It was a dream for the little Katie inside my heart who said this is your chance to become their monkey queen and feed them and hold them and love them. I didn't hold them, but I did feed them, as glimpsed in the video below. 

You see, the Amazon wasn't exactly the trip that I had hoped it would be, mostly do to diarrhea. Sometimes that occurs when one travels and happens to unsafe food that was deemed safe by the host organization. Not thinking anything of it at first because I already have issues, I let it go until it was too late to see a doctor due to the nonrefundable Amazon trip. So, I spent a lot of time in the jungle either in pain, on the toilet, avoiding food, and/or sleeping.

When I did venture out with the group to go on an incredible jungle trek, I felt like I was Indiana Jones. By the way, the movies don't show the after effects of very realistic parasites that Indiana Jones must have had. If you want a simple introduction, everything in the jungle can kill you! We walked through the mud for two and a half hours. It was mud that was so thick that it ate someone's boot. I got stuck in the mud twice and needed to call for reinforcements to help me out. The mud was also slippery when it coated other surfaces, so it was incredibly difficult to keep from falling into the mud pits. This would naturally force you to have to cling on to nearby tree trunks, but wait! If you clung onto certain tree trunks, giant ants would come out and vigorously defend their homes by biting you into oblivion! Other tree trunks had two inch black spikes covering the trunk. I learned that the hard way!

Finally when we made it out of subtropical purgatory, after glimpsing sloths, aardvarks, and other creatures, we emerged through the trees to explore Lake Sandoval by boat. We saw caimans and a variety of birds around the lake while we got to sit in the boat and take a break.

"Stinky Bird," which looks like a phoenix

After we boated along the large and thriving lake, we arrived to the entrance of a lodge, where I claimed a comfortable hammock. My body molded to that hammock like melting butter, and I took one of the best naps. 

When we got back from our trek, we did a little zip lining up in the canopy, and I climbed across a wobbly rope bridge to a beautiful lookout. I stayed at the lookout for a few minutes to sit and reflect on the sheer volume of wildlife around me and how blessed I was to experience it, but there was a tinge of sadness in the feeling of awe. This was truly a privilege, thinking of the future generations who will not have the opportunity to witness it in the same condition that I had due to deforestation, mining, oil, and other factors contributing to the destruction of the Rain forest.

What an interesting thought that if I return, the Amazon rain forest will be weaker than it once was. The air will be a little less clean, the forest a little less abundant, the animals a little more threatened, and the uncontacted tribes a little more aware of the outside world and the slow death of their home. There will be a day when the Amazon rain forest dies, and I hope I never live to see that day.

What a sad and beautiful world in which we live.