I decided I wanted to see some of Ecuador’s Amazon, so on February 20th I took a plane ride to a city called Lago Agrio in the north of Ecuador. The flight was pretty fantastic – very short, and only a little turbulence when we flew near the absolutely stunning volcanoes. I got picked up at the airport by the tour company and we drove through Lago Agrio to our lunch spot, passing loads of deforestation and the longest oil pipeline I’d ever seen.
Lago Agrio is also known as Nueva Loja, as many of the city’s first colonizers came from the province of Loja. The Amazon Rainforest around the area has been badly damaged due to oil spills, deforestation for homes and buildings for oil workers. The construction of roads has disturbed animals - with more roads comes more deforestation, an increasing human population in the area, noise pollution, hunting, and animal trafficking for zoos plus uneducated medicinal uses.
In fact, this area of the Amazon has been made infamous by the documentary entitled Crude, which covers a lawsuit between Chevron and locals living in the Amazon rainforest. The movie shows how the area around Lago Agrio has become severely polluted from numerous oil spills and lack of proper clean-up by the parties involved. While the case stipulates that locals have been harmed by pollutants in their water, causing their families cancer and their animals to die, it should be noted that this documentary only covers the specific lawsuit against the oil industry – and tends to paint locals as victims and tourism as a savior when both are part of the cause of the overall Amazon destruction themselves.
It doesn’t discuss the far greater problems the Amazon suffers – including an increased number of tourists and lodges built to support them. The lodges have very cheap prices – they operate on ‘quantity’ of tourists, rather than the ‘quality’ of large per/person tourist dollars. Our lodge could hold up to 45 people at once, with most other lodges on the lake holding at less a dozen or more people as well. Sometimes there are up to 20 different boats on the lake at once. Damage is done by the gasoline that enters the rivers to run tourists around spotting animals, and the environmental damage from the sewage they produce since it is disposed of improperly even in the best of lodges. (Our lodge had loads of plastic trash and ‘junk’ just thrown in the back of the property need the river, and it was one of the better lodges!)
But an even bigger problem than tourists is the fact that a population lives around the Amazon area at all. Lago Agrio continues to grow bigger, with more people expanding their properties to include bigger houses in the villages, modern appliances which require electric and water – and sewage disposal. This results in even more utility projects, thus more deforestation. With more infrastructure such as roads and ‘human comforts’ of air-conditioned hotels, comes even more people and the cycle continues and grows larger ever loop.
I got to start meeting some of my tour group members when we sat down for lunch together. There were some interesting animals to be seen already – bright blue striped butterflies! As we continued towards the jungle’s river we started seeing blue morpho butterflies flying around as well. We eventually were led to the dock by our guide Roberto and into the boat which would take us to the cabin. All of our bags were piled up on another boat to come.
Cuyabeno Reserve is still an absolutely fantastic place for seeing wildlife. The park has been damaged, and continues to be damaged along with the rest of Ecuador’s Amazon. The short-term riches, long-term losses mentality of Ecuador’s government means that unfortunately, it won’t remain this way for long. For now, Cuyabeno contains 10% of the world’s entire plant species lives in Ecuador, with every hectare of land in Cuyabeno containing more than 200 plant species. Some of these include massive Kapok trees, Caucho strangler figs, Mahogany, and submerged trees such as Macrolobium trees (also known as guarango in Quichua), the chambira, the peach palm, and the morete.
There are currently 475 fish species, including the giant arapaima fish. There are 96 species of amphibians in the park, and 91 species of reptiles… including the famed anaconda which can reach up to 9 meters in length. In the waters of the river are also Amazon manatees. These are very rare to see as their reproduction is slow and they are very sensitive to environmental damage. Tourist and resident’s boats have struck them, and the gasoline put into the river from the constant and plentiful boats’ usage prevents their population from recovering.
There are 165 species of mammals in Cuyabeno. The most famous are the jaguars in the park, but it is already virtually impossible to see them due to their low numbers. Our guide Roberto has been working in Cuyabeno for years and has never seen one – and he only knows of two tourist groups who have seen one in the park.
So we were off, on our boat ride to the lodge! We saw some awesome animals along the way, the first being just around the corner from the dock – an anhinga bird, also known as a snakebird – which is what the word ‘anhinga’ translates to from its original Tupi language. The bird gets this name because of its appearance as it swims through the water with only its head sticking out – looking like a snake. As the bird swims and dives under the water for its food, it hunts using its long beak to ‘spear’ small fish. We saw our anhinga standing out of the water to dry its feathers – as it does not produce oil and cannot fly with wet feathers.
I couldn’t get a photo of the every bird and interesting creature we saw! We also saw Pygmy Kingfisher, American Kingfisher, some yellow flycatchers, a fuzzy millipede floating on the water, and a bird I thought was an undulated tinamou.
Our tour group got a good look at two different groups of birds who constructed hanging nests: caciques and oropendolas. Caciques are generally black birds, but they have blue typically around their eyes. Oropendolas on the other hand are larger than caciques and more yellow in color, though their color variations are quite large. I believe that both groups build their long, hanging ‘basket-like’ nests at the end of tree branches, preferably over a river or near a wasp’s nest for protection for their eggs from predation by other animals – and especially other birds.
Our boat continued, and Roberto told us some interesting facts about some of the animals we saw along the way. I spotted an Amazon Kingfisher flying just above the water of the river to our left – they are often seen along the rivers as it is the location of their mating. We also saw some fork tailed palm swifts, a fantastic-looking great black hawk, loads of dark blue greater ani, and some noisy cobalt-winged parakeets. As the river water got deeper we began to spot the dolphins swimming along the top out of the water. These dolphins are nearly blind, and luckily, we were able to see some of their unique pink color!
Roberto informed us that usually in February the lake is much lower than it was when our group was there. Because of ‘global weirding,’ rather than become nearly completely dry (as the lake typically does in these months) it has remained filled with water. In dry months if you visit Cuyabeno you do way more walking, but have a chance to see different animals! During this dry season, it is common to see tapir, peccary and capybara on the floor of the current lake – you can even walk on many of the parts we were currently on in a boat! Because there is so much less water, the animals have less choice for watering holes, and the larger anacondas are typically more visible as well.
Once we got to the Cuyabeno Lodge run by Neotropic Turis we were greeted with some drinks and split into groups to meet with our respective tour guides. While Roberto handled the 5 day/4 night group I was in, there were another dozen or so guests who were being led by a separate guide on a 4 day/3 night tour. While our tour groups ate at the same time and hung out a bit together on the outside decks, the tours were kept mostly separate which I believe made for a better experience for all (smaller groups = more chance for animals.) While we were speaking with our guide a bright red snake appeared near the edge of the river, on the land which made up ‘our’ little island.
This snake was a chonta snake, also known as a mussarana (clelia clelia) snake. Interestingly, these snakes are not dangerous to humans, and don’t typically bite, though they do constrict pit vipers and other snakes – eating them whole as food. The snake we ran into must have been a juvenile, as it still had most of its red coloring on it. As chonta snakes become adults, their skin changes from red to a dark blue/black. As we approached this chonta the first time, our group managed to be noisy enough to cause it to slither away quickly. About 20 minutes later I snuck back to the site and found the snake. When I approached it, it raised its head in typical ‘snake attack’ position, and once I got some great photos I let everyone know it was out again and we crept back quietly to see it.
We went out to the lake in the afternoon to see some of the birds and have a swim to cool down. There were loads of animals around the lake, including a bunch of noisy hoatzin birds! These birds are known as stinky birds because of their strange smell. There were a few other noisy characters such as yellow-handed titi monkeys and orange-winged Amazon parrots, black-headed parrots, blue-headed parrots, and maroon-tailed parakeets. At one point our group was scared by a massive arapaima fish which jumped around in the water in front of us. Our boat went to the middle of the lake where we were able to get some photos of a group of neotropic cormorants.
In the evening we had a delicious dinner along with a welcome drink made out of granadilla fruit and alcohol. At dinner, Roberto discussed a good deal about the destruction occurring in the Amazon rainforest and the lack of political will in the Ecuadorian government to change their ways and increase protection. Correa went through the process of getting rights for nature, but then has allowed ‘senderos’ (the terminology ‘roads’ can’t be used, as they are supposedly not allowed) – roads by another name – to be built through the super diverse areas of the Amazon by the Chinese in exchange for the Chinese’s high-interest loans made to the Ecuadorians in order for the Ecuadorians to pay for the Chinese’s building of hydroelectric dams throughout the country (such as the one we saw near Zamora.) One of Roberto’s friends was mentioned on TV (along with his Facebook photo) by President Correa as a ‘traitor to Ecuador’ simply because he wrote a letter questioning the President on his seeming switching stance on protecting the environment. The Amazon desperately needs protectors.
The following morning our group set off by boat for some animal spotting. We saw a ringed kingfisher, a crimson-crested woodpecker, a many-banded aracari, a group of scarlet macaws, a lined forest falcon, and groups of communal spiders. We slowed down at one point and looked up into a high tree above us. There was a large hole in the tree, and Roberto told us that a family of night monkeys lived inside. Just as he told us this we saw one of the parent night monkeys (apparently there are three – two parents and a baby) peaking its head out of the hole and staring down at us! So cute! Night monkeys are the only nocturnal monkeys – and they do not have color vision, there’s no need for it! We continued on in the boat, and as we were driving around in the boat we got stuck on a fallen tree in a low part of the river. We all had to get out of the boat and stand off to the side while our driver forced the boat over the tree – then we carefully stepped back in and continued on.
Next we headed out to visit a nearby Siona Community. The Siona people used to be the Siona-Secoya people, and they are very similar but want to be considered separate tribes. Roberto took us to meet a Siona woman named Berta and her children. We asked Berta some questions about her life. She’s 34-years-old but has 7 children, and is pregnant with another one. While she is married to one husband, the shaman of the village is allowed to have as many wives as he wants. One thing that stood out that she told us was that she did not enjoy life in Lago Agrio when she’s visited because you “always need money when you live in the city.” Berta much preferred life in the jungle. Food was just around the corner in the garden or in the river, there are no house payments on a house made of palm reeds, and money is only just “for extras” rather than a necessity.
We were going to watch how she makes casabe bread making. Berta took us out to her yuca garden out back and chopped some out of the ground for us. Apparently, there are three kinds of yuca she could use – black yuca, white yuca, or yellow yuca. Berta unwrapped the pink natural wrapped from the yuca and washed them well, before using a grinder to get the yuca into a soft, mashed potato-like substance. Berta spread it evenly in a long reed hanging basket, then hung the basket up and squeezed all the toxic juice out into a bowl on the floor. Berta cooked the yuca in a thin pancake on top of an open fire – we all got to take a turn cooking if we wanted as well. While she was making the casabe bread, I noticed a tattoo on Berta’s arm and asked her about it – it was her own name she tattoo on with jungle ink when she was a teen. Once the casabe was done, we all tried pieces of it with pink sauce, honey, and/or canned tuna. Strange combination! The casabe was simple, a bit dry and a bit tough, but it was good! Especially once topped with the extras.
After we filled up on casabe we went back to the boat to return to the lodge for lunch. Before getting to the lodge we stopped off to see a massive kapok tree. Kapok trees have white and pink flowers, and play host to many different types of animals. This tree grows quickly, sometimes more than 13 feet in one year, and overall it can grow up to 200 feet high and 10 feet in diameter. Interestingly, it is believed the kapok tree’s fruits (each containing 200 seeds inside it) floated from Asia to South America as they do not sink in water. Alternatively, people could have brought the fruits and seeds with them. The kapok’s wood is good for canoes and thus humans find this tree very useful.
We had lunch once we got back (it looks small on the plate, but the lodge actually offered pretty much unlimited food and 3 courses at every meal) and I explored the small library where I found a jar containing a yellow tree boa which Roberto said used to roam around the lodge property before it died. We ended up doing some spectacled caiman spotting from the lunch room. One of the lodge workers had managed to use a caiman call to get one mother and its baby to come from the water right up onto the shore. They rested there while we got some great photos of them!
In the afternoon we headed out for another boat ride of animal spotting. We saw some cute little grey-breasted martins, some little ‘puffy’ looking dusky capped flycatchers, a black-tailed tityra, a tiny hawk, and one dark blue and black violaceous jay. We got to get up really close to a fantastic great blue heron, a wading bird which spears prey with its sharp bill and swallows them whole. There was a group of chestnut-fronted macaws flying past us high in the sky. While they were quite far away we could (with binoculars) make out their mostly green, slightly red and blue bodies. There is a distinctive chestnut brown patch near their beak which gives the birds their name.
After dinner our group decided to go out on a night walk. This was a whole different way of seeing the Amazon, as the huge spiders and other creepy crawlies come out at this time. The path we decided to walk on was called Palma Roja (Red Palm), and the buildings around the area used to be part of the scientific station of the University Catolica. Roberto told us a freaky story about the scientific station. He explained that a female University student had been working at the scientific station, observing the behavior of saki monkeys. She was up in the canopy, attached with a harness, watching the monkeys when they suddenly attacked her! The woman panicked and jumped, somehow scalping herself in the process, she was discovered by her University-student boyfriend on the jungle flood surrounded by blood, and she eventually recovered. Later on, at the same scientific station, there was a huge fire. Everyone escaped OK – including the woman who had previously been scalped at the station! Let’s just say, I wouldn’t go alone to this place. Especially not in the dark! It was a good thing we were in a group.
There were so many different (but very cool) looking spiders! This included tarantulas, tailless whip scorpions, and so many more I couldn’t even identify. My favorite, the tailless whip scorpion is actually not a scorpion or a spider at all. It is an amblypygi, which is a separate order from both scorpions and spiders, and while it does not bite, it does have ‘thorns’ on its body it uses if frightened. Our group spotted a headlight beetle, a large click beetle which glows through different spots on its body in order to lure its prey. These beetles are famous in jungles of the Americas, and have been used by indigenous people as lights at night in the jungle. Apparently, the beetles can even be mashed up into a paste and spread on the face and body in order to glow in the dark.
Once we got back to the lodge and had some breakfast we saw a bunch of movement in the trees. Suddenly we saw squirrel monkeys, loads of them. Overall, more than 100 squirrel monkeys ending up coming through the camp, swinging through the trees in the massive circle of trees around the lodge. Along with the monkeys, we heard some really noisy, really loud birds called chachalacas being ‘set off’ by the monkey. One group member named Holly and I headed around the back of the lodges after the monkeys came through, and she showed me a large yellow and black lizard called a tegu. The tegu is similar in size to a monitor lizard, and is apparently one of the most common reptiles in the pet industry. Its’ food of choice is the eggs of the spectacled caiman, the same type of caiman we saw with its baby on the other side of the island before.
During the day we decided to ask Roberto to give us some temporary tattoos with a fruit called huito. This fruit is said to have antibiotic and fungicidal properties, and has been used to treat bronchitis while in the form of tea. The fruit itself is extremely rich in tannin, and its juices, while clear in color initially, produce a dark blue dye when in contact with leather or human skin – and can be used to dye both. And it can be used to make temporary tattoos. My tattoo lasted for almost one month!
During this walk we heard the sounds of green-backed trogons (but we couldn’t quite find them) and tried eating some lemon-flavored ants – they tasted just like lemon candies! At one point we spotted a Rufus woodpecker, as well as a golden-green woodpecker. There was also a beautiful white-fronted nunbird we spotted. My favorite were the male golden-headed manakins we saw at their lek.
After our walk we headed in the boat for another look at the anaconda (it was still there, in the same spot) before going to the center of the lake for a swim. An afternoon swim had become our routine – and it was so fun and relaxing!
During the evening we went out on the boat for a caiman spotting trip. We did find a couple of small caiman on the river, plus loads of frogs (including a bull frog letting out some really cute noises) and huge bugs such as the Amazon cockroach back at the lodge. There was some kind of giant cricket that shocked us all as well by jumping out of the jungle and into the dinner room, flying around at everyone!
The morning of February the 23rd was really a day for monkeys! Around the lodge I saw yellow-handed titi monkeys again, plus later in the day we saw both squirrel monkeys and saki monkeys – and we heard the sounds of howler monkeys in the distance! Our luck was so good in part because that day we didn’t have the motor boat. Since the boat needed to go pick up some other passengers, we paddled down the river in a quiet and relaxing canoe. We were able to take the canoe to some of the more secluded parts of the reserve.
The nature of the canoe allowed us to see many more animals than usual, including a black fronted nunbird, , a redheaded woodpecker, a slate-collared hawk, a little cuckoo, red-capped cardinals, a male red-breasted black bird, and a black cara cara – we did catch a glimpse of a female green-backed trogon, but she was gone too fast. There were beautiful groups of birds flying together across the sky, including small green parakeets, cobalt-winged parakeets, and loads of blue-grey tanagers. Of coarse standing proud were some white heron and little blue heron around every corner. Sometimes we could hear tinamou calling (but never quite see them) and there always seemed to be black vultures present.
The squirrel and saki monkeys got incredibly close to us. Squirrel monkeys travel in troops of up to 500 members, and every time we’ve seen some there’s been a bunch of them. They are pretty small monkeys and thus need the protection they get from a group. We encountered curious, fluffy, grey equatorial saki monkeys as well, and these guys seemed really curious about our group. They came all the way down from the trees up high to sit over our boat, dangling on low branches staring at us. How cool! Roberto explained to us that due to a river dividing Yasuni National Amazon Park and Cuyabeno Amazon Reserve (monkeys do not swim across rivers) different species of monkey are found in each of the parks.
We were really lucky to see so many monkeys that day, as these animals, along with everything else in the jungle, are still hunted by the indigenous communities. In Ecuador, the indigenous people are allowed to kill and eat anything they want. Our guide Roberto works sometimes at the Huaorani Ecolodge. He told us a story about how he was presented a gift by the Huaorani people: a maito (meal wrapped in a banana leaf) containing the arm of a woolly monkey. He told us that the arm looked so much like a baby’s arm, and had such a bad aftertaste, that he couldn’t take more than one bite before passing the gift on to a Huaorani to finish.
Our group was returning to Lago Agrio the next morning, so we packed and brought our bags down to the boat. Before we left the lodge I slipped in to take some photos of a group of long-nosed bats we found sleeping in the back of the library. Sorry to wake you, bats! On the way out of Cuyabeno Reserve we saw even more new species! This included a blue crowned mot mot, a green ibis, and a striking black hawk eagle. The best part was when a group of capuchin monkeys tried to cross the river in front of us. We got a real show of ‘monkey see, monkey do’ when the Alpha male got territorial and bared his teeth at us to scare us, then the second in command younger monkey did the same right alongside him!
Once we arrived back at the shore we had a couple of minutes to check out the info center for the reserve, which was filled with skulls and skins from animals from the reserve which were killed by local hunters. We got one last animal surprise in the form of a two-toed sloth hanging near the info center for a snooze. Cute little fuzz ball! We got back into town were everyone jumped off at the airport for a plane or bus.
Except for me! I ended up spending the night at a comfortable (once I found the switch for the A/C) hotel in Lago Agrio before my flight the following morning back to Quito. Colin met me at the airport and we talked about my tour experience over a cheeseburger lunch. Later that day we decided to leave Ecuador a couple of days early for Columbia – off to a new country with not too much time to spare!
Francesca
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