Bolivia again! Amazonian Basin

Ok, again in Bolivia this time around to go for the Amazonian Basin adventure.
I got to La Paz on the 11th. of November and organized a tour to the amazonian basin: 2 days in San Miguel del Bala, where there is an ecolodge sustaining an aboriginal community. and 3 days in Chalalan ecolodge, in the middle of Madidi National Park, 4 hours by boat up on Tuichi River.
To get to any of these places first i´d fly to Rurrenabaque, a small town located by Beni River at the entrance of the Amazonian basin. This is a tropical area and it´s represented by 2 different ecosystems: the jungle and the "pampas" or wetlands.
And then I´d take a boat up the Beni river to San Miguel del Bala, a 20 minutes trip. And a 4 hs trip also by boat would take me to Chalalan ecolodge, up the Tuichi River.
The flight to Rurre went smoothly. The plain was a surprise, no more than 20 passengers would fit in there and we had to sqeeze to get to the seats. So 6:15 am I was flying out without a camera or an ipod (they got soaking wet with some bottle water literally poured into the backpack..no comments).
Once in Rurre the guide from the first tour was waiting in the airport and he took me to San Miguel del Bala. San Miguel del Bala is a small community located 3km away from the entrance to Madidi National Park. 32 families belonging to the Tacana aboriginal group live there. The Tacana Indians have historically lived along the shores of the Beni and Tuichi rivers and within the boundaries of the Madidi National Park. Madidi National Park and San Miguel are protected areas which means no one can hunt any animals or set up a fire in the jungle. And the community lives from handcrafs, agriculture, fishing (limited to 4 fishes per family per week) and the ecolodge revenues. They built and run the ecolodge themselves with the financial and technical help of local authorities and several NGOs. The manager of the lodge belongs to the Tacana community and their performance is reviewed each year. If they are not good enough they´d be replaced. All the people working on the lodge belong are Tacanos.
The place is amazingly quiet, just the sounds of nature could be heard from a lounge with great hammocks and protected with mosquito nets. To get to the cabins we had to "climb" 50 mts of uphill stairs. So I ended up sleeping quite isolated from everything and everyone and maybe the unwanted company of some tarantulas, snakes and all kind of insects. Thankfully each bed has a mosquito net, so this was a life saver :)).
On the first day we went to the Tacana community, 20 minutes away, and the guide took me thru their lifestyle and activities. Something that called my attention was the punishment system. It consists in hooking the offendant´s foot by the anckle into a hole in a wooden board. The board is located up a step outside the school. So the offendant would have his body hanging with the leg upside hooked in the board. Street fight: 6 hs of this. Each type of offences have an amount of hours of this punishment. As they know each other quite well they know who did what thus they seldom have to use this method, an average is 3 per year. they don´t have domestic violence, or robberies or any kind of violence. How cool is that!!!
The guide showed me plantations of corn, orange, avocado and so on. People built their own houses, they don´t use wood, they use the leaves from special trees so the roofs and walls would be strong and resist the water. Husband and wife participate in the making of the house.
During the raining season they all stay in San Miguel, they wouldn´t travel anywhere as the only way is by boat. The river level increases and it gets really dangerous. Anyway there are few things they´d buy from the town, Rurre: shampoo, soap, cooking oil. The rest of the goodies are handmade.
They don´t use the traditional medicine. They´ve got a whole collection of medicinal plants and trees. and there are people in the community that know perfectly what to apply and when. These medicinal plants grow in certain areas of the forest though and luck of knowledge can cause death in a matter of minutes. Nowadays they are trying to expand that knowledge in the community.
The school, with 3 teachers, is up to grade 8th. They don´t have high school. All the kids have to go to school and parents make sure they do.
That day I went back to the lodge. The food in this place is totally handmade. and it´s very yummy! i think this was the best food so far, hygiene and taste wise. I was delighted with the rice bread so I asked the cook for the recipe. And the cook was giving me instructions to smash the rice to make the flour! they make their own rice flour! Unbelievable! haha! i don´t think my rice bread is that good, but I’ll give it a go anyway :))
In the afternoon we went for a hike in the jungle and saw all different traps to kill animals. This is histric information as the families from the community have their own animals to eat, like chicken, duck and pig.
After dinner I heard there was a night hike in the jungle. And my guide didn´t want to do it. But luckily they don´t speak a language other than Spanish so he couldn´t pretend there wasn´t anything happening. So I joined the group of 2 English guys for the walk, which can take normally half an hour. But we spent more than an hour stopping everywhere and turning off the lights and in silence in search of an "armadillo" or monkey or anything. Lucky us we saw like half a dozen of tarantulas, giant caterpillars and that was it.
The cabins are located like 50 mts away from the kitchen and lounge. So I was there with the company of my soul and maybe other unwanted "friends". I loved the mosquito net! First night was ok, I could sleep without any trouble.
Second day was mind boggling! In the morning we went to a place called "el cañon" (the canyon), just 30 minutes by boat away from the lodge. It was very narrow and there was no way of holding on to anything as poisonous spiders were walking all around the walls full of moss. we walked steping on slippery rocks, trying to be careful with the spiders as they also swim! and sqeezing to avoid the vegetarian bats (this didn´t make any difference to me) flying towards me, and still awake at that time of the day!! mf!!
Lunch that day was awesome with different ways of cooking fish, delicious!
In the afternoon we went to a place called the swimming pool. again, close by boat. we walked 1 km to get there. and we had a refreshing time with cold water and feeling cold just for once in 2 days! on our way back the rocks were very sleepery so I stumbled and fell a couple of times with the result of a bruise in one knee and a bump in the other thigh.
That night all other groups of tourists left the lodge, so it was quite boring. Went back to my cabin after climbing the stairs and tried to sleep. a nice harvest fly got into my cabin and it made noise all night long with its wings against my mosquito net. Damn! That night at dinner time we say a couple of snakes, so the idea of these thin creatures entering my cabin didn´t leave my mind. Sleep unsuccessful!
Third morning the guys from chalalan were supposed to pick me up by boat and take me to the next ecolodge. I´ve waited for 4 hs and no signal from these mf!! So i decided to go back to Rurre and furiously talked to the guy in charge in the Chalalan agency. Result: I´m going to spend a night in Rurre as there aren´t any boats departing from Rurre today.
But also (bad luck keeps on going, f f s!!!) I was supposed to go back from rurre to la paz on the 17th (Tuesday) but they are expecting a change of weather from the south along with a lot of rain. When it rains in rurre as a safety measure the flights are suspended as there is a dirt track and it could get very slippery.
This means also I have to move my bus to Cusco on the 18th to who knows when. Nice.
The chalalan guy attempted to send me to a shitty hotel, which i knew since i read my lonely planet completely. so he changed the hotel for a better one. Of course the chalalan guys will pay the bill for everything tonight. Lucky them i don´t drink, but now that I consider it, I could do with a mojito..
To be continued...