Our second week in our immersion Spanish course journey involved a quick plane trip over the andes from Quito to El Coca (AKA Puerto Francisco de Orellana), a town on the upper reaches of The Rio Napo. The Rio Napo is a major tributary to the Amazon. We continued down river 3+ hours by fast boat to the Yaturi Eco Lodge (if you can get there through the fallen trees!) deep in the Amazon basin. Here we discovered a food we really like: Yucca root.
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- Quito.
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- Out the window.
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- Flying back to Quito.
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- Hard to tell, but there’s a tarantula on my shoulder.
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- Tarantula.
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- Fishing for Piranhas. We didn’t catch any.
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- Platanos.
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- Cacao.
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- Yucca. The roots are quite tasty.
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- House in the jungle on the Rio Napo.
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- On safari.
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- Iguana on a stick.
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- Gives blue berries a whole new meaning.
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- Ta Da!
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- Weaving…
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- Weaving a backpack.
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- Anyone want a backpack?
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- Kilroy was here.
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- Here’s why.
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- Artist’s Conk – a shelf fungus that grows on trees.
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- Angela’s getting horny.
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- Wonder why they call this a torture tree?
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- Hoatzin, AKA Stinkbird.
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- Ronda in the jungle.
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- Saira, one of our instructors, demonstrates annato.
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- Achiote, the source of the natural pigment annatto.
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- Study that Spanish!
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- Wooden walkway.
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- Napping on the Napo.
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- Bed.
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- Our humble accommodations.
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- Docking at the lodge.
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- Tow.
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- Tow it out of the way.
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- Need more power!
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- Hack, hack, hack…
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- Unfortunately, that tributary is plagued with log jams.
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- Our Lodge was on a tributary to the Napo.
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- Boating.
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- Storm clouds.
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- Clouds on the Rio Napo.
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- Speeding down the Rio Napo.
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- El Coca dock on the Rio Napo.
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- Nice little plane for a hop over the Andes.
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