Mossies vs Mossies

I never thought I would dedicate a blog entry to mosquitoes. That was not until when I became under siege during my Choquequirao trek. I was dreading my trip to the Amazon jungle after, knowing that the welcome would be warmer, given the presence rivers and rainforest. Then I thought that since there are people like Natalie (a Dutch whom I met on a plane to Arusha) who research on Malaria, there would be people who love to read about mosquitoes.

I started getting bites on my feet from this point

To be fair I think both mosquitoes and flies bit me in the Andean mountains. What intrigued me was how they have survived the cold and altitude (they were no mosquitoes and flies in Kilimanjaro). They were very active for most part of the day and they were onto my feet the moment I changed into my slippers (no no! I don't think it was the smell).

The Andean bites gave me red nodules with a fang red mark. 

I had about 150 bites in the Andean mountains (50 on each of my arm and 50 on both feet). It has been more than one month since the Choquequirao trip, I now have scabs and the marks are getting dark and it still itches at times.

The Amazon mosquitoes pushed the total tally to 500. No, I was not exaggerating. The mosquitoes in the Amazon were very aggressive. They even bit through my clothes.  I had 9 bites on my left middle finger alone (and it was only because I poked my hands out of my long sleeve shirt to hold my camera in order to take a photograph). So if you were to extrapolate the number of bites, I easily had 500 of them. 

The Amazon mosquito bites were pink bumps which could be easily differentiated from the bite marks of the Andean ones. Most of the Amazon bumps are gone by now.

Fortunately, the Amazon mosquitoes left my face alone most of the time. When I sensed too many mosquitoes, however, I did not take the chance and covered neck and half of my face up too:

Nobody laughed at me when I did this

That was when I wished I had one of those sun caps/ hats with flap at the back - that way, I could avoid having bites on my ears and neck. Seriously, it was very very irritating when the mossies kept buzzing near my ears.

Conclusion from the trips: Mossies love tourists. I am their Chinese take-away.

Prevention

Initially I used the BioZ Natural insect repellant stick. No deet. Either it did not work well or I had not applied enough. In the jungle, everyone took pity of me. Keith sprayed his Boots Repel Tropical Strength 50% deet on me. Jhonatan sprayed his Sawyer's 100% deet on my hands and I wiped them on my clothes. Christian sprayed his Deep Woods Insect Repellant 25% deet and it kept away mosquitoes for 3 hours. 

On the last day of the trip, Miki then taught me to apply lower percentage deet repellant on the body and spray 100% deet insect repellant on the clothes. I will try that next time.

I would also get a spray instead of a stick so that the insect repellant can be applied on the clothes easily.

If I have a specific trip to the jungle next time, I may also try out one of those mosquito repellant clothes and wear lighter coloured clothes instead of heat absorbent dark coloured ones. 

Aftercare

I alternated the use of Elomet mometasone furoate cream (prescribed by the doctor for my sandfly bites previously) and tea tree oil. Both are not anti-itch but are used to treat the bites. They dry up the skin so I had to alternate the usage.

In the jungle, Christian let me try the iodine tree bark. Keith passed me his Caladryl Clear (a spray which contains pramoxine HCI and zinc acetate) which smells like calamine lotion. Miki gave me her AfterBite Itch Eraser (an applicator which contains ammonia and natural oil). 

All worked although the best solution came from Nelly, who recommended using lemon on the bites. They did not have lemon in the kitchen and Jhonatan got me a lime instead. It stung but the relief was instantaneous and I did not even have to wake up during the night to apply additional anti-itch solutions.

Amazing Amazon : Tips and considerations

Exploring

Where to go 

When I was doing research on which part of the Peruvian Amazon to visit, I came across 2 websites which I found useful: 

Article: http://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/wild-things

Forum: http://www.fodors.com/community/south-america/rainforest-in-peru-iquitos-puerto-maldonado----whats-the-diff.cfm

The websites had some descriptions of the activities available and some names which I could do my research on. 

From there, I wrote to 3 operators, 1 in each of Manu, Puerto Maldonado and Iquitos. Initially I was more inclined towards Manu and Puerto Maldonado because they are near to Cuzco, where I was. In the end, I chose Iquitos because of the timing, cost and positive reviews. 

I am glad I made that choice and would highly recommend my guides Christian and Jhonatan to anyone. 

How to get there 

When making reservations, do ask your lodge/ operator if they have corporate discounts with airlines. Mine does (although I did not use the discount because I was only made aware of it after I have booked my airticket). 

Due to the relative inaccessibility of the jungle lodges, companies normally include free airport pickups and drop-offs and all transports (cars and boats) to the lodges. Do ensure these are included in the price.

What to do 

Hammock room

At the lodges where I visited, all of the activities were free (except if we chose to go to a village to shop or drink). There were a lot of activities to choose from (canoeing, hiking, boating, visit native villages, have a session with a native shaman, canopy exploration on ziplines, swimming, fishing) and of various time length (anything from 1 hour walk to 2 days camping). One can go all out and pack everyday with a lot of activities or simply chill out in a hammock at the lodge. 

The schedule board shows where everyone is going
so that everyone is accounted for at the end of the day

If you have special interests in certain wildlife, let your guide know so that they zoom in on those areas. 

Boating are good alternatives if your legs are tired but it does limit what you see (as in, you will only see the wildlife that like/ are by the waterbank). When boating at night, bring your torch. Flash your torchlight around and look out for red spots – they are the eyes of the wildlife (think birds, caiman, frogs etc).

Spotting the gladiator treefrogs in the darkness

What to bring

The usual. A poncho because it can rain any time. Plus your super duper camera lens, super duper binoculars, super duper sun screen and super duper insect repellant. 

Clothes 

My face and neck were sensitive to insect repellant (slight burning sensation when applied from hand). I used a towel to wrap around my neck to absorb my perspiration and protect against the sun and mosquitoes. I thought it would have been great to have one of those sun hats or caps with flaps at the back that covers the neck. 

Avoid wearing dark clothes because dark colours absorb heat and mosquitoes sense heat. If you have one of those mosquito repellant clothes, wear them. If not, spray deet on clothes.

When I was trekking in the jungle one day in a dusty pink top, I was wondering why safari companies ask their customers to wear safari garb when it is not necessary while nobody told me to wear camouflages in the jungle. I think safari garb or greenish/ brownish-toned clothes are good in the jungle because they offer camouflage against the wildlife. No?

Mosquitos

The mosquitoes in the jungle were aggressive. It may not be viable to use 100% deet everyday. Miki taught me to spray 45% deet on the body and 100% deet on the clothes. Apply and reapply regularly. Anti-itch solution and calamine are useful to prevent scratching after been bitten.

Amazing Amazon : Best and worst

Most frequently used words

They were probably "Where?", "Huh?", "What are we looking at?". Most of the time, whatever our guides have found are so camouflaged that we have no idea what they have spotted. Bless Christian and Jhonatan. They must have had a hard time with us.

Gentlest

Dorilla, the woolly monkey. Dorilla was a baby when she was found by staff from our lodge in a market. She and her mother were captured but unfortunately her mother died. Staff from the lodge purchased and later released her to the wild. 

Dorilla has yet to be accepted by other woolly monkey families and currently lives on her own. Staff from the lodge will visit her from time to time. Our guides called out to Dorilla and she jumped into our boat. Her eyes and coat were both soft and shiny. I could feel the strength of Dorilla's limbs when she hung on my arm to reach out for an orange. Yet, she was so gentle when she took the orange from me. I so much wanted to give her a cuddle and bring her home.

Photo credit: Christian

Biggest surprise

When Dorilla urinated on me. Christian captured the priceless moment when she peed and my reaction immediately after:

Most adorable

The sloth moving in slow motion when we first found it. Christian whistled to it and after a while, it lifted its head and right hand in slooooooow motion and then opened its eyes even more sluggishly, as if going "Huh, what is happening?". It reminds me of ET and Yoda.

Photo credit: Christian

Photo credit: Christian

Best find
Definitely Christian for finding the sloth!

Most fascinating

The creatures we saw were fascinating BUT I think Jhonatan beat all of them, hands down. Jhonatan would run for anything that moved and was often on all fours, looking for something that caught his eyes. When a snake slid away from us, he would run for it. Keith laughed at how he would have run in the opposite direction. 

Jhonatan rummaging for something on the forest ground again

Most claustrophobic

In a tree trunk. Keith did not have his rabies shots and I could not let the very enthusiastic Jhonatan down. We duckwalked into a tree trunk, home to common myotis bats:

Can you see the bats?

It was fine except that when the bats flew away from us, the echo produced by the flapping of the wings felt like the sound of propellers turning right next to my ears. It did not help that there was a tailess whip scorpion spider and army ants in the picture.

Photo credit: Jhonatan

Tailess whip scorpion spider which Jhonatan kept wanting to catch
while I kept saying nonononono

Bat baring its fangs

Best catch

Everyone, except me, fished very well and kept getting big trouts and barracudas on the line. Someone even caught an electric eel (which has since become the coolest eel in the lake as it has been released with a fishing hook piercing - well nobody wanted to touch the electric eel and could only cut the fish line) but I did not see that catch so it does not count.

So, the winner of the best catch goes to Manuel who speared an armoured catfish at night.

Armoured catfish

Thick sucker-like mouth

We were camping and had barbecued fish for breakfast.

Our catch from the previous night
From top: barracuda, armoured catfish, trout 

I had to ask Christian how to eat the fish. Its skin was really a shell and we had to break the fish into pieces and dig the meat out.

Scariest

I cannot decide on the winner. The front runners for the scariest things I did in the jungle would be:

1. going on the canopy zipline 45m above ground

2. going on a swing

3. swimming in the river (with piranhas and Pepe the dangerous caiman lurking in the background)

Christian threw me an empty container for just in case
(just in case I need a weapon to hit Pepe?)

Loudest scream

The loudest scream would have come from me on the swing (Keith said he heard me from his room). "A swing?" I hear you say. Well, to my defence, it was not an ordinary swing. It was a swing hanging from a tree some 30m from the ground. When I first saw it, I thought whoever swing hard enough could probably do a Tarzan and dive into the river from height too. I saw Matthäus and Britta having so much fun on the swing, I thought I should give it a go too.

Matthäus giving a demo and Britta looking tiny on the swing

Matthäus said whomever heard me would probably thought I did a bungy jump. Everyone who saw me had a good laugh. I think the video is funny too (embarrassing but funny).

Video: Swinging

Most elusive

I knew beforehand that I would have next to no chance to see a jaguar so it was not too disappointing not to see one.

Scratch mark of a jaguar

The bald red-faced Uakari monkey was another matter. We trekked for almost 10 hours but did not see one. It was really disappointing since Rose had seen them in groups of 30 - 100. This is how it looks like:

Source: www.perujungle.com

Bravest

Rose, who is planning to stay at the river for 18 months (or however long it requires) to do her research on the red-faced monkey. She will be away from her family in the USA, cannot take Malaria pills, cannot apply insect repellant, will not have telephone reception and hot shower, have to trek for hours to find her monkeys (if she finds them at all)... Much as I love my stay in the jungle, I do not think I can live here for this long. And she has already lost weight! My hats off to you, Rose and Good Luck!

Rose

Sweetest

The cakes. We had cakes on special occasions (such as Lanie and Chris's wedding anniversary) and farewell dinners. Keith, John, Miki, Anne Marie and I were leaving the next day. I protested that Matthäus and Britta had "Come back soon" on their cake and Christian had to add the words to ours too. ;p

Last night at the lodge
Rose, Keith, Jhonatan, Nataly, Christian, John, Miki, Anne Marie

Amazing Amazon : Wildlife

As we walked in the jungle or cruised by the river, Christian and Jhonatan would whistle or make animal calls, as if reassuring the wildlife that we were friendly parties. Mostly the targets would stop in the track, return their calls and observe us from a distance before continuing their way. It gained us precious moments while I whispered "where?" and searched for the wildlife. 

Flora

45m above ground and more to climb

The best "models" as they "obediently" remain on a spot for me to take photographs. The Amazon forest has such an huge collection of flora which are, sadly, often neglected by tourists. 
Look at these interesting finds:

The huge leaf that is bigger than my foot

The iodine tree bark produces sap which can be
applied to mosquito bites for relief

One can knock on the roots of the Ficus (Telephone) tree
to ask for help. It produces sound that travel as far as 1 km.

A lobster grasshopper on the trunk of
a porcupine palm 

The roots of the stranguler fig tree
are taller than a human

Primates

In the safaris in Africa, nobody would be too concerned with the monkeys as the predators are more interesting. In the Amazon jungle however, I found myself wanting to see the monkeys. Afterall, the one I was visiting is thought to boast the highest number of primate species in an unprotected reserve.

I saw the pigmy marmoset, owl monkey, tamarin, capuchin (thought to be the most intelligent of all monkeys), squirrel monkey, spider monkey and even the Saki monkey (which was thought to be a newly discovered species). Most of my photographs of the monkeys were not good - they were either moving too fast and/or on the canopy. In any case, my old point and shoot camera could only do so much with distance, movement and low light so I really did not bother to take a lot of photographs. 

Christian pausing to observe and listen

When we go trekking, Christian would pause to listen for the monkeys' movements on the canopy, called out to them and tracked them down. We were supposed to follow him quietly but quickly. Given the way we clumsily stepped on and broke branches, rustled the dead leaves, tripped over new shoots, vaulted over fallen trunks and ducked overhanging roots, it really did not help the "sneak up on the monkeys" cause (seriously?). The monkeys would have heard us from miles away.

Limbo rock in the jungle

The Pygmy Marmoset is the smallest monkey in world, with a body length of only 5 inches. They live in very small groups and near our lodge too. The breeding female gives birth to twins twice a year .   

Pigmy marmoset

The squirrel monkey, however, lives in very large groups of 100 - 500. They were like acrobats and I enjoyed watching them jump from tree to tree and from great height too.

Squirrel monkey

Reptilias

We saw a number of snakes slid away from us. The coolest would have the Amazon scarlet snake, which swam across the river, slithered up the muddy bank and disappeared into the jungle. The snake lives near water and preys on lizards and small rodents.

Amazon scarlet snake

Christian spotted this olive whipsnake, probably an adult, on our first trek. The olive whipsnake is semi-arboreal and is terrestrially active during the day, sleeping in a loose coil on thin branches at night.

Olive whipsnake

The caimans we saw were submerged in water. Even Pepe, the resident black caiman at our lodge, was camera shy. Adult black caimans are 8 - 10 feet long, making them the longest Amazonian crocodilians. They are aggressively defensive and should be considered potentially dangerous. I found out the males are really loud during my camping trip. Christian had called out to them (it sounded like a sea lion) and they answered in loud and deep-toned bellows (indicating adult males). It was too bad they were too lazy to charge at us that day and we had no boats to track them down.

Pepe the black caiman

The spectacled caiman has a curved bony ridge that crosses the snout to the eyes (hence its name). The adults are 5 - 7 feet long. This species of caiman turns darker during the day, when cold or frightened.

Spectacled caiman in swamp

Amphibias

The frogs and toads I saw were mostly tiny, not much bigger than my fingernails. The Amazonian poison frog is a celebrity in the area, with tourists making special trips to find them. The poison is on its skin and the brilliant colours serve as warning to potential predators.  I was initially worried about the poison but was reassured that these ones do not have strong enough to harm me. However, I was not allowed to touch it, in case I transfer the insect repellant on my fingers to its skin. 

Amazonian poison frog

Eyelashed forest toad

Tan-legged rain frog

This treefrog has a 'clown' phase and a 'giraffe' phase, when its skin has spots similar to giraffes'. During reproduction, 300 - 600 eggs are laid on overwater vegetation and the tadpoles drop into the water when hatched.

Clown treefrog

Aves

The Amazon is home to one third of all bird species in the world and also serves as sanctuary to migratory birds. I saw a woodpecker, woodcreepers, antbirds, the resident yellow rumped caciques (which live on trees in the compound of our lodge), wattled jacanas and black-collared hawks, just to name a few.

This is the osprey I spotted from a distance (I am so proud of myself!). The osprey is a migrant, often seen singly and have no breeding records for Peru. They prey only on fish.

The osprey that I spotted

The hoatzin are normally perched low over still or slow-moving water. The most amazing thing about this bird is that it has links to some fossils from 5 - 23 million years ago (Miocene period). It looks like a pheasant but is linked to the cuckoos.

Hoatzin
Photo credit: Christian

Turkey vulture in flight

I spy blue-and-yellow macaws

Blue-and-yellow macaw

Found during one of our night boating trips
Ringed kingfisher sleeping on a skinny branch above the river
Isn't it worried it would nod off and fall into the water?

Others

We did not "only" see birds and monkeys. On my camping trip, Christian, Manuel and I had been trekking for 2 hours to look for caimans when Christian spotted a three-toed sloth behind a tree next to our trek. Before this, I only knew Sid the Sloth from Ice Age (he is nothing like this beautiful babe) and the 'closest' real thing was seen from a boat - a male with an orange belly on a 40m high tree top in a distance. We were really lucky. Apparently, sloths eat, sleep, give birth and die holding on to branches on tree tops. They only come to the ground once a week to urinate and defecate, digging a hole and covering it after. I hope we have not interrupted her toilet break!

Three-toed sloth

Video: The fast sloth

Sources: 

My guides, Christian and Jhonatan

Reptiles and amphibians of the Amazon by R.D. Bartlett and Patricia Bartlett

Birds of Peru by Thomas S. Schulenberg, Douglas F. Stotz, Daniel F. Lane, John P. O'Neill and Theodore A. Parker III