Working in the Cloud Forest

As I said before, the internet situation is not great. But I'm learning to manage! Turns out it's not worth it at all to do the 4-hour round-trip bus into town for an internet cafe - that internet is just as bad as ours, but they're charging you money to sit and wait as opposed to playing cards with people. Instead I'm taking advantage of my late nights doing metabolic experiments on birds to use the internet while everyone else is sleeping. It's much faster at 2am! And by "much faster", I mean I can usually load my email, I can use Facebook messenger pretty reliably, and I can upload 5 pictures to Facebook in only four hours! Hooray!

So I guess the work is a good place to start. There are three main jobs here - nest searching, mist-netting, and metabolic experiments. The mist-netting crew is meant to have lots of experience already, and our station has two very skilled mist-netters (Ian and Felicity). Currently they are out mist-netting in some other region for 20 days, so they'll be back in a week or so. Nest searching is exactly what it sounds like - you search for nests. No experience necessary, so anyone can do this. It's one of the main things that I did in Texas this past summer, but this seems more difficult here because I'm not looking for nests of a particular species, I'm looking for ANY nest. Yes, it means that any nest I find counts, but it also means that I get distracted by any species that happens to be in the area. I could just find this particularly difficult at the moment because nesting season hasn't quite begun yet, so we spend six hours nest searching every morning and most of us don't find anything. Gets a bit off-putting even after only a couple weeks. The last job is metabolics, which is actually a combination of the three jobs. Every afternoon we have to catch birds in the mist nets to use for metabolic experiments during the night, so the metabolics people have to run their own nets to catch those birds. Then one person stays up each night to run the experiments, which consists of sticking the birds (up to three) in a mini fridge and changing the temperature from 10 degrees C to 20 to 30 to 34 and recording changes in oxygen consumption, mass, and temperature. Unfortunately the data collection process is really slow (the software can only record oxygen consumption for one bird at a time), so each different temperature takes up to nearly two hours. And that doesn't include the time required to increase the temperature of the fridge, the time to take the birds out and record mass and temperature, or the time to turn everything off in the middle of the night to fill the generator up with gas again. The first night that I did metabolics we ended at 4:15am, and that was even with cutting the last hour of data collection. Tonight seems a lot better - it's looking like I'll be wrapping up around 3am with all of the data.

If it wasn't obvious, I'm on the metabolics team. I jumped at that opportunity because you get to do a little of everything! I'm learning to run a mist net, band and measure all kinds of birds, run metabolic experiments, and I get more reliable internet! What's not to love? There are three of us doing metabolics - Meaghan (American), Juliana (Colombian), and myself. We do all of our tasks on a rotation basis - tonight I'm up doing metabolics and I'll sleep in in the morning while the other two (and everyone else, really) is out nest searching. Everyone comes back for lunch, and then I'll go to open the mist nets with Meaghan, and Juliana can either come with us or nest search, but the idea is that she's back at 4pm to start getting things set up for metabolics (starting the generator, cooling the fridge, etc). Either Meaghan or I will get the birds back to the lab by 5 so Juliana can start metabolics, while the other closes the nets. Then it cycles through again. Right now it's slightly different from what I just explained because Juliana and I need more practice with getting birds out of the net. Fortunately we have Jack (Brit), who also has a lot of mist-netting experience and is helping us with the afternoon netting. Our station is unique in that our two mist-netters want to do some nest searching (typically they would only be netting all day), but Jack is eager to mist-net, so he's going to be rotating out with them (when they're back). Great for everyone! Camilo (Colombian) and Cynthia (Peruvian) are both nest searching, and Julian (Canadian) just showed up yesterday, so we don't yet know what he'll be doing in the long run. Oh, also - the afternoons are generally also when people set up nest cameras and sensors (if they found a nest in the morning) or for weighing and measuring nestlings.

The nice thing about staying up late every now and then in exchange for sleeping in is that you get some free time during the day to do laundry, take a shower, or just do whatever. And let's be honest, my first choice is usually not to shower (I think I mentioned this in my last post, but it's bad enough to mention again). In Tambopata (where I was last year) we had cold showers. That was fine because it was really warm and humid and a cold shower felt great. We were told ahead of time that we'd have cold showers here, but what they actually meant was that we'd have ice water showers, which are extraordinarily unwelcome when it's about 15 degrees C outside with no sun and a whole bunch of cold air and mist blowing in. As a result we've taken to showering every 3-4 days, or when the sun is out. It's been a long time since the sun has been out, so I braved a shower on one of my mornings when it was down to 10 degrees - absolutely miserable. Couldn't even bear to stick my head in the water, so it was just a body wash. The good thing is that the cold forces us to wear layers, so I like to think that by layering up I'm keeping the smell contained. I didn't say that it's true, but it's what I like to think. Amazing that none of us really realized that our station would be the coldest of the three - I surely thought it would be the highest station because, you know, that altitude, but apparently they have hot, sunny days because they're ABOVE the clouds, whereas we're forever trapped below them. Dang! Jack and I have our week off together and are planning on buying all kinds of warm clothes in Cusco. Also accommodations with beds, a hot shower, and fast internet. Plus we're getting pizza, bacon guacamole cheeseburgers, meat, cheese, peanut butter, and beer. And probably lots of other crap. I'm so excited!

Time to wrap up tonight's metabolic stuff - will try posting a picture sometime soon (no promises)!

Internet and My First Week

So it turns out that our internet situation is way worse than I anticipated. We technically have internet at our camp, but it takes at least 20 minutes just to load gmail, and that´s if it decides to load at all. Our other option is an internet cafe in town, which is two hours away by bus. It sounds like we go into town on Fridays to get more fruits and vegetables, so that´s the only day that I´ll have any kind of reliable internet. I use ¨reliable¨ very loosely, because it´s horribly slow, depends on the availability of computers, and the computers may or may not work once you´re on them.

Other than that, so far it´s going well - we´ve started practicing each of the different jobs (nest searching, mist netting / banding, metabolic rate measurements) and I´m using Spanish again! We cook meals on a rotation - breakfast is on your own, but then we each take a day to cook lunch and dinner for everyone else. The meals have been surprisingly delicious! But without meat or dairy, I can see them getting a little repetitive in the coming months. There are two other fluent English speakers here - Meaghan is from New York and Jack is from England. That´s two accents to make fun of! We all get along really well and so far it´s been great hanging out with them. It´s way colder than I anticipated (been freezing my butt off every night), so I bought two blankets in town earlier today. Unfortunately we have cold water showers (more like ice water), but since it´s so cold and we don´t sweat very much, we tend to go a few days before braving the showers. I also wear so many layers that it kind of keeps the smell trapped... or so I hope. We did just found out that the tourists across the road have hot water, so we may be sneaking over to their showers when we can. If that doesn´t work, at least I have a travel sized bottle of Febreeze...

I´ve taken a ton of great pictures of birds, monkeys (stealing food from the tourist kitchen), a snake, and a coati. Don´t know if I´ll be able to upload any of them before I´m in Cusco again (with REAL internet), but the computer that I´m on now doesn´t have working USB ports, so I guess I´ll have to try next week. Oh, but we get a week off in either the first or second week of September, and we´ll have to go back to Cusco no matter where we decide to go after that, so I´ll definitely have better internet then. Now I need to figure out where to go for my time off! It sounds like Meaghan is interesting in going to Colca Canyon (TONS of condors there) with me the few days after we finish in December, so it might be nice to just hang out in Cusco with nice amenities and what not for that week (you know, since I´m sleeping in a tent on a hard wooden platform for four months without much variety in food). I´m thinking a nice hotel with a comfy bed and lots of meat and cheese. And pizza. And beer.

Well I don´t know how long it will take to upload this post, and I only have 40 minutes left on my internet, so I should probably wrap this up :-P My plan for communication is to draft emails at camp without internet and send them out when it´s working well enough there, but if not I´ll just send them out on Fridays. Same with blog updates. By the way, it´s really hard to know which email client will be easier to use on a given day, so if you want to communicate, just send email to both of my addresses (stephl301@comcast.net and stephanie.a.levins@gmail.com). Hoping to go into more detail in my next post, but today I´m just sitting here rambling in the internet "cafe". Ciao!

My Last Month in the Jungle (from 2012)

Yeah yeah yeah… I said I’d have this last post up six months ago, but I got distracted by things like cars, TV, milk, and Texas. Anyways, here are some random awesome things from my last month in the jungle!

One morning I was at the colpa by myself and I heard a puma attack a peccary! I had just watched a herd of peccaries wander into the trees next to the clay lick. Then all of a sudden I heard this incredibly loud cat-like … growl, followed by what sounded like a peccary grunting and then squealing/screaming. Immediately after that there was a loud thundering as (I assume) the rest of the herd ran off, and ALL of the birds flushed from the trees at once. Then it was silent. I sat there with my jaw hanging open trying to comprehend what I just heard, and then I became uncomfortably aware that my radio had died earlier that morning and I was only about 75 meters away from where that commotion took place. I imitated the cat sound for one of the guides back at the lodge and he played a couple of sound bites for me to choose from, and he said I definitely heard a puma!

I’ve been away from home on Thanksgiving before, but this was my first time away from family on Christmas. I helped Gaudy (lodge masseuse who also welcomes new tourists, works at the “gift shop”, and sometimes helps at the bar) decorate the lodge the week before. Back at home we always drive up to the mountains and chop down our own Christmas tree, so considering that I was living in the jungle I was TOTALLY going to just walk 30 seconds from the lodge and chop down a tree with a machete. Unfortunately they had a fake tree in storage that they use every year, but fortunately there were *only* a dozen cockroaches that scurried out of the box when I opened it. After that I was very careful to make sure that I was picking up an ornament and not some ridiculously-oversized insect. Instead of taking a full day off for Christmas, we worked the morning of Christmas Eve and the afternoon of Christmas (it really wasn’t that bad – when you’re in the middle of the jungle and sweating in only shorts and a sports bra, it doesn’t exactly feel like Christmas anyways). Gustavo started the Christmas celebration by blasting Christmas songs in Spanish over the radio just as our morning shifts were ending. There was a big feast for lunch that was served to everyone in the tourist living room (Christmas Eve is the big day in South America – Christmas Day is just the afterthought). Katharine and I weren’t hungry so we stay in the loft chatting for a few hours (of course we’re not hungry when there is a feast…), but that afternoon we made brownies and cookies, and then joined the other researchers in the loft for some games and pisco. There was a party in the bar that night, but I was fading fast and didn’t stay up for very much of it (especially after finding out that our Secret Santa gift exchange was postponed until the next day).

Christmas morning I woke up to a crocheted bird on my floor from Santa (a.k.a. Katharine)!! We chatted for a few hours (one of the guides said we were mealy parrots because we never stopped talking; the next day he changed it to yellow-crowned parrots because they are more chatty than mealy parrots) and just hung out in the loft all morning. My Secret Santa (Maximo – staff member who cleans the lodge and helps transport things to and from the port) gave me a little figurine of a girl made of beads! Gustavo’s Christmas present to me was letting me climb a tree that I hadn’t climbed before! (What a sneaky way to make me look forward to working on Christmas.) Breakfast was leftover dinner, and lunch was leftover breakfast (which by that time was only rice), so Katharine and I stole fruit from the tourist basket. Fortunately it was my turn to eat dinner with the tourists, so I got soup, salad, lasagna, and juice!

Speaking of food, the quality and amount of food seemed to come in waves. For instance, a few days after Christmas I was passing by the dining tourists on my way to the staff dining room when one of the guides offered me his plate of fancy tourist food because he wasn’t hungry (to be fair, they get soup and salad before the main course). The other guide immediately offered up his plate as well, and then one of the tourists told me to take her son’s plate, too, because he wasn’t going to eat it! Somehow I hadn’t even gotten to the kitchen, but I already had 3 plates of delicious food. I kept a plate for myself, and I think I gave a plate each to Katharine and Yessenia. That’s not something you just leave out for anyone to take – food is precious in the jungle and everyone hoards it, so when you have extra you hoard it for the people who will hoard for you later.

I hoarded food in good times and bad, and it was always nice having Katharine as my fellow hoarder. When she got back from the early morning work shift before me, she always made sure to grab me a couple bread rolls, and when there was only one left, she gave me half. On one of our last nights in the jungle I walked into the kitchen before she did and saw that they had our favorite soup, but not very much of it. I filled up one bowl and went back to get a second, but in the 20 seconds that I was gone nearly all the rest had been taken, so I poured half of mine into her bowl. I sat there guarding two bowls of soup until Katharine walked in, and she was ecstatic. One of the newest researchers saw me giving her soup and asked why he didn’t get any. We explained that one week into his stay was too early to have food saved for him, and that he should find a best jungle friend to co-hoard with.

Another food story: one morning there was no real breakfast food for Katharine and me to eat, so we spent 45 minutes waiting around for the tourists to finish eating so we could nab their leftovers. Meanwhile everyone else was eating the meat and rice provided for the staff. As soon as we saw them wheeling the leftovers into the kitchen, we hopped up to get first dibs. As we were patiently waiting for the kitchen staff to unload the dishes from the cart, one of the other (usually very nice) staff members ran in front of us and grabbed the only two bread rolls in the basket, saying they were for her and someone else (both of whom had eaten full breakfasts by that point). Katharine and I both turned and called back at her, but she just kept walking. That was one of the more infuriating situations involving food. If you see/have some good food, don’t let it go.

Other notable things during my last month:

·         I lost so much weight that my pants no longer stayed on by themselves. Every time I took my climbing harness off, my pants came off, too. Sharman, a visiting veterinarian from Texas A&M, saw my pants situation and insisted that I take two pairs of her pants and one of her belts. She even told me to keep them after she left because I clearly needed them more than she did!

·         In a typical Peruvian fashion, Carlitos wanted to impress a white girl that he was working with one afternoon by bushwhacking his own path on one of the islands. I was waiting with a couple guys on the other island for him to make his way to the beach so we could pick them up with the boat. After several radio exchanges in Spanish and a whole lot of laughing from the guys on my end, I found out that Carlitos had gotten lost and that the guys with me were going to have to go out with their machetes and find them.

·         I climbed Franz, the nest with the mother who sits inside and attacks when you open the door. I got the chick out just fine (smothered the mother with a towel), but when I went to put it back I realized my arm was on the wrong side of my climbing rope, so I couldn’t reach far enough to place the chick in the nest. The chick was squirming a lot, and I didn’t want to have it squirm out of my grip while moving to the right side of the rope, so my only other option was to pass it to my other hand (the one on the mother). I knew she’d attack me, but it didn’t make it any more pleasant. She chomped down on the back of my hand (the one I had been smothering her with, which now was holding her chick) – broke the skin through TWO pairs of gloves!

·         I finally climbed Tizard, which is our tallest tree at 37m! The view was incredible (and the climb was ridiculous). Unfortunately I could see a storm rolling in, so I couldn’t stay up there long.

·         My last time doing phenology with Gustavo was just after a storm, so the island we were going to had flooded. The boat dropped us off on the shore, but we had to cross a low, narrow section (the part that flooded) to get to the main island. That meant wading waist-deep in croc-infested waters. Gustavo warned me about this, and I think he was expecting me to be miserable, but I had so much fun that I was actually giggling. Gustavo was amused, and we had a really good time! It was my favorite phenology outing by far.

·         My last morning at the colpa was one of my best times at the colpa. There were few clouds and it was sunny and beautiful. Normally we see/hear only a handful of species, and if we see many different species it seems to be at different times. However, that morning I saw a BUNCH of species, and many of them at the same time! I saw scarlet macaws, blue-and-yellow macaws, chestnut-fronted macaws, mealy parrots, orange-cheeked parrots, blue-headed parrots, common piping-guans, razor-billed curassows, and I heard cobalt-winged parakeets and dusky-headed parakeets. Of course, no camera, but it was an amazing sendoff from the jungle!

·         Katharine and I traveled back to Puerto together and stayed at the Tarantula Hostel (WAY better than the one I stayed at before heading into the jungle). We got a very large room, there were screens in the windows so we didn’t need mosquito nets, there was a delicious (and different) breakfast every day, the people there were incredibly nice, and they had a scarlet macaw and red-and-green macaw that hung out on the porch. The downside was that it was a 10-minute drive into the main square, but it was easy enough to hail a mototaxi (guy riding a motorbike) or motocab (guy riding a motorbike with a metal shell covering a bench in the back for multiple riders). Being on the outskirts also meant that we had saddleback tamarins and squirrel monkeys come hang out in the trees by our window, and there were dusky-headed parakeets and cobalt-winged parakeets that flew overhead. We were back in civilization but still had reminders of the jungle.

·         Don was returning to TRC the day after we left, so we managed to meet up with him (and Yessenia, Paula, Carlitos, and a couple guides) in Puerto for pizza. We managed to get everyone together in a fairly reasonable amount of time, considering we had no way of contacting any of them (other than the emails that we sent out that morning). We shared our Chuncho experience with Don, and he told us some far worse stories of his own. After that we all decided to go to a club, which was when I rode my first motorcycle! One of the guides had an actual motorcycle (not one of the mototaxis), so he took me for a spin. What a fun welcome back to civilization!

Pizza in Puerto! Clockwise from back left: Carlitos, me, Don, Yessenia, Richard (guide), Katharine, Paula (from Chuncho), Manuel (guide)

The most exciting, terrifying, and memorable experience of my entire time in South America happened right before Christmas. Sit back – it’s a long story. The project director, Don, came to TRC along with another researcher (Bruce, Sharman’s husband). The main study site for the macaw project is the Colorado clay lick, right by the TRC lodge, but it is getting overgrown with vegetation as the river changes, and so there are fewer birds returning there each year. A couple hours downriver is the Chuncho clay lick, which is at least five times longer than the Colorado clay lick and has THOUSANDS more birds. Don is interested in turning Chuncho into a permanent study site, so he, Bruce, Paula (a guide who has volunteered for the project before), and Andres (boat driver) went there for two weeks to do some preliminary studies. They needed one more person, so they took Katharine initially, saying that I would swap out with her after a week. This part is just awesome: A few days after they all left, a tourist boat arrived that had stopped at Chuncho to take a letter from Don (protected in a Tupperware container). He had written to Gustavo asking for certain supplies and saying that Katharine would be staying a bit longer. I asked when Gustavo was sending the supplies downriver and if I could include a letter to Katharine. I spent the entire next morning writing a letter while at the colpa! I wrote it in one of those mini spiral notebooks that is smaller than an index card, so I had to staple all of the pages together (like a little book!). I gave that to Gustavo to put in the Tupperware, and he looked at the book, looked at me, and said, “it’s only been three days…” I just smiled. The best part was that a few days after that, I GOT A RETURN LETTER! You know how it’s awesome to receive snail mail? It’s way more awesome to get mail via boat on a river in the Amazon. I think we were each able to send two letters. The funny part was that I had heard more from Katharine than Sharman had from her husband.

Eventually Bruce and Don came back from Chuncho, at which point I was informed that I’d be getting to go to there after all, but only for two nights. The awesome part was that Katharine would be staying there during that time, too! The night that those guys came back we had a party in the bar – Sharman and Bruce were leaving the next day, so they were very generous in buying everyone drinks. I actually got to chat with Bruce for a bit and he was really cool. He told me that they really didn’t need me at Chuncho, but he convinced Don to let me go anyways so that I could see the site, get some time away from TRC, and also see Katharine. Thanks, Bruce!

The next day I took a supply boat downriver with Sharman, Bruce, Gaudy, and a couple other staff members who were heading into Puerto Maldonado. I had a nice time chatting with Sharman and Bruce – they even shared some of their snacks! After a couple hours in the boat, Bruce looked up and shouted, “JAGUAR!” We all looked around and saw a jaguar on the sandy riverbank! He was right there in the open! Of course when he saw our boat, he walked behind a fallen tree where we couldn’t see him. The boat driver turned around and was making his way back to the tree, when all of a sudden a capybara darted out from under the tree’s limbs as the jaguar lunged after him, just narrowly missing a bite of the capybara’s leg. We were all stunned at what we just saw! The jaguar retreated behind the tree, and the boat driver kept getting the boat closer and closer. We got less than five meters from the jaguar, at which point Bruce panicked and told the boat driver that we were too close. With the language divide it took a while for that point to get across, during which time several of us got pretty nervous – I kept imagining this (obviously hungry) jaguar jumping onto our boat. Fortunately nothing like that happened, and Sharman got some great pictures. We resumed our trip downstream and discovered that Chuncho was just around the next bend in the river. Good to know I met the neighbors.

Camp kitchen (photo from Katharine)

Our boat stopped just long enough for me to hop off, and then it continued on to Puerto. Andres, the Chuncho boat driver, was down cleaning his boat, so I met him just as Katharine appeared at the top of the staircase cut into the sandy cliff. She showed me around the camp and then we talked for over three hours. It had only been a week, and we’d been writing letters during that time, but somehow we still had that much to talk about! After the second hour, Andres told us that it sounded like the colpa at camp because we were making as much noise as the birds! After a little while, Andres went to pick up Paula (Peruvian woman helping with the research) from the colpa while Katharine made dinner for everyone. She made super delicious food with only meager food supplies, so we realized that the chefs at TRC just couldn’t cook. After cooking, Katharine and I bathed in the river which was AMAZING because there were no sand flies at Chuncho! We sat downstream of the boat so there was no current, and it was just a wonderfully relaxing experience sitting in the river. We stayed up chatting for a little while and then we all went to bed since we were getting up at 4:30 to monitor the colpa. Paula and Katharine had been sharing a tent, but I was staying in a tent that had been put up by some tourists the week before. I climbed in and was getting ready for bed when I saw a huge tarantula on the wall right above my pillow – the whole thing was larger than my palm, and I have man hands. At first I was going to call for Katharine, but I thought, “No, I’ve been living in the jungle for over a month, I’ve GOT this.” I grabbed one of my massive rubber boots and knocked the thing off the wall and then tried smashing it with the heel. I tried a couple of times but he kept moving out of the way, and then I smashed down hard right where he was and thought “YES! I AM SUCH A BEAST! I JUST KILLED A TARANTULA WITH MY BOOT!” However, when I picked up my boot, the tarantula was nowhere to be found. And that’s when I lost it. I started scrambling around the tent trying to find this thing and make sure that it wasn’t on me, and then I saw it sitting on my pillow. I wasn’t about to take any more chances, so I called for Andres (who was still up), shouting (in Spanish) that I needed help because there was a tarantula in my bed. He started laughing and came over to get the thing out. My hero!

The next morning I woke up crazy early and went to the colpa with Paula. Before then I could already identify all of our birds by sight, and many of them by sound, but Paula did a fantastic job solidifying all of the calls in my head. She was great at pointing out calls in the distance, imitating calls herself, and quizzing me on birds we heard. I probably learned more in the few hours that I spent with her than I did in the first month at TRC! Kind of sad it took that long, though. After four hours (9am), Katharine came to relieve us, so we went back to camp to eat some of the amazing food Katharine had already cooked. During that shift, Andres noticed some really dark clouds far away upstream from us and said we would have to keep an eye on how much the river rose that day. Not long after that we got a little bit of the storm and it started pouring (granted, only briefly). However, it was enough to cause part of the roof over the kitchen to collapse, which apparently wasn’t the first time. Andres worked on cutting new logs for the roof while Paula started packing up camp since we were all moving out the next day. At one point during the storm, Don showed up (he was on a boat back to Puerto) and had a fast conversation with Paula in Spanish, I think about the monitoring schedule on our last day with regards to weather.

At 1pm I went to relieve Katharine, and Paula told me that if I saw the river rise more than a meter I should radio back for Andres to pick me up early. The first 3.5 hours of my 4 hour shift were pretty straightforward – I counted some birds and the river didn’t change. However, in the last 30 minutes the river silently rose a meter without me even noticing. In the last 10 minutes of my shift, Andres got on the radio and started shouting, “STEPHIE! STEPHIE! HURRY! HURRY!” I thought he was already waiting for me at the pick-up spot, so I threw all the gear together and ran to the side of the island. Unfortunately there is a little trench right before the actual shore that had completely filled with water, and there was no visible way around it. I still thought that Andres was waiting for me, and I didn’t want to waste precious time, so I jumped right into the trench filled waist-deep with water while trying to hold all the gear up. Of course, when I got to the pick-up spot, I saw that he was just rounding the corner and that I probably could’ve looked for a way around the trench. Oh well. I threw everything into the boat and jumped in myself, and then Andres took off back to our camp. The river had only risen a meter by that point, but it was moving FAST. There were also things like trees that had gotten stuck under the water that created all of these rises and dips, and we had to navigate through them in order to dock. Normally the rocky shore is visible and we float down past it, turn around, and then cruise back so that the other person can hop off and tie the boat up. However, by this point the shore was gone, so Andres started shouting and whistling for Paula to run down from camp and catch the boat’s rope. As she was running down, Andres had the unfortunate job of turning the boat around. Our boat was really small – much smaller than the boats that we had at TRC, so when we headed straight into those bumps and dips in the water, we started rocking side to side pretty hard, so much in fact that some water started pouring over the side of the boat at the peak of one of our side-to-side rocks. That’s when I immediately kicked off my rubber boots, because if we were going to capsize the last thing you want is to be wearing knee-high boots that will fill with water and weigh you down.

Camp from the outside (photo from Katharine)

Paula tied the boat up and she and Katharine helped get us and the gear out of the boat. Katharine and I chatted while she made some more food, but Paula and Andres were talking a lot in Spanish and were running around camp. We finally found out that Andres was going to take the boat across the river and spend the night on that side to protect it from falling trees on our side. He said that the storm upstream earlier was only just started to make the river rise where we were, and that it would probably rise even more. We made sure that he had a radio, candles, food, and sleeping bag, and then we watched as he made the treacherous trip across the river. I can’t say for sure how wide the river was, but I’m pretty sure it was over 100m across. The three of us girls watched from the shore to make sure Andres made it across – his boat was rocking all over the place, and it took a good couple minutes for him to get to the other side, but fortunately he made it. This was maybe 6pm.

After that Katharine and I ate dinner while Paula continued to pack up the camp. I think a couple hours had passed before we thought to check the height of the river (around 8pm?), and we were shocked to see that it had risen another meter. The first meter of water simply buried the rocky shore, but this second meter started gobbling up our staircase. The river was still two meters below the level of our camp, so we weren’t too concerned. Soon after we checked the river we heard a tree fall down. And then another. And another. And another. The river was eroding the shore and taking down any trees in its path. By the way, a falling tree is LOUD. The scary part was that the sound of falling trees was getting louder, which meant they were getting closer. It was also dark, so we couldn’t see much beyond our camp. We tried contacting Andres, but he said he would only turn on his radio if he needed to contact us. Everyone usually went to bed around 9pm, but we didn’t like the idea of getting into an enclosed tent and being unable to get out of the way of a falling tree. At least the main camp was open so you could get out of the way quickly. Katharine and I just sat around chatting and making jokes about the situation, and eventually Paula gave up trying to pack and joined us. We had turned off the generator and were sitting around a candle in a bottle just waiting to see what would happen. I think around 10pm we went to check the river again and it had risen another meter. Now there was only a meter of cliff between us and this growing river. Over a meter of shore had also eroded so our staircase was gone and trees had fallen in front of our pathway out. We were just hoping that Andres would be able to find us in the morning. Paula put a stick in the ground about 5 meters from the edge of the cliff so that we could monitor erosion. I should also point out that this was December 21, 2012, which was the day that the Mayans predicted the world would end. No, I’m not kidding. Katharine and I were getting pretty nervous at this point, but we were trying to keep the mood light by joking about the whole thing. After a particularly long period of silence, she asked, “Did the Mayans specify a time for the end of the world?” Seemed hilarious, but also kind of important at that point.

We passed the time with more jokes, silence, stories, and warm milk, and then Paula decided to check the river again around 11:30pm. She came back with a solemn look on her face and just said that things weren’t looking good. That is not what we wanted to hear. We asked if there was a plan for what to do if the river kept rising, but there wasn’t. We continued to sit and wait. Paula was exhausted and napped on and off, but Katharine and I were running on adrenaline and sat figuring out what we were going to do. I think we all decided to check the river again around 12:30 or 1am, and we were horrified to see that the water had eroded another meter of shore and that it was just one meager foot from flooding the land. I really can’t accurate describe just how terrifying that image was. Just try to imagine a massive, rushing river stretching into the darkness, just about to spill over the land and flood your only safe place. Something I will never forget.

Waiting to run into the jungle (photo from Katharine)

The river had risen nearly 4 meters in 7 hours, and now there was 1 foot before complete disaster. We all decided it was time to get ready to run, so we packed up our backpacks with water, a couple of snacks, candles and lighters, flashlights, machetes, Katharine had a compass, I had a whistle, and Paula and I each took radios. Paula quickly taught Katharine and me how to make a climbing “harness” out of only a few feet of rope, so that if we had to we could climb trees and wait out the flood. Paula also gave everyone rolls of bright pink flagging tape so that we could mark our trail if we had to run into the jungle (the only trail system followed the river, so that wasn’t really an option). We had the crappiest possible map to work with, but we made a plan to head west into the jungle to escape the river, and then cut north by daylight and follow the river downstream to the next ranger station, which we estimated would be a day’s hike. Then we sat with our bags next to us and waited. Every now and then someone would shine a flashlight out towards the river to make sure that water wasn’t silently creeping into camp (we were about 20m from the river). And then we kept waiting. I’m sure that facing a flood in the middle of the Amazon jungle is terrifying in any situation, but I couldn’t stop thinking that it was just the three of us with no boat, no way of letting anyone know where we were or were planning on escaping, and it was pitch black. Plus, if we happened to die that night, there’s no WAY anyone would ever find our bodies. Speaking of dying, I’ve never been more convinced that dying was a real possibility. I thought there was at least a 25% chance we would die that night. I have to say, we were all pretty calm for thinking that we might not make it to morning.

 

We kept on waiting with the sound of the river and falling trees in the background. We waited until about 3am and were relieved to see that the river had not risen anymore, so the others decided to try and get some sleep in the tent (we were all sleeping in my tent that night because they packed theirs up). I don’t think I slept more than 30 minutes because I hated being trapped in the tent when there were still trees falling down. I got up and resumed my spot at the center of camp and just waited for the sun to rise. You have no idea how absolutely amazing it was to see dawn approaching. Katharine joined me about 30 minutes later and we just sat waiting for Paula to wake up and to hear what the plan was.

This used to be a clear path to the river (photo from Katharine)

I’m a little fuzzy on the details, but at some point Andres showed up with the boat and started hacking a path through the fallen trees so that we could get out. Meanwhile Paula finished packing up camp and Katharine and I started moving everything to the boat. The river had dropped a couple meters from the high point, but it was still at least 2 meters higher than it was when I arrived 2 days prior. Andres was understandably stressed – there were entire trees floating down the river (a lot of them) – and he had to navigate us to the ranger station an hour downstream. The boat was completely full of all the gear and equipment from the camp. We strapped on life vests as tight as we could and kicked off our boots in case we capsized. We also knew that the ranger station was on the west side of the river, so if we *did* capsize, the plan was to swim to that side and keep walking downstream. Fortunately we made that trek without any problems. I had never been so happy to be at a “secure” wooden hut before! Paula and Andres dropped us and some gear off, and then Katharine and I had to wait for what ended up being a few hours for a supply boat heading upstream to pick us up. The guys at the station let us cook in their kitchen and take showers, and then it was just more waiting.

Eventually the supply boat showed up and we loaded it with our gear and prepared for another treacherous boat ride. This time it was 3 or so hours upstream to get to TRC. Katharine and I were alert for most of the ride – life vests on, boots off, scanning the water for trees. The other passengers were much less concerned – many napped for most of the ride. Katharine and I were both getting pretty nervous because there were a couple of small children on board who refused to wear their life vests and were hanging off the side of the boat. We both sat ready to grab them if we hit a log or something and they fell in (their parents were sleeping).

At last we reached the TRC landing area, or what was left of it. The river was still pretty high and had covered the entire slope up to the main land. The lodge manager and several of the other staff members were waiting for us so they could help everyone out of the boat (we had to walk along the top of a fallen tree with all of our equipment). Katharine and I spent another hour or so transporting things from the boat to the lodge and finally collapsed in our loft. The other researchers got back from their work in the field and tried to tell us how we missed a crazy flood (one of the trails not even remotely near the lodge was submerged in a foot or two of water). We just looked at each other and said they had no idea what they missed out on. That night was one that I’ll never forget. Even if I described every detail perfectly, there’s no way you’ll ever understand the pure fear of facing a flood in the Amazon, and everything that it means, unless you’ve actually experienced it. What an adventure!

Now, if you don’t want to hear about my stomach illnesses, you should stop here. Thanks for reading!

For those of you still here, let me ask you a question – have you ever vomited while simultaneously crapping in your pants? No? Well under normal circumstances it’s probably a horrible experience, but put yourself in the jungle and it’s 50 times worse. Make it New Year’s Eve and it’s 10 times worse on top of that. In my case, my stomach started feeling funny a little before the first round of drinks. I figured I just had a little diarrhea but would wait until we toasted that first round. Unfortunately the drink-pouring happened in typical Peruvian-fashion, a.k.a. slow as molasses. I think I lasted 15 minutes before deciding I couldn’t wait and headed across the lodge to the bathroom. Fortunately I got there just in time (running the last dozen meters), but I completely surprised myself when I started throwing up (I don’t even know the last time I threw up due to some kind of stomach bug). If *that* was surprising, you can imagine my utter horror when I realized that I was defecating at the same time. It was then that I thought, “Sure, I survived the flood at Chuncho but I’m going to die in this bathroom stall with shit in my pants in the middle of the freaking jungle”. At home I would’ve assumed food poisoning, but in the jungle you have no idea what the problem is – it could be the food, the water, a bite, or a dozen other things.

After recovering from that incident, I went back out to the bar area to tell Katharine I’d be resting in the hammocks and to let me know if there was any kind of soup for dinner. When I got there, she immediately said, “Woah, what happened to you?” – Apparently I was sweaty, pale, and had a panicked look on my face. I told her I wasn’t feeling great (I couldn’t let *everyone* know I had just crapped in my pants… which is why I’m posting it on the internet 6 months later). Katharine came over to check on me when dinner was served (no soup, of course). She really was my best jungle friend because she helped me move to the couches that were closer to the bathrooms, brought me a bucket (just in case), rummaged around the kitchen for some crackers for me to eat, and spent the rest of the night hanging out with me on the couches instead of enjoying the festivities. Jordan (one of the newest volunteers and also a mountain search and rescue volunteer back in the US) and Mabe (Peruvian volunteer training to be a vet) came by to check on me periodically throughout the night – really nice of them to do that. When they realized I had been going to the bathroom every 15 minutes for over 2 hours, they started talking about the cutoff for when to send me downriver to a hospital in Puerto Maldonado. I heard that and just looked around the lodge to understand the full meaning – it was nighttime on New Year’s Eve, so the 8-hour boat ride in a river with entire trees floating downstream would be in pitch blackness, and everyone capable of driving the boats was drunk. If the stomach illness didn’t kill me then that boat ride sure would have. FORTUNATELY my bathroom trips became less frequent, and I was able to make it through the night without any problems. It’s amazing how I had no appetite for two days after that – all I ate were crackers and I was never hungry for anything more. Debilitating stomach illness – the jungle diet!