Katy and I headed north east to Puyo by bus on a rocky dirt road that was cut out of
the jungle.
In Puyo we found a beautiful hostal with wooden cabins installed in the garden with hammocks for chilling in outside on the balcony.
We didn't have enough time to have a full jungle experience, so settled for a one day trip. Our guide Louis drove us to a spot where a local threw his net into a pond and caught our fish for lunch. We then headed alongside the river which was muddy and swollen from heavy rain the previous day and night to where a dug out canoe was waiting for us. These canoes are very unstable at the best of times, and we carefully got in and set off downstream, with our boatsman navigating the canoe from one side to another to slow down our speed in the fast moving river.
We got out further down the river and walked up a steep path to the top of a mountain where we were able to see a panoramic view of the jungle and the river. Katy also tried her hand at playing Jane on the rope swing.
After a tasty fish lunch we set off through the jungle alongside a stream toward a waterfall,
where Katy and I took the plunge and had the best power shower of our lives!
Our last visit was to a local indigenous community who were two days into a four day fiesta, celebrating nature and the end of a hunting trip. Huge quantities of chicha, a traditional drink made from maize and fermented by the women with spit had already been consumed when we arrived, and many of the inhabitants could barely stand up. It was considered impolite to refuse the chicha which was aggressively and constantly poured into the mouth by women, but luckily i was at the tail end of a month 'on the wagon' after a blood test had shown my liver was not as healthy as it could be. So I got our guide to explain that i couldn't drink the chicha for health reasons.
The chief of the village welcomed us with bowls of chicken and vegetable broth and when we had finished he invited me to dance. He was quite a sight, dressed in full camoflage with a colourful headdress, but I kept a straight face and did my best. We had walked a long way that day and I was quite relieved to sit down, only to be pulled onto my feet again to dance with the medicine man. After that there were a string of men who also insisted Katy and I danced with them, many of them covered in vomit from the vast amounts of chicha they had consumed.
Suddenly I realised that Louis, our guide, was beginning to look the worst for wear and gently guided him outside, reminding him that he had to drive us back to town!
We left the villagers to their continuing fiesta and returned carefully to Puyo.
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