Yanallpa Caño and Dorado River
This morning, when the “knock-knock” came on our doors at 0530, light was just beginning to seep among the rain forest trees where we were quietly tied to a white barked cercropia along the southern shore of the Ucayali River. By 0600 as we boarded the skiffs, the birds were already flying and chattering and the day had begun. It was a perfect time for us to go out to maximize our wildlife viewing. Today we had heavy cloud cover but only a few droplets of rain fell during the two-and-one-half hours we spent out in the skiffs exploring beautiful Yanallpa Caño. All three skiffs were out and all three were full of eager guests with cameras and binoculars; no one missed this morning’s outing!
We had a fabulous trip and among the three skiffs saw an incredible variety of birds and mammals. If I can remember at least most of them, the list goes something like this: Five species of monkeys (monk sakis, a lone brown capuchin, saddle-backed tamarins, squirrel monkeys and a family of three adorable, sleepy night owl monkeys), at least five individual sloths in all the possible, funny sloth positions (hanging by his feet upside down, seated comfortably in a fork of two branches, hanging by one arm and scratching her belly…). Yes, one can identify the sex of the sloths easily, even from a great distance, as the males have a bright patch of yellow fur on their backs.
We added to our list of birds too, with a scarlet-crowned barbet, three species of macaws (scarlet, red-bellied and blue-and-yellow), the largest of the Amazon parrots—mealy parrots, a plum-throated cotinga, crested oropendulas, two members of the night hawk family—a common pauraque and a giant potoo etc., etc. Chef Raul Rodriguez had a sumptuous breakfast buffet waiting for us upon our return to the Delfin II—and we were hungry and did his meal justice!
Captain Remigio immediately began our navigation upriver and we travelled approximately 45 miles for a bit more than six hours to tie up near the mouth of the Zapote River. It poured during our siesta time and while we reviewed and updated our wildlife list, which was perfect timing, really! Now we have seen 84 species of birds and 13 species of mammals! We delayed the afternoon outing by about a half-hour and by then, almost magically, the rain had stopped. We went out in the skiffs and once again had wonderful wildlife observations: we saw at least three troops of the acrobatic squirrel monkeys, two troops of saddle-back tamarins, two groups of monk sakis in the largest trees curled on the horizontal branches ready to sleep for the night, four sloths high in the treetops drying their fur after the rain, several species of hawks, a laughing falcon, and many, many other types of birds.
As dusk fell a brilliant, full moon rose, and the common pauraques (relatives of the night hawks) darted above us as they chased insects and were soon joined also by bats. Naturalist Rudy imitated a common potoo and was answered immediately by two potoos, one on each side of the river. A lovely nocturnal potoo duet ensued!
The naturalists turned on spotlights and searched for the eye-shine from caiman. We found several and although they did not sit still for long as we approached, some of us got good looks at them sitting low in the water hiding among the aquatic vegetation. As soon as we were all aboard the Delfin II, we headed upriver, navigating an additional 35 miles until about 0100 in the morning to reach our furthest destination this week: the Pacaya River.
