Dorado River & Cedro Caño
We travelled with the Ucayali River last night, no longer against it, and rushed along at speeds up to 12 knots. At about 2230 we tied up along the riverbank on a sturdy cercropia tree. In the morning a large male iguana was perched beside the ship at eye level to the bridge!
“Knock-knock” came upon our doors at 0600 and two skiffs of photographers/explorers headed up the Dorado with Luis and Rudy. Reny took a skiff of kayaking enthusiasts—also up the Dorado—to where he and the crew had left the five jungle kayaks just before dawn. They had a pleasant float with the current down the river passing showy white great egrets who lined the shores looking for fish to snatch, blue-and-yellow macaws which flapped and squawked overhead and howler monkeys that roared their morning chorus in the distance.
Luis and Primo found more of the ubiquitous squirrel monkeys and heard, but could not catch a glimpse of, an elusive giant river otter. These otters are rare and endangered and, along with the black caiman and huge paiche fish, are the reason that Pacaya-Samiria Reserve was originally set aside and first protected in the 1940’s. We are glad to know they are still to be found in this area, even if we could not see one!
Rudy and his driver Paul had a small “private” group of guests, and we saw macaws also, and got good views of hoatzins and an Amazonian red squirrel. For me the most intense moment was when a jungle rat dropped out of a tree and into our skiff, and ran up my back to sit on my shoulder before leaping into the water and swimming to safety.
We were hungry for another of Chef Raul’s delicious breakfast buffets by the time we returned at 0830. After everyone had a bit of rest and relaxation, I gave a short talk about my own research experiences and then with Reny we updated our wildlife lists. Before lunch our charming barman Deny (who is a junior guide—i.e. a guide in training, so he was one of the kayakers this morning much to guest George’s delight) gave us a pisco sour lesson and then many of us made our own piscos, so both lunch and siesta were a bit louder and longer for some of us today.
Before the afternoon’s final skiff ride exploration and wildlife searching up Cedro Caño (and incidentally, this is the stream we did not get to visit on our way upriver because we were rained out on Wednesday morning) I gave a departure briefing—yes, sadly tomorrow we leave this lovely boat and our cruise on the Amazon comes to an end.
On the afternoon’s outing we said farewell to the rain forest and were again lucky to avoid a rain shower. The clouds were dark and ominous but we were able to see more squirrel monkeys, a couple bare-necked fruit crows (now that is a name only an ornithologist could love), a much searched for and anticipated trogon, a brilliant blue cotinga, many parrots and we added a couple new birds to our final list, too. Gray dolphins were surfacing and splashing around the boat when we returned and lightning flashed in the distance while the sun set, a brilliant orange globe, in the west. We will navigate until 2000 and tie up this evening near Puerto Miguel, and we will visit their market in the morning as there are especially good artists who make very nice handicrafts in this village.
Dinner tonight was a lavish barbecue and we applauded our trio of sharp-eyed naturalists and their all-important driver sidekicks; these six skilled, patient, and knowledgeable men made this expedition a complete success! The “Teenagers”—the rowdy crew band, preformed and we had a hilarious time dancing—and especially enjoyed watching young cabin boy Jorge dance! It has been a marvelous week and no doubt the happy memories of all we have seen and shared this week on the Delfin II will light up of our lives for years to come. May the mighty Amazon rain forest, and all her extraordinary creatures, long endure!
