Amazon, selva, animals… but NO rain!

Whoever named the rainforest like this, we really cannot understand why on earth such an expression was chosen – after conducting an exhaustive long-term study of 4 days and 3 nights at and around the Rio Ucayali (one of Amazon’s two main source rivers) without a single raindrop, we conclude that the name rainforest is rather naive and should be replaced. As alternative we suggest to the scientific community “Selva de Gilber”.

“Selva” is nothing more than the Spanish term for the rainforest. Starting from Pucallpa, we did an excursion to some lonely places of the jungle. Since it is winter in this part of Perú (while logically at the same time it is summer in Lima), the whole area is flooded and hence can be accessed easily by boat. To do so we hired a guide named Gilber (60 years old, has lived all his life in the jungle), who took us with his “peque-peque” to lagoons, canals and over the VERY huge river Ucayali. During this trip, we slept in a lovely wooden cabin, covered with a palm-leaves roof and resting on pillars. Actually most houses here are built in that style due to the flood lasting several months every year.

The fauna is quite amazing: we saw sloths, monkeys, rose and grey dolphins, thousands of birds and millions of insects, who Esteffen didn’t like as much as I did (the exploration of the Amazon’s insects also continued during the night in our sleeping bags, especially with the high diversity of “cucarachas”). All the other animals are rather difficult to detect, but fortunately not for our guide, who is able to recognize a toucan in a distance of at least 30 meters while passing by boat and preparing a meal (which has always something with bananas – I think we ate at least 1kg “platanos” per day, so my mum was wrong when telling me that one banana each day is enough). Afterwards we needed 10 minutes to get to the point where we were able to see the toucan in a distance of less than 5 meters …. additionally Gilber also found an alligator in the middle of the night at our house, so obviously he can detect animals even while sleeping. The only explanation we have so far, is that he founded the “selva”, thus it seems justified to name the forest to his honor! Continue reading

Lima – holiday is better than studying

…. and beach is better than office!!

At least that could be how we would resume the beginning of our world-trip. By “we” and “our”, I now mean Steffen and me, since I met him in Lima after a relaxing night flight from Argentina to Perú (I almost overslept my flight during my transit in Asunción :P ). We were located at the Hitchhikers Hostel in the Miraflores district, a very nice location with beach, cliffs and luxurious houses, but the hostel was a bit too tranquil, means we did not meet many other guys (maybe partly due to the Dakar-rally that is starting tomorrow from here). Nevertheless we had a nice new year’s eve where we saw many fireworks along the coast and later I also went to a “boliche” which was quite okay.

Lima’s old town in the center is very beautiful, especially the “Convento de San Francisco” with its history and catacombs was worth a visit. On another day we had a crazy trip with Eduardo from Mar Adentro Excursiones to the “Islas Palomino”, where we could see lots of different birds, penguins and of course with the highlight “nadar con los lobos”, i.e. swimming in the middle of the sea surrounded by sea lions :D This experience was kind of weird but really fun, we were simply not expecting something like that, where the sea lions are touching you and jumping right over your shoulder. Have a look at the photos to get a small impression ;-)

Definitely the most interesting trip was going to the “pueblos jóvenes”, which from the outside we first thought to be the poorest districts with endless hills full of bad huts where 60% of Lima’s population live, looking like the Brazilian favelas where you’d better not go into (we changed our opinion about that). We were guided by the German agricultural engineer Alois Kennerknecht, who lives in Peru for 25 years. He explained us that in fact economically this areas are not that bad, as they are used as a good possibility to make money: you invest and build such houses on an empty place, far away from the existing infrastructure where there is nothing, then after two or three years the government will have extended the streets and brought water and electricity, and you can resell your “cabaña” much more expensively. And in fact once we were inside these villages we actually never felt unsafe, but rather could see the purchasing power (supermarkets etc.) and that the houses are not in such a bad shape. We also saw one of the biggest cemetery of the world. Continue reading

Salta la linda

So as I told in my previous post, I spent the last 5 days in and around the beautiful city of Salta in the north-east of Argentina. Without realizing it, you are already rather high in the Andes (about 1500m above the sea level), but Salta itself is just not looking like such a mountain city (although it is still very beautiful). Nevertheless it is pretty easy to get to smaller traditional villages and regions having an elevation between 3000m and 4000m, where luckily the Coca-leaves help a lot against the altitude sickness, as they improve the oxygen uptake.

Compared to Iguazú, the Salta province is really dry, hot and it almost never rains. And also the people and the feeling here are much more typed: you could easily think you were in Peru or Bolivia without seeing any changes, as they say “we look equally, have the same spirit, wear the same clothes and listen to the same music”.

I have done two excursions, one to Cafayate and another to Humahuaca. Both of them are two small villages having an amazing “quebrada” (ravine) as main attraction, where the shape and the colors of the rocks are incredible (see the photos). We also met some locals who spontaneously invited us to join them drinking some wine and eating empanadas (the area is well-known for having the best empanadas from all Argentina, and they indeed deserve this reputation). It was very nice to share such a moment with them, you wouldn’t be able to feel that kind of friendliness by doing only official tourist-tours.

I spent the rest of the time at Salta in the Sol Huasi Hostel, enjoying my time with many cool guys from all over the world, talking and laughing a lot. And we also had a great Christmas party, with a delicious dinner and (of course only a little bit of) alcohol, then music, dancing and partying all the night …. I really don’t know why the next day was rather relaxed and that quiet! Continue reading

Iguazú – Natural Wonder

After a comfortable, 18 hours long night-bus ride, I arrived to Puerto Iguazú, the last city in the Provincia de Misiones before the Brazilian and Paraguayan frontier. My first impression of this region was that it is much greener but also a lot poorer than the Provincia de Buenos Aires, where I have lived for almost 5 months.

I stayed there three days in the Hostel Inn Iguazu, which is in fact rather like a real resort hotel with a very big swimming-pool and lots of French guys …. the hostel, and also the whole region is very international, means it is the first place in Argentina where everybody speaks English, of course due to the main tourist attraction here: the Cataratas del Iguazú:

We went there two consecutive days, the first one to see the falls from the Argentine side and the other day to watch them from the Brazilian side. We also took a helicopter to see them from above, a water-boat to get a wet shower from underneath, and you are allowed to swim in the river at a place with only little flow. This natural wonder is absolutely unbelievable and indescribable, the photos only can give you a small glimpse of the size and the tons of litres that are falling down every second. You really HAVE to see this great place once in your life!

I was really impressed by the intactness of the nature, you are really feeling like as if you were at the Amazonas with lots of jungle plants and animals. And also the tropical rain is simply crazy: the sun is shining, and one minute after it is raining in a way I’ve never experienced before, and 10 minutes later the sun comes back again, as if nothing had happened.

By the way, I have fulfilled one of my challenges, because a “remis”-driver asked me whether I am from Argentina (that was such a great feeling). And right now I have just arrived to Salta in the equally named province …. let’s see what expects me here! Continue reading