Our alarms went off at 2AM, and by 3AM we were climbing into the bus to reach the airport. There wasn’t a lot of happy chatter.

I was lucky enough to lift my head from my book on the flight, just in time to see this.

We landed in Puerto Maldonado minus a couple of passengers. A husband packed both passports into their big suitcase, checked it in, and then they were stuck when they needed to show both passports and boarding passes for the flights.

Just keep it in mind… domestic flights overseas sometimes require passports, unlike Australia. It’s always best to keep them close.

They were able to get their suitcases off the plane, and took a later flight to join us. They’re still married, by the way. 😂

Imagine our excitement when we saw some sloths in a tree right beside the luggage drop-off in Port Maldonado! This is a mother with a baby in front of her.

Here they are from another angle.

Annette took this video. I like it because you can see the baby’s face.

This was the snack offered to us on the boat taking us to the lodge. Anyone who knows me IRL knows that I can’t stand bananas.
As the boat droned on, most of us fell asleep. I was dreaming…

… when all of a sudden the boat stopped moving.
“A family of howler monkeys on the river bank!” called Claudio, and we all grabbed our phones. I was too late, but someone else on the WhatsApp group was quicker.

After 90 minutes, we arrived at the lodge. We were assigned our rooms. I have the Anaconda room, which is essentially a cabin with fly screens instead of glass, to let the breeze through and the mozzies out.

This will be important later.

I thought this was a capybara, but it turns out it’s an Aguti , which are like squirrels. They hide seeds and nuts in the ground.

This is.the guide for our walk, carrying a machete. Jaguars are occasionally seen here. We were going on a gentle walk to a lake 1km away from the lodge, to try and see caiman/alligators.

Along the way, we saw an Ironwood tree… just a young one of 200 years old.

Our guide did a panorama shot, going up instead of across the. I’ve never thought of doing this. I experimented with the next tall tree we came across and it worked a treat.

I find out something new about my phone on nearly every trip. That’s why I have to keep going; just to get my money’s worth from my phone.

Our guide saw a hole in the ground near the track and invited us to come down with him. Once he mentioned “spider”, only Annette and I took him up on the offer. I brought my wide-legged jeans on this trip and they sometimes touch the ground, so I had sturdy rubber band around my ankles to lift the legs up a bit.

I figured I was safe from any creepy-crawlies running up my legs inside my jeans, so I took up position right outside the hole.

Meet the Chicken tarantula. It’s bloody massive. I was keeping a close eye on where it was going, I can tell you!
Its bite won’t kill us, as we’re too big. Its venom just makes us sick. 

They catch their prey with a claw, bite them, and then butcher them with the claw as the venom takes hold.

It’s called ‘Chicken’, because when she hunts, her babies are behind her. She calls them to her when the food is ready, just like a mother hen.

Here’s the caiman lake.

This is the only caiman we saw. Yes, I promise it’s real.
It was more like a shape under the water, so it was a bit of a fizzer.
It was starting to get dark, so we headed back.

Anteaters and armadillos destroy the trail looking for ants. They think the raised trail might be an ants nest.

This was lying in the path in front of us, with the broken part hidden. Our guide made us stay back while he checked it out, cautiously turning it over with his machete.
it’s a Bell Wasp nest, fortunately empty.

Just before our beautiful dinner, I wandered down to the dock to take these photos.

We’re meant to go on a 6 km walk early or tomorrow morning. I looked at the weather prediction for tomorrow and it was a 95% chance of storms.
Hmmm…

Dad joke of the day: