This River is Wild

So, as many of you know, I spent last weekend in the rainforest. What many of you don’t know (and I only have myself to blame on this one), was how much I loved it. As I told the MG, it was an experience so far removed from my life back home, which is exactly why I came to this country.

We left Saturday morning and after a quick stop at Papallacta, a volcanic hot springs where Liz enjoyed her first warm shower in this country, we arrived at a small town where we traded in our sneakers for rainboots and hopped into the canoe that would be our main mode of transportation for the weekend as we were staying on a river (not the Amazon…we asked). We stayed in cabins that were far more luxurious than we had imagined and ate like kings, two things that we had not expected given the preparation of our program director, who had led us to believe that the great outdoors would be our bathroom and that we may have to kill our own food.

Nghiem and I at the hot springs

The crew on the canoe.

Ryanncita outside the girls cabaña

The days in the jungle were jam-packed with activities so I’ll just give you some of the highlights. We had a spirit-cleansing performed by the villages Shaman and the next day went to see where he lives with his family and while there we were treated to a typical meal (I’ll explain this shortly). There was a night hike in which we saw a mondo tarantula and I almost cried. Not really, but I did run away which is hard in the dark when your flashlight is borderline dead. We also visited an animal rescue site where we saw monkeys strange birds. It was also Matt's 21st while we were there so we celebrated with cake and wine.

Here's the group inside one of the biggest trees I have ever seen

I’m really just trying to rush through these highlights to get to the following: While there we played Survivor because, honestly, conditions were too perfect not to. It didn’t last that long (we voted out the creator in the second tribal counsel and things were downhill from there), but it was one of the funniest things I have ever been a part of. The threat of being voted out became the motivation behind everything we did. Therefore, we did not question:

- eating ants we had found in leaf stems and that tasted like lemon

- building a raft together and rowing said raft back to our campsite

- participating in a blow dart gun competition (in which Brianna won immunity)

- painting tribal figures on our faces while visiting the indigenous family

- forming alliances and backstabbing friends

Ten minutes later, once cooked, these were part of our lunch (Mom - remember when I boycotted sandwiches for a year after finding a worm in the bread?)

Game faces.

Our river bath. By Day 3 cohabitation was becoming difficult with the amount of dirt that was clinging to us.

So although the game didn’t last long and I was/still am more bug-bitten than I ever have been in my life (Mom I’m taking the Malaria pills, have no fear), I loved the jungle and the four days we spent there and think it was one of the most hilarious and amazing weekends of my life.