It’s been a busy week this side of the
Atlantic. On Monday myself and Cara headed back in Puerto Jimenez, ate
chicken quesadilla (a culinary masterpiece), bought our boxer shorts
(surprisingly comfy, and a perfect addition to the hippish
all-my-clothes-are-damp look I prefer to call ‘jungle sheek’) and swam
in the warm waters of the Golfo Dulce. The next day, on route to our
first turtle survey of the week we stumbled across a Neotropical otter
nibbling on his breakfast. It was my first sighting and a pretty special
one at that, considering there is no research regarding their
population. The turtle patrol however put a sadder emphasis on the
morning, as one of the greens had laid her eggs too high in the sand
causing the tide to turn up the nest. None of the eggs survived. Nature
even in all its beauty can be cruel, especially on the already hard done
by turtle hatchlings.
Wednesday morning saw a new addition to
our weekly schedule; trail maintenance. For five hours, armed with
spades, machetes and chainsaws we dug a completely new trail through the
dense rainforest. The heat was made bearable by the water fight Kirsty
and I had and the fresh orange juice the cook at OSA gave us. It was
quite an accomplishment digging up roots that gripped the ground like a
child does its mother. Whilst it was tough, as proven by the blisters on
my thumbs, it was physically rewarding and actually rather enjoyable.
As the work we were doing was part of collaboration with OSA
Conservation it meant spending the morning with the guys who work here,
who are possibly the nicest and funniest people I’ve met. Juan Sito for
instance has the cutest smile and would laugh at me sweating and say
“mucho aqua?” to which my reply was always “si!” Then half comatose I
cooked for everyone, slept and then cooked again.
The next morning I woke up at 2:45am and
crept out of camp, led by Nathan and followed by Sam and American Sarah
for my first ever Peje. The tales that had preceded the journey were
not wrong, it was a tough walk. We clambered down steps, under fallen
trees, passed razor grass, through swamps and lagoons and came out into a
pitch black clearing. It felt as though I were in a big dark room, all I
could make out were the outlines of leaning palm trees and a line of
bright white froth thunderously crashing seconds after the last wave
ripping the silence in two. And then, I looked up. Above me the milky
way eloquently lit up the night sky, so bright that you’d think that if I
reached out to touch a star, I’d be burnt. The poignant night sky
slowly faded into a subtle pink glow that was delicate and just so
pretty. By this point we’d been waking for hours on the sloped sand and
my calves ached, we had 43 sectors to survey and each was the length of
two or three buses lying next to one another. But the end, sector 43,
the finish line, was so indescribably worth it. Words do not do this
perfect little corner of the world justice. The rainforest fell into a
lagoon that cattle crossed as the sun rose, and the birds swept their
wings in amongst the palm trees. You could see for miles above the tree
tops to your right and miles across the ocean to your left. I was
entirely humbled to be one of the few people who got the complete
privilege of seeing this private and protected landscape, so entirely
untouched by tourists with no trace of the 21st century.
‘The circle of life’ ran through my head on repeat whilst Nathan sang
‘Hakuna Matata’, I had to remind myself that someone hadn’t just picked
me up and dropped me into a Disney movie. This was real. And I was
there. I even turned to Sam and said “all we need now, is a good
soundtrack”.
On our way back, we had to walk up the
stairs of doom. Which went like this; Sam pushed me up, I nearly passed
out, got to the top and had a semi-asthma attack, fell over and got
razor grassed. All I could do was lie there, in the middle of the jungle
and laugh, life was too perfect.
On Thursday I went on an Otter survey
all the way to the top of Piro river, another 5hour trek. We were
joined by the lovely Juan Carlos, the head of science at OSA who,
whenever I would turn around would be doing something funny such as
putting a feather in his hair and exclaiming “I am the Mexican
Pocahontas!” or wearing a leaf as a mask. I managed to find a few otter
tracks on my own, which was a rather exciting considering I’m the
non-scientist on camp. We also saw a poison dart frog carrying its
tadpoles on its back, which apparently is unbelievably rare, and we just
happened to see it. The way back down the river was absolutely
terrifying. If ever there was a way I would die, it would be walking
down a fast flowing stream of water up to my waist, that’s bed was made
up of rocks like marbles, during torrential rainfall with trees falling
down around me. Its not the place for the clumsy, wet rocks are not
sturdy walking ground but they do however, make you appreciate pavement
in ways I never have before.
On Saturday we walked across the beach
with Toucans flying low above our heads to the waterfall. On our way
back I saw a figure in the sand making its way to the sea. My first
thought was that it was a turtle so screamed out and pointed towards it
“WHAT. IS. THAT?!” Carlos, Malorie and myself just sprinted, a rather
peculiar site for Sarah and Kirsty behind us. Turns out, it was a baby
crocodile. I can’t believe I just saw a baby crocodile on the beach and
we strolled along, its hard to put these sort of moments into
perspective.
The lagoon brought more fun, as a tree
trunk had fallen into it and was floating on the surface like a banana
boat. This provided endless entertainment, Kirsty did backflips off of
it and I did my best impressions of Dirty Dancing and the Jesus Christ
lizard (walks on water) whilst Malorie clinged to it with dear life and
Natalka and Carlos swam around in the background collecting coconuts.
Then we returned ‘home’ for Yaka chips and a little bit of Madagascar
and fell asleep listening to the rain on the tin roof of the hammock
deck.
Now, I’m off to learn more Spanish, which will save me a lot of awkward situations, so ¡hasta luego.
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