Today, after breakfast, we were given a close-up demonstration of a man from the lodge making chocolate from the cocoa bean. He had to have burnt all of the feeling off of his hands because he would just pick up those burning seeds and crack them! We would all gasp as he basically stuck his hand in the fire. After roasting the beans, we grinded them in a grinder that reminded me of the applesauce maker we use back home with the crank handle. Some people dipped fresh grown hot peppers in the chocolate paste product. They were suffering!!!
Afterwards, we all made our own pottery from clay the locals had made from lodge property. It was really cool to see one of the women take my silly espresso cup and turn it into a traditional Quichua bowl. We’ll see how it turns out!! We’re going to paint them once we get back from the Waorani territory.
Finally, we got all booted up for one of the highlights of our trip…the river hike! Honestly, I couldn’t tell you if the men holding machetes made me feel more or less safe because machetes meant they were preparing themselves to chop off snakeheads in the Canuayacu River. This hike was breathtaking. At one point, we found a small waterfall cove about 10 feet up that Skip and Mark hoisted me up to. It was so deep that when Meg fell into the water she still didn’t touch the bottom! I did NOT want to know what lived at the bottom. Emi and Ava joined us…we gave Mako Mermaids a run for their money. There was another part where we had to take our boots off and swim with bats flying above us. Towards the end of our hike, we found a small spring we could jump off of and had a lot of fun trying to make the biggest splash.
When we got back, we had our final chocolate tasting with Kallari chocolate at the lodge. I could barely keep my eyes open. I was so tired! I will say Bios chocolate has still proven to be my favorite. For dinner, we ate by candlelight because the lights weren’t working. It reminded me of when our electricity would always go out at home during any storm. Now, I am frantically packing and blogging before our journey to meet the Waorani people without any service or WIFI!