Hey friends! It has been a while but I’m back! The last 4 days have been absolutely amazing. Saturday we started our day with breakfast at the lodge before getting ready to head out for a river hike in the Canuayacu! It was very hot out in the sun but the water was so refreshing and we had a decent amount of shade so it wasn’t bad at all. It was pretty shallow for the most part. Some parts went pretty deep but it was not bad at all. The hike was around 2 miles and at the end there was a little pool that we all got to swim in. After the hike we made our way back to the lodge and had lunch. After lunch we had another chocolate tasting, this time with Kallari chocolates. They had a very good collection and afterwards I got one of their dark chocolate bars and a banana chocolate bar. After that we just hung around the lodge for dinner and packed for our long day of travel.
The next morning we woke up for breakfast and quickly got on a bus to go to our canoes for the trip to the Waorani nation. I slept for most of the bus ride and then we loaded up into our motor powered canoes to hit the water. The ride was around 6 hours but I was able to sleep for a pretty large portion and it wasn’t bad whatsoever. We made it to our lodge there later in the afternoon before having dinner. We got the meet Elizabeth, Todd from the Iyarina lodges daughter. We had an amazing dinner at the lodge before calling it a night after the long day of travel.
The next morning we got breakfast at the lodge before getting back in the canoes to see more of the Waorani nation. We also decided as a group that to have a better experience we should scrifice our phones for the day in order to closer connect. We went with some of the tribe to see some of the vines in the jungle and we got to try and climb and swing around on them which was always something I wanted to do. After the vines we went and saw one of the historical trees in the area and learned about its importance to the Waorani culture. They told us stories about how the warriors would use the tree as communication if lost as well as how it was a place for them to sleep if being chased by Jaguars. They also told us stories about how their elders when sleeping would get whats called Jaguar vision where the big cats in the area would come closer and be much more tame. I thought it was very interesting to get this insight into their culture and their stories were so entertaining. After this we went back to the lodge for lunch before taking the canoes back to the tribe to play Soccer. We got to meet the family at the tribe and then played soccer with them which was VERY muddy but very fun. Following the soccer game the family said they had a surprise for us and we went back to their house to see that they had a domesticated Tapir. The animal was so interesting and we found out that it was a very rare animal to see, let alone domesticate. After that we went back to the lodge again for dinner before going back to the tribe one last time to see a cultural dance of theirs. We also got to share our own “american dance” where we incorporated a couple different classic dances like the cup song and the macarena. The whole day was so engaging and the tribe was so accepting of us it felt like I was with my own family. I truly will forever remember this experience and I think it has been my favorite moment of the whole trip. Today we just travelled back to the Iyarina Lodge and was really chill. The trip took around 10 hours with canoe+bus back to the lodge and we had dinner at the lodge before calling it a night.
