Day 69 - 71 Fawlty Tower in the Jungle

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Parts of Ecuador is on the western fringes of the Greater Amazon Jungles, as I had never been to the Amazons, so I had this thrilling anticipation while on the Tucan Truck to our next destination, the Isla Eco-Lodge near Misahualli, just a couple of hours drive north of Banos.

Will there be malaria carrying mosquitoes, venomous snakes and creepy spiders...etc, and all the excitements of seeing endangered faunas at night, and the magic powers of the shamans....all conjuring up the image of an exotic adventure ahead.



The first thing we found out, was, definitely no Internet...nothing to worry about too much, if there were enough to keep us entertained........

We were the only group in the entire compound amongst trees, all 12 of us.

One of our huts

Our welcome was a greeting with a boot matching ritual, finding a pair of rubber boots that fitted....looking at a couple of days walking in the rain forests, I guess.  The boots were almost brand new, actually.  "There'll be a lot of walking in muds", we were told...wow !

But our first taste of the rain forest was a little disappointed, an late afternoon fishing in the local pond, a man made muddy pond with little water barely covering the concrete dam around it, albeit it, with a bit of fishing strings at the end of a tree twig, a taste of the what the locals would do in the traditional way!  But then again, would traditional fishing use nylon strings and steel hooks....? They probably used these as hooks,

But the most interesting part of the whole stay, was nothing to do with the Rain Forests walk, shaman showing their crafts, and the villagers surrounding the lodge...but the "Fawlty Tower" performance of the manager. But I won't bore everyone with this until last...

Our morning of the first full day was a jungle walk by a very enthusiastic guide, Juan and, his wife as the assistant.  First we were introduced to colouring plants, which were used, amongst other purposes, facial paintings, for ritualistic or warring times.

Then there are many herbs and medicinal plants, poisonous or otherwise..

and big fig trees

and of course, the Cocoa plant for chocolates, 

 

However, in addition to a few ants and a lone tortoise, there were no wildlife other than a few swinging tarzans.

According to the guide, there are few wild lives in this area because of encroaching human settlements, which led to the breaking down of the ecological system for their survival.

Which also meant, sadly, little purpose for a night walk.

The afternoon was followed by a dance by children from the local orphanage,

It seems that they have given their best to entertain us, and we'd show our appreciation with a small donation.

Juan and his immediate family.

A few steps away is the village next door, where Juan and his family live. Being the most educated and prosperous male of the small village, he also carries the burdens of raising the children of his brother ( who committed suicide sometime ago), a story probably not too unfamiliar in the surrounding area.  Tourism brings good and bad to the indigenous communities, it is very hard to calibrate, and not feeling sad for some.

Cloth washing on the river

Kids trying to impress us

a treat !?

The villagers were also busy setting up stalls for the weekly market day, which other communities nearby would descend, tomorrow.  Although it is only a village of few huts, but being on the river bank, and presumably central to the river traffics, it also is a small trading centre.

Together with Nienke and Will, we entertained a few kids who became very curious about our cameras, or to be exact, what themselves would look like in a photo.

The most satisfying part was to see their glee and giggles when looking at their own images on the camera monitor.  Nienke agrees to bring them the prints when she returns in a few weeks, it would really be the first photos for these children to keep.  I think that will be a "treasure" for them, but hopefully not for too long, before they'll have their own camera taking photos for others.

The lodge caters for all our meals and looked after special requirements such as vegetarians and gluten allergy to their best abilities and resources.   However, the services was taking very long.....there seems to be limited in manpower in trying to provide too much unnecessary services...Nienke tried to convince the manager about simply just letting us serve ourselves, to help them along...but not much had changed.  The only response, was, the manager himself turning up to serve, a positive in its own right, but was it really helping !

The most exciting moment for the evening, or the night, was the shriek from one of our ladies ( who shall remain nameless !) in the middle of darkness.....which brought my memory back to this sign in an outback town in Australia..

We crossed the river and Juan took us to visit a local shaman, who showed us his wares, after changing from his modern everyday garment into what one would expect of a shaman, with a basketball pants underneath.

We were shown how to make baskets, spears, small bird traps etc.

a small basket that turned into a hair bunch

and find out our hunting skills using a blow-pipe.

It was all a very enriching experience, but one can't stop wondering how genuine is this, especially the so called healing powers.....would it stand up to close scrutiny.
The manager's Fawlty Tower performance continued to baffle us, suddenly, our afternoon river boat cruise was cancelled, due allegedly, to the lack of interests from us and costing too much to run.  Then after some discussions with Nienke, it was on again......this time, the other extreme, himself leading the charge.

The boat cruise did not go very far, about a 1 Km or 2, nor were there much interpretive explanations, but it was a river cruise nevertheless.  The most exciting part was to navigate the boat over a long rapid.

The dinner continued to be the same long drawn service, which could have been improved by simply letting us self serve, in fact, alleviating the lack of personnel, however, the manager must have a mind of his own.

To the credit of the manager, he really did try to improve the services, but was not really listening to what the customers are saying.  He did try.  But does nothing to solve the long running problem in the restaurant, other than placating the customers. That night, another shaman was called in unexpectedly, to demonstrate some healing rituals with smoking herbal leaves, presumably, to keep us happy.

I can only surmise, that the manager / boss just did not know what delegation means.

Next Post:  Otavalo - Crossing the Equator and back

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