Manu Biosphere Reserve: birds, birds and birds..

Thursday morning two couples and I took an early puddlejumper plane ride through the clouds to the Boca Manu "landing strip" (aka a grass field).

Boca Manu airport (seriously)

Boca Manu puddlejumper

A two hour boat ride along the Rio Madres de Dio later, we arrived at Manu Wildlife Center, a beautiful lodge made entirely from wood reclaimed from the river.

it's actually illegal to cut trees down in Manu - everyone collects it from the river... an interesting concept

After a huge lunch we went on a short hike in the woods behind the lodge and visited their canopy. A winding wobbly iron staircase takes you 100 feet above ground to a giant platform built into a tree:

looking down

The rainforest canopy was amazing, and my new friends the birders were in heaven as the guide pointed out species after species.

when in doubt, say it's a flycatcher

As mentioned last winter I'm not a bird person necessarily, but even I was impressed with the quantity in such a short time. The guide saw a "lifer" - his first spotting of a dusky crested flycatcher in the wild. A "lifer" for me too, as were the other 50 species of birds spotted that day. (Really. Fifty. We counted. In, like, four hours. Amazing. We would hear a lot about Barry Walker during the trip. His list of species living in the reserve is 12 pages long, and allegedly this only accounts for half of the species actually living there.)

black fronted nun bird

curious scarlet macaws in the garden at the lodge

We also saw "social spiders" (so named because they build web communities instead of going solo), common house geckos and gorgeous Amazonian rainforest flora.

The lodge has no electricity so dinner, the walk back to the cabin and the shower before bed were by candlelight.

jungle kWh

I tent-camped with no shower for most of my time in Peru and this was quite a step up, but finding a large beetle on the bathroom sink and a big spider in the shower were new adventures for sure. In both cases I apologized to them for invading their space and asked them not to crawl on me during the night, and went about my business. I think they obliged but it's hard to say for sure.

Slept under a mosquito net for the first time. Did not like it - felt a little stifling especially with the humidity. But when in the jungle...

yes, I put it down first