The little fellow above was perched just outside our hotel room. He was quite chatty and enjoyed mimicking my calls to him. I taught him to say “Maya” and have an 18 year old witness to attest to this. During breakfast Maya and I decided that we had endured enough car driving adventures for one vacation and opted to return our rental car early (an ordeal in itself). We would fly back to Quito and do day trips from there once our stay in the Amazon was over. We are staying at the Napo Wildlife Center, the only lodge within the Yasuni National Park for the next three nights. Getting there requires a 2.5 hour boat ride in the motorized canoe shown in the foreground of the image below followed by a 1 hour ride in a hand paddled canoe. The bridge pictured here is the only one for the next 600+ miles as the river flows into the Amazon River and then into the Atlantic Ocean.

Our motorized canoe with twin 75hp motors speeds along at 35 mph with the back sitting no more than 2 inches above the water. It is really quite exhilarating and for reasons that remain difficult to comprehend, we actually remained dry.

As we head deeper and deeper into the jungle the trees that line the river are simply magnificent in both their size and density.

Our lodge is located on a lake which can only be reached by paddle canoe. During this last leg of our journey, we are treated to sightings of 4 different types of monkeys, an anaconda, and several species of birds.

Our Amazon lodge is owned and operated by members of the indigenous Kichwa community, the only such ownership arrangement in all of Ecuador. It is an idyllic collection of small huts and an 8 story dinning hall, bar, library, and wildlife observation tower. Maya takes little time to situate herself in the hammock on our porch while enjoying a rainbow producing light shower. It is clear we are going to have a great time here.