As we did yesterday, we started our day with the birds. Up at 5:30 and in the skiffs by 6:00. When you first roll over at the sound of the alarm clock, you wonder, why am I doing this? Once you get outside and the life of the river is flying, swimming and hanging all about, it all becomes obvious. This is the time the forest wakes up, and you should as well.
A few of our highlight sightings of the morning included a family of waddled jacanas, mostly toes with a few feathers perched on top, picking their way through the water lettuce. A family of wide-eyed night monkeys peeked from their hollow tree home. Squirrel monkeys leapt fearlessly from shoreline vegetation. A squadron of over a dozen blue and yellow macaws squawked and flew over our three skiffs.
We walked in the forest at Casual. Here were found two snakes, a red-tailed boa and a green anaconda. The one that stole the show and our hearts was a baby female three-toed sloth, tentatively climbing up and down a small cecropia tree.
For the afternoon the ship tied near Nauta Creek. Black water meets white water in this area, and both the gray and pink river dolphins were busy fishing all afternoon at the convergence.
Boarding not only the skiffs, but the kayaks as well, we investigated Nauta Creek, finding more squirrel monkeys and a singular red howler monkey. Once again we had a productive and exciting day of discovery along tributaries of the Amazon River.
