We started our day with a nice forest walk near San Francisco Village. This location is very close to the confluence of the Marañon and the Ucayali Rivers. Once merged, they originate the mighty Amazon River, which will continue to travel eastwards under that name for another 2,300 miles until it reaches the Atlantic Ocean!
The forest, where we walked today, is only exposed during low water season. Although, technically, we still are experiencing “high waters,” the volume of it has already dropped enough to expose some land in different sections along the river.
Some of the villages will also be established in “dry ground” areas. This is the case of San Francisco Community, which we visited right after breakfast. The community is occupied by approximately 400 people, most of the locals are fishermen and farmers, as there are not many other jobs or any other sources of income.
The friendly villagers greeted our guests by inviting us into their lives and their houses. As we strolled the simple cement-paved sidewalks, we saw smiles and waving hands all over the place.
The community also has one school, which is not only attended by the kids from this village, but also some children from other nearby villages who commute on a daily “canoe” journey to attend. Today our guests not only experienced the simple life of the rivereños (river people), but were also invited to enter some of the classrooms to talk to some of the students.
Our visit ended in a big “shopping frenzy,” as the local women involved in producing handicrafts using local fibers and materials had all their products on display right outside the school grounds! We all loved the colors and the creativity it must take to make all sorts of animal figures! Several products would be very handy for our daily city lives!
Our afternoon took place in a completely different location by the Ucayali River, known as Clavero Lake. Although there is a community nearby under the same name, we concentrated our afternoon on looking for the wildlife of the area. Some of us chose to cross the lake via skiff, while others were enjoying a nice kayak exploration on the nearby creeks. Occasional showers were experienced, but what is a trip to the rainforest without a little rain, right?
