real ECO-tourism
We have just come back from a very ECO-friendly tour to´the jungle´, booked at an agency (Maldidi Travels) run by a very inpiring woman. Let me explain:
A few days ago we flew into the Bolivian Amazonas, into Rurrenabaque with the idea to go on a pampas tour. This is a tour into the wetlands around here, were you can spot loads of wildlife.
But we heard some very animal-unfriendly stories: drugging a tarantula spider with cigarette smoke, so you can put it on your face for a picture, grabbing baby kayman´s & anaconda´s to show them to you (which apparently caused that there are 50% less around these days) and feeding wild animals. So we weren´t that keen on going to the pampas anymore.
But then we ran into Rosa Marie, a very interesting Bolivian woman who managed to achieve that a part of the rainforest here is now a national park (which means now it is all protected area) in a time when Bolivia was still a dictatorship. Something that required a lot of persistance and guts, because she had (and still has) a lot of enemies. Such as local politicians who want to built a huge dam in the area or to cut down big pieces of forest to make a lot of money, but of course would destroy the nature there.
Despite this (often criminal and violent) resistance she still succeeded in making part of the rainforest here, a national park. This is why, a couple of years ago, she has been decorated as the worlds most effective nature conservator.
Now she has bought a big piece of another part of the rainforest herself to also turn it into a protected area; the Serena reserve. To attract tourists to this reserve she has built some nice lodges over there, reached by a 3-hour boattrip from here. The profit that is made from the tourist visits, is invested back into the reserve, for further protection against illegal hunting etc.
So this is how we ended up going on this more expensive, but definitely more ECO-friendly ´jungle-tour´. It was certainly worth the extra money!
The lodge was very romantic. It had no walls, it´s only surrounded by mosquito nets. Not even the bathroom, but because you´re only surrounded by rainforest nobody can see you anyway. And because there is no electricity, at night everything is lit by candles.
After blowing out the last candle it is pitch-dark, which makes you experience the noices and smells of the rainforest even more.
But we were also a bit worried after our neighbours found a scorpion in their lodge. The guide told us not to worry though, because he had a cure for scorpion poison. He came up with an old fishook, we never realised before that fishooks should be part of the first aid kit……
We woke up the next morning by the sound of rain. Very cosy. Even though it´s dry season here and we arrived in a humid and very hot environment, the weather has changed very quickly during our stay. So it has mainly been raining here for the past few days.
During our stay in the Serena reserve we still got to see a lot of animals. In between the rains, we still walked a lot, spotting heaps of monkeys, and have canoed along a couple of lakes, spotting heaps of birds and a some kaymans.
We also enjoyed the food in the lodge very much, because even though they don´t have electricity here, the cook still prepares amazing meals. He was for instance able to prepare a very creative but very tasty ´cholcolate-pancake´ cake for Jannis´ birthday.
Even since we have arrived back in Rurrenabaque the rain has not stopped yet. So we can´t fly out of here, as there is only a grassy airstrip here (we heard that the mayor here doesn´t allow the building of a concrete airstrip here since he still is trying to build the dam, and too many tourists going to the Madidi park would prevent this forever). So instead of an easy 1-hour flight we are going a 20-hour bus-ride back to La Paz tomorrow….
Love, Martine.
P.S.
We have published loads of pictures on our Flickr-webpage again.
Tags: Travel, Tag Index
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