Day 3: Into the Amazon Rainforest!

Today was a major traveling day to go into the Amazon Forest. We had a long day of traveling ahead of us. We woke up early and were taken by Adventure Life representatives to the airport. We were given our tickets and we waited for our plane ride to Coca!
Coca was an interesting town. This was considered the major port town of the Napo River and the hub for all of the people in the region. We arrived and were greeted by one of our guides for the Manatee. The Manatee was the ship we were to travel on during our adventure! After a brief bus ride through the town of Coca, we arrived at the boat dock we were supposed to launch from. We greeted the other travelers for the first section of our journey. A smaller boat from the Manatee picked us up and we traveled 2.5 hours down the Napo River. The 2.5 hour ride seemed very short, because there was always something to see along the way! The Napo River had different plantations and natural gas stations closer to Coca. As we traveled further down the river, we saw a few housing developments and a couple of community centers. Closer to the Manatee, all we saw were rainforests. When we boarded the Manatee, we were given a room and the rundown of everything that will happen on our tour. The weather was beautiful with some isolated thunderstorms, which were cool to witness. Everyone got settled and we went on our first small expedition along the sandbars of the Napo River. We were looking for different bird species. There were many black skimmers, plovers, sandpipers, and greater yellowlegs. The black skimmers had very unusual bills. Their lower bill was longer than their top bill. They dip their lower bill into the water to scoop up any fish they come across. One of the most beautiful birds was the pied plover. After viewing many bird species and the sunset, we headed back to the ship for dinner. After dinner there was an optional night walk tour. I went on many night walks when on a trip to Costa Rica, and you always see some of the most unusual, fascinating creatures roam about. Two of our guides took us through a secondary forest located along the Napo River. We saw amazing insects, arachnids, and fungi. We even heard different tropical owl species. Also, I learned that tarantulas make noise that sounded similar to chirping crickets...which was sort of creepy. I brought my blacklight along and I was easily able to find the scoprians hidden within the foliage. We saw many tiny frogs and huge katydids. Overall, the night walk was a success!