Finding Our Way Upriver

Our mission was to leave on the 8 o’clock boat up river to Monkey Island. We caught a colectivo to town and marveled at the freshness of the morning air blowing through the windows on this cloudy morning. The jungle smells were strong, moist, sweet, tangy. Like salad dressing. Unsure of the layout of Leticia’s street, we caught a taxi to the docks. Its doors could only be opened from the outside, the windows were manual, and the inside might have needed the seats replaced and everything else cleaned. But it was only $2 and we arrived.

We could see our Cali friends boarding a large, albeit old, “fast” passenger boat and figured we’d travel with them to Monkey Island, but entering the ticket office we were greeted by an unsmiling secretary who informed us we were too late for the 8 o’clock boat and the other boats would not stop at Monkey Island. Further conversation revealed that someone, somehow, had figured out how to make a fortune off that single stop and we probably didn’t want to pay the extra $30 a person to go there anyway. We bought tickets for the 10 o’clock boat to Puerto Nariño, stowed our stuff in the corner of the “rapido” (running or “fast” boat) office, and set out to find breakfast. We first found a tremendous fruit market, not so large as Palo Quemado in Bogota, but still impressive with stand after stand of familiar fruits, fruits we’d never seen, meat, chicken, and an overwhelming amount of fish, which we watched them bring in from the docks. Interesting to me is that while even the little corner stores in Bogota had fruits imported from other parts of the country - popular ones like mangos and mandarins - and Palo Quemado had anything you could possibly want, this, probably the largest market in Leticia, had primarily “local” produce. Perhaps this is because Bogota had to import almost all fruit, while Leticia had the enough options to avoid doing so...?

Unloading platano on the docks, probably to ship out.

You can find anything at the fruit market... even cow eyeballs.

After an Amazonian tamal, empanadas, fresh-squeezed orange juice and many pictures later, we were finally back in the “rapido” office. We followed an employee across a board laid from shore to a floating floor, where we waited until boarding time. They packed as many bags as they could into the boats luggage racks, then threw the rest to balance on top of the boat. Not knowing we needed to be pushy, we scattered - Ethan wound up near English-speaking Germans and beside a Colombian child who loved playing with his ipad, Dianne by an American “missionary,” Tyrel by a Colombian Christian who spoke English, and I by a little indigenous girl who really wanted to close the window and was scared of me because I told her if she did, I might get sick (truth). One of our favorite sights going down the river? A school, and all parents paddling their canoes in to deliver their uniformed children. 2 hours and several rainshowers later, we were getting off on the dock at Puerto Nariño.

I didn't figure out how to rotate this before importing, but notice the approved safety walkway onto the loading dock.

Of course your luggage will make it downriver!

The first building we passed read “Hostel. Tours Available.” Looking up at the... village? ahead, we could see that we had gone just a little further back in time. Bogota is very Americanized, very modern except in the slums. Leticia was not so much so; it was a little poorer, but still not what one might consider “3rd world.” Puerto Nariño had “river homes,” built on stilts with no glass on the windows, though some building had screens. Electricity yes, and maybe even some direct TV, but anyone would immediately realize he was not in America anymore. We later learned that this indigenous pueblo had no motorized vehicles, not even motorcycles (very common in Leticia), except a trash truck and a fire engine. And really, why would they? Except for the narrow lanes up and down the hills of the village, there were no roads. Everyone traveled on the river, or on walking paths cut through the jungle. 

One of the prettier homes in the village.

We’d been told to find a man with a boat on the river. We didn’t have to look far. I turned down a man with a tour company card and a hotel offer the second I stepped off the rapido. We were standing across from the hostel when the next man approached us. This Ticuna Indian was about shoulder-height to me, with a scar or birthmark across his face, very stout, talking very fast, and so “convincing” he might have scared me had I been alone. Instead, I translated. He wanted $100,000 pesos ($50) to take us on a 6 stop tour. I couldn’t quite get straight what the 6 were, but I was sure I did NOT want to go swimming in a lake. No, he wouldn’t reduce the price if we didn’t swim, he was already giving us a good deal, think how many things we would see and do. Yes, we’d do it, but we needed to put our stuff down. Oh, where did we want to stay? Did we want something economical? That hostel was $25,000 for 2, but he knew where we could sleep in hammocks for $6,000 ($3) each. Still just a tad suspicious, we asked if we could look at these lodgings.

The restroom facilities: the barrel of rain water is an important component.

Our lodgings turned out to be a wonderful experience, but even at the first glance we knew it wasn’t a place we’d recommend to just anyone. We were introduced to a tiny indigenous grandmother who had a big empty room and a handy outhouse with a toilet flushed with a bucket and a pipe that spewed cold water for a shower  - in a concrete compartment where we found at least three kinds of mold growing. She gave us a key to a room with padlock and a bed where we could leave our belongings. We wondered if it was her room. 

Preparing grass to make string to make baskets, bags, purses, and clothing.

Our guide suggested that before we left we come see some of the artisanship of the indigenous. The tiny little woman and 2 or her friends were weaving string from grass. They parted the grass, soaked it, dried it, then braided it, each step of the process taking hours. We were later to see some of the final products and shake our heads in awe.

Finally, we were ready to set out on our adventures.