La Selva and Spanish classes

 I arrived August 7th to Gaia Amazon EcoLodge which is smack dap in the middle of the Amazon right by the Napo River. I organized this with my Spanish. The idea is trying to up my Spanish while doing something interesting at the same time.  My cabin is great, can fit four but its all for me. Very clean, lots screens everywhere, has a fridge, fan, and solid shower with hot water.

There are a few different groups here and we do excursions together. Day 1 I went for one in the afternoon. We had about a 2 hour hike through the forrest, saw LOOOOADS of interesting stuff. One of the coolest things was lemon ants. Our guide took an inconspicuous true, broke the stem and it was full of ants. They have a lemon taste when crushed, which also releases pheromones; apparently park of a defence mechanism to alarm the colony). I actually remember hearing about a restaurant in Norway that uses these, Maaemo.

Our guide Roberto pointing out a tarantula. He largely speaks Spanish which is great for me, but he speaks clearly! Super knowledgable!

Below: family from England getting ready to devour lemon ants.

Ceiba tree below - over a hundred year sold.

Justing walking through Amazon, nbd

This little monkey is part of a family that hangs around our lodge. The baby is super tiny and hangs onto mommy's back, dead weight like my brother Adam.

On day 2 we had an excursion along Napa river. the best part was swimming along with a nice current, felt very much like a natural lazy river. We saw tons of interesting plants and insects, this is one of them that apparently can make you hallucinate but is also used for common colds. He wouldn't let me eat it all :P I can't find the official name of it.

This is our little boat we used on day 2 to travel from place to place. I learned our drive is 18 and training to be a guide, he was telling me how intense his courses are cause they need to learn all about insects, plants, animals, etc. 

Below is the walking palm tree, which has those massive roots visible. It actually can move a fair bit according to sunlight. The local tribe use the spiky roots as a grinder. 

I started my Spanish classes with Gustavo. He was awesome, we are doing 4 hours a day.. play time is over! This is where I do my classes, great view! He is an amazing artist, check out his instagram artpekerman, he actually gave a painting to Gustavo Fring from breaking bad.

Day two after dinner we had a night tour! There were so many spiders, many reached out to the size of a fist, many had actually caught something and were enjoying dinner! 

Below is a poisoning frog (red backed poison frog), I was not allowed to lick this.

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