My Soul's Rebirth

Part 2. The Storm

Two days into my third trip the rain started. It was late evening, around 10 pm. The storm was intense with giant, sopping wet rain drops. The thunder boomed and the electrical charge of the lightening continued hour after hour. On occasion I could hear the splintering of massive trees surrendering to the heavy rain and howling wind. It was by far the most destructive of all storms I had experienced. No, Mother Nature wasn't just angry...she was downright furious! All night the storm raged and at approximately four hours in, my beloved jungle hammock started leaking. This hammock had been exceptional and it was advertised as torrential-rain-proof. I guess they need to add a disclaimer excluding Amazonian rainforest storms. Poor little Tequila was shivering in fright from the raging storm and from being wet and cold. I gently covered him up more deeply under my two blankets. It is surprising how cold it gets in the rainforest, especially being so close to such a large river, and of course from being soaked to the bone. The leak inside forced me to crawl out of my cozy little hammock and out into the storm. Luckily, I had a chunk of plastic that I used as a tarp. It was miserable though, securing the plastic in the midst of the raging storm. The storm from hell lasted about six hours and I can only imagine how many inches of rain fell in that time; four inches, six inches? Who knows. We actually awoke to a fairly nice morning. You know how the air seems unusually pure right after a heavy rain? We had that.

The majestic beauty of a river was called Jatunyacu, which means big water in Quechuan, one of the native peoples in the area. Big water....they got that right. Generally the river is classified as a class III to class IV. When the weather turns sour, it is an easy class V. The river was raging so hard that you could actually hear gargantuan boulders the size of small houses rolling and clashing under water. How do I know that there are boulders that size? Because they are littered all over the beaches. The Jatunyacu is actually the headwaters of the Napo, which is in itself one of the great tributaries of the mighty Amazon river. So you have this huge river nestled in some really rugged and beautiful country. The other feature of this area is that it borders the infamous Llanganati mountains in the Llanganati national park. This region is well known for being dangerous and unforgiving to all those who enter. The area is also legendary for the Inca king, Atahualpa's, ransom. This is quite the story and I feel it is worth blogging about down the road seeing as it is a region of great interest to me.

So it was probably about 6 am, with the sky finally settling down. Our supplies were getting low, and poor Tequila and I were soaked to the bone. The tiny one and I sat in communion for a moment, and we made the decision to head back to the city of Tena for badly needed rest.

We began our two-to-three-hour trek out. The trail was swampy as expected with some really sticky mud that tried with all its might to bring us under. The streams we passed on our way in were now small rivers with exceptionally strong currents. Like the mud, they also tried to suck us down. It took us about one and a half hours to make it to the area known as the piscina which means pool in Spanish. This area has been turned into a quaint, beautiful little swimming area that serves beer, which of course means it is a tourist trap. The piscina also represents the start of the trail system leading to my prospecting camp. This pool is formed from a cascading waterfall which joins two other rivers. The area is all exposed bedrock, which creates natural slides that are actually a lot of fun.

Generally the area is a hopping place loaded with tourists, but due to the high water and safety concerns, the piscina was shut down. I passed through a dead zone where not a single soul was in the area. Usually I would buy a beer and chat with some of the tourists, most of who were clueless that a trail system even exists beyond the pool.

I decided to settle down for a bit and to check for a phone signal. This was a critical moment when I made the horrible realization that I hadn't shut off my phone and that it was completely dead. Getting in and out of here was quite difficult, but usually I had been able to hitch a ride with one of the white-water rafting vans that pass through from Tena. Ironically, I never had to use my phone in the past and found out later that there is no cell service out there anyway.

As time passed, I grew more and more frustrated, because during my previous trips, transportation to Tena was never an issue. There I was stranded, with dwindling supplies, but I knew from experience that there was a village about two miles away, named Shandria, in the direction of Tena. After making the fateful decision to head that direction, Tequila and I packed up (about sixty pounds of gear now, compared to my previously combined weight of one-hundred pounds, which includes my drinking water that I started with) and left the piscina.