Today was another awesome day. We woke up early so we could climb up the tower at our lodge and do some bird watching. We saw some beautiful coloured parrots and a Tucan from close up! After the bird watching and breakfast we set out on a long paddle canoe ride. We went down a small river and to a lake that is only accessible by paddle boats. It was nice and quiet and we saw a few more birds. It was blistering hot…which reminds me I don’t think I have mentioned how hot it is here! I sweat just sitting still. Thankfully we have been able to stay in the shade or have a breeze from the motorized canoe. But when we were paddling there was no protection, just straight sun. On our way back down the river we had an awesome view of monkeys from quite close up. We also had a really good sighting of the pink river dolphin. You see so much more going at a slower pace. At one point the dolphin must have been hunting a fish near our boat because all of a sudden there were a ton of bubbles and the water got cloudy and then a big fish jumped so high out of the water and nearly landed in our boat! We also saw one of the dolphins swimming around with a fish in its mouth!

We paddled almost 6km and we were exhausted when we got back to the lodge for lunch. After lunch we relaxed and just spent the afternoon in the hammocks. A big group arrived today that will be spending Christmas in the amazon! We are leaving tomorrow to spend Christmas in Quito.