Night walk, night stalk

Following dinner on 3rd February 2007 I had agreed to go for a night walk with Richi, one of the guides at the lodge, who wanted to see the jaguar. I had expected to slowly walk a few hundred metres looking for insects and frogs, as I had a few nights ago with RN, Vika. As we set off, however, he announced that we would walk to 2500 m on Main Trail (it’s about 5 km in total). Not only was this a much longer walk than I was expecting, it also took us just past half a kilometre of “messy” trail that winds around and over tree roots and is always treacherously wet and slippery. It’s my least favourite section of any forest trail. Not only would we walk this, but then we would have to turn around and walk straight back through it!

Treacherous roots, wet, and windy, this path is bad enough in the day, let alone in the dark!

We set off at a fast pace along wet and muddy tracks with no hope of being quiet enough to not disturb the animals. I was a bit cross at the unanticipated length and our seemingly pointless fast pace.

Very early on, however, we saw the night monkeys. These are really cute and, as the name implies, active only at night. I hadn’t seen them before and managed to get a good view this time, which was a good start to the walk!

We trudged on. It wasn’t until we were past the evil rooty part of the trail that I began to feel happier. Even though I was tired (I’m normally in bed by 9 pm!) I wanted to walk a bit more on the nice flat, dry section of trail before facing the journey back across root-hell.

We saw a peccary (like a wild pig) move across the trail in front of us and stopped to see if it would emerge again. We turned of the torches and waited quietly. My eyes quickly became accustomed to the dark. It was almost a full moon and visibility below the trees was very, very good. Nonetheless, the animal was gone. We turned to walk back along the good section of trail in the moonlight. Once again, the forest was astonishingly beautiful. The white moonlight on the track and the dark silhouette of the tree branches against the light sky.

I saw a huge frog sitting in the middle of the path! I’d seen little frogs before, but nothing this size. It sat there in the light of the torches for quite some time. This was more like the walk for frogs I’d been expecting.

About hand-sized. Somewhere I have the proper name and will endeavour to add this and the others soon!

I staggered back though the evil section of trail, sure that at any point I would fall. I splashed into a puddle and nearly stepped on the biggest toad I’ve ever seen. Only it’s back was visible, but it was beautifully coloured. It had green lines and red splodges. It obligingly hopped out of the water so that I could see all of it. Buffo marinus, the largest of the amazon toads. I took a few photos and then Richi picked it up to show the black patterning on it’s white belly. We noticed strange white slug-like things on it’s back and wondered what they were (later we realised it was a secretion made against predators that has hallucinogenic properties if ingested).

Buffo marinus the largest toad in the area! Very very pretty!

The journey back was strangely surreal. I found a couple more large frogs on the trail and we stopped in the swamp at around 1900 metres to look for tree frogs. It was far too wet to get into the good corners of the swamp where we’ve found frogs before, so we walked a little bit around the edge. We found another large frog and one small tree frog before the depth of the water and persistence of the mosquitos persuaded us to leave.

I was feeling much happier now the rooty bit of path was past and we’d actually seen some really cool frogs! I was also walking in the front for a change. This is nice on night walks because you can see further ahead than the next person’s wellies, and the glare of the light isn’t as bright. This time however, it was a mistake. We heard a sound to the right and stopped, then Richi urgently called me back the 6 metres or so to him. I got back just in time to hear something fairly large move away through the undergrowth. It was a cat – a jaguar!! Richi’s heart was racing! We turned the torches off and listened intensely in the hope that we might see it again. Admittedly, I might have felt a bit more secure had we had, for example, a machete or even a big stick ;-)

We could hear movement a little further down the track, so crept slowly forwards (past the 1500 m marker), listening intently for further signs of where it is. Then we hear a low, mournful growl in the forest. It was spine-chilling and primordial. Unmistakably a large cat. We stand in the dark. The sound moves around us to the left. I felt simultaneously afraid and excited that I might see a jaguar!

Gradually, the howl or growl started to come from further away and then behind us, and eventually was lost. I don’t know if I was relieved or disappointed at this point! We continued along the path with a bit more bounce in our steps, excitement had won (at least now the danger was past!).

Abruptly the tree tops ahead of us began to shake violently! Something large was moving in them. Probably monkeys. Perhaps alerted by the movement of the cat, although that was further away now, so maybe it was something else... We stopped, our torches off again as it’s much easier to see where the trees are moving in silhouette. With the lights on, you only see those branches closet to you as the light reflects off them, and the jungle feels much more closed-in. Once again, we were waiting in the dark. As we heard movement, we’d briefly turn the torches back on.

Then Richi spotted something high up to our left. We turned the bright torches on in time to see a shape clearly visible walking along a branch. A monkey... but no! It doesn’t move like a monkey, but like.. like a cat! It’s a black cat! A puma?!! But no, it’s too small? “Jaguarundi” Richi supplies. Cool!! We watched it for sometime. After prowling along the branch, it waited in the tree, part of it’s body hidden and it’s tail hanging down curled around the tree towards us. We watched it with the binoculars until my hand became stiff from pressing down the “extra-bright” button on the torch.

The tree tops were still shaking around us and we finally moved the torch away from the cat. Instead we saw the red howler monkeys. These are one of the largest species of monkeys seen in this area and normally active in the day. They were clearly moving away from the Jaguarundi!

The rest of the walk back was fun. I felt buoyed-up by our encounters with the cats and very, very surreal, like I was dreaming. Frogs, toads, peccary, monkeys and cats all on one walk!! What more could I ask?!!

Cheeky frog sitting in the path!

No pictures of the Jaguarundi, I'm afraid, it was pretty dark and high in the trees and I was busy watching it!!