Home » Ecuador » La Amazonía: The Village of Wachimak

My time in the amazon was easily the most extraordinary time of my life. nothing that i have ever done can compare to that time in adventure, uniqueness, and pure incredibleness . . . i imagine that this is what travel was like 100 years ago. there were many times that i felt like a national geographic explorer truly discovering the ways of the ecuadorian amazon.

La Amazonía: The Village of Wachimak

Andy Wunder
2007-04-19 22:35:13

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given a strange and repulsive drink to quench my thirst. it didnt quench anything.

here i was in the middle of the amazon, about to live with people who spoke quechua. live with people that knew very little of me or my world.

My hut. They cleared a bit of forest and put it next to a small river. It was a 5 minute walk from the village.
when they reach adolescences, they take a wife, make a family, and learn to hunt and farm instead of learning how to drive a car. they dont work for money, they work to subsist. on the first day, the man that looked after me asked me the name of the leader of the US ... for those of you that arent surprised, even the most uneducated and illiterate ecuadorian kid knows the president of the US.
i was truly in the middle of nowhere, living amongst a foreign people in an environment only known on documentaries. I was incredibly excited for the weeks that laid ahead of me.

they led me to my hut ... and i literally mean a hut. it was a 5 min walk from the village and through the jungle to another clearing. my hut was on stilts and right next to a small river. im not quite sure why they chose to place my hut far away from the village, perhaps for privacy, but i would have preferred to be in the middle of the village. during the day, the jungle is of unquestionable beauty. however, at night the amazon can become a frightening
place. all light is swallowed underneath the canopy producing pitch blackness and the jungle makes some very frightening noises at night. it didnt help that they told me of the poisonous nocturnal snakes that inhabited the jungle.

i spent my first day becoming acquainted with wachimak. as i met the people and animals i was going to spend the next two weeks with, i truly had no idea what laid ahead of me. below are some recounts of the incredible experiences and obstacles that i encountered while living with the people of wachimak.

it is only appropriate ...