Macará and Jocotoco Jorupe

Every few days I get itchy to go somewhere. So, on Tuesday I decided to get on a bus to Macará. There are two routes that the buses take and I chose, of course, the wrong one. It was 6 hours on a mostly unpaved road which was still being constructed. The buses are comfortable, the ride was beautiful, but it was tedious travel. This route took me through Cariamanga and Sozoranga. The birding website Birds in Ecuador informed me to look for chestnut collared swallows in Sozoranga. I did not see them. I use that website and its maps for all my birding trips. It is very helpful. Finally, I arrived in Macará. There were few choices for a hotel on Tripadvisor. It is a very small border town. I did, however, choose the best hotel. Hotel Arrozales, named after the mainstay of the town- the rice fields- is a new, modern and clean hotel. I asked the attendant if I could see the room first. Queen size bed, a balcony, large shower with hot water and very clean. For $20. Sold. I changed my shirt and went for a walk. There is an airport which had a closed control tower. It wasn't needed as the people on the runway were not in planes. I suppose it was a remnant from the border wars of 1940 to 1995. It is also very convenient for drug trade. It is in the middle of town and folks sure aren't going to walk around it! I ate a shrimp and rice lunch at a Peruvian restaurant and drank a pitcher of a local drink with a lot of sediment. Delectable for $4.50. One of the first things I noticed about the town was that they like to fly their flags. On the Peruvian side the cows were white and the farmers dressed in red and white. Interesting. There was a futbol game on- Ecuador vs Venezuela- but no one in public places watching it. The girl told me people watch it from home. I could hear the game from every house. I found a new bar called Vino y Tapa and watched the game with a few locals. Ecuador kicked ass. Back at the hotel I asked for a taxi at 6am. They looked stunned. How much. $30. No way. I realised that they had no idea where the Jocotoco reserve was located. " I will call in the morning" she said. In the morning the kid at the desk could not get a taxi. I don't think he knew how to call one. A kid comes walking down the stairs with an expensive  camera on his shoulder and binoculars around his neck. Bingo! "Are you going to Jorupe?" Yes, I said, do you want to share a taxi? "No, I have a car" Bingo again! So off we went at 6:15 am to Jorupe which was only a 10 minute drive. The gate was locked so we walked up to the lodge. It took an hour and we saw lots of great birds. A bat falcon was the most impressive. Thibaud Aronson is from France, about 25, speaks English, Spanish and French,( not a dumb US college kid) and was traveling from Peru with his father. He had to go back to the hotel at 8 to pick up his dad. I stayed and walked the trails. They feed pale-browed tinamou's at the lodge. Nice bird to see. When I got back to the lodge Thibaud was there with his father, Allen, I think, a notable botanist. Again, I meet such interesting people. They dropped me back at the hotel and headed back to Peru. I rested and went for a long walk down to the river at 4pm. Along the way were hundreds of chestnut-collared swallows along the electric lines. They were everywhere. Field workers stared at the gringo with binoculars. Got the birds I was looking for and back to the bar!
Christmas trees are up. They seem to love xmas trees in Macara. They also love manger sets. Very elaborate manger sets. I saw many little baby Jesus's. No xmas music though. Again I asked the hotel to get me a taxi for 6 am. I got one at 6:30 and it was $5 to Jorupe. I walked up to the lodge and birded the trails. Red-billed sythebill. Long-billed starthroat. 13 new species! And the trails are beautiful through the Tumbesian dry forest. The ceiba trees are glorious. Fantastic place. I got back to the lodge and asked the girls to call a taxi and have him pick me up at the front entrance in 1 hour, as that would be how long it would take for me to walk down. At the road I waited almost an hour. No taxi. My blood began to boil. It's hot, I'm tired and I have to walk back up. I gave the girls a piece of my mind I probably should not have shared. I had also learned that I never had to pay $160 a night for a room at Jocotoco lodges. I am a resident and the price should be $60. Now I'm really pissed. I got an email from Paola, who runs the lodges in Quito, saying that those poor girls never had to call a taxi before. Bullshit. When I did have a taxi come- and I made him drive up to the lodge- it wasn't a taxi but some kid with a beat-up car. Paola was upset because she said I called her a liar. She has never given me a straight answer, which is typically Ecuadorian. She offered me a refund which I refused but I told her I would have to reconsider doing business with her. $160 is very expensive as lodges go in Ecuador. And their food is just simple fare. She emphasized that the lower fares are to teach ECUADORIANS. I emphasized that the money for Jocotoco comes from GRINGOS. Which is true. Anyway, I didn't let this spoil my day and got back to the hotel in time to go have a beer. Or 4. And a vino verano. Or 2.
Next morning I caught a taxi at 6:30 and went to the border crossing. This is the only place where you can access the river. The comb ducks are found here. I found 4 of them! Back to the hotel and breakfast- included with the room. I was told that trucks go to Loja and I could catch one in front of the church. I found one and it costs $10 to go to Loja in a brand new 4-door Chevy truck. We would take a different route to Loja. All paved roads. A young couple with a baby also were going and they were in the back seat. The driver was the fastest driver I have had yet. The tires squealed on every curve. The baby was laying on the seat and if he had slammed on the brakes she would probably have needed a new baby. At the police check point they wanted  to see my passport. We were in Loja in less than 3 hours. Speedy Gonzalez gave me his number. It is so easy and cheap to travel here.
A friend of mine here passed away after what should have been an less complicated operation. I'll stay with my Harvard surgeons. Very sorry to see him go.
Now I am waiting on my landlord, who never tells the truth, to come and fix screens. I may move again soon. This house is a little expensive for what it provides. I should stay here and wait out the El Niño event for which the U.S. Embassy sent a warning. It is supposed to be one of the worst ever, especially along the coastal provinces. We shall see. I'm ready to go somewhere again!

Smugmug

Jocotoco Buenaventura

The Jocotoco Reserves are areas where land is purchased in order to preserve certain species of birds. There are 11 reserves, I believe. I went to another reserve for 4 days. The Buenaventura Reserve and the Umbrellabird Lodge are closer to the coast, northwest of Loja. I took a bus to Loja and then the bus to Piñas, a 5 hour trip. My bus driver looked like an Ecuadorian Ralph Kramden. In Loja an indigenous woman asked for the time and I showed her my watch. Then I realised she could not tell time so I told her the time, which I should have done to begin with. In Piñas I took a taxi west for 40  minutes to the reserve. It was a holiday here in Ecuador. The Day of the Dead, when all go visit their relatives stacked in tombs. The bus took a route which carried us over a narrow dirt road for 2 hours. My vertigo has diminished considerably. Along the way I saw folks bathing in the rivers to cool off and wash themselves. I had to close the window on the bus to keep out the dust. It was hot. The sun was bright in town but as we neared Jocotoco in the taxi the clouds descended. I was in the cloud forest again. The muddy road to the lodge was about 5 miles long. As it was a holiday there were many local families visiting the lodge to watch the hummingbirds. Many were trying to touch the birds. Two Coatis came and one shit in the corner. Everyone laughed. I was shown to my cabin and immediately headed out on the trail to bird (verb). White-shouldered tanagers, blue-necked tanagers, club-winged manakins- check! There were birds everwhere. I, I, I say, everwhere. The cloud forests are truely amazing places. The variety of plants and flowers are astounding. At the lodge was Bruce Sherman from Texas. He was in Ecuador to photograph birds. He had an elaborate setup for pictures of hummingbirds. There were 5 flash mounts  on tripods. One of the ladies tried to look through the flash. Bruce dosen't speak Spanish and told her slowly 'it's aaa flaaashh..'  She was a little embarrassed. Bruce seemed  to think if you spoke slowly enough everyone understood English. A 30-something couple from San Francisco showed up at the lodge and Ivan intoduced himself as a board member of Jocotoco. Not much personality. His girlfriend  is an Ecuadorian who has lived in D.C.  The 4 of us had dinner and chatted about the foundation and how they had to split the tour business away from the foundation. Jocotocotours are a separate entity. I was in bed by 9 and up at 5 to meet my guide, Leo. We walked the old road up  to a higher  elevation to look for the El Oro Parakeet, which is one of the birds of special interest. There was a derrumbe which  blocked the path  and I was afraid to try to scale it--- long way down. I dipped on the parakeet as I  did at Tapichalaca and  the golden-plumed  parakeet. I'll git em one day! My guide was a nice guy but not a great birder. I had nice looks  at white-tipped sicklebills and club-winged manakins were abondanza. They make a sound with their wings. Watch one HERE.
The next day I walked the trails alone and saw many more birds. The long-wattled umbrellabird is the most fascinating crow-size bird. The males resonate their calls through the wattle, which is  longer then the bird is tall! I heard  one  calling and tracked him down. Not easy to do in the jungle.
Ivan and his GF departed and were replaced by an older man with white, unkempt hair. A Brit was here. Not your average Brit, mind you, but an O.B.E. Brit! Nigel Simpson is the benefactor of Casa Simpson at Tapichalaca and founder of Jocotoco. A  pharmaceutical chemist who sold the company and gave money to preserve birds in Ecuador. At dinner Bruce wanted to know if Brits liked the Queen. I wanted to know how he came to have a frog named after him. He funded the exploratory project. He was quite interesting and very personable. I enjoyed talking with him.
I stayed an extra night. It is hard to leave the cloud forest jungles. The beauty and strange sounds are enchanting. Eleven  new species of birds. But soon I was back on a bus headed home. A man threw a glass bottle out the bus window and I finally said something. Shame on you, I said.  He wasn't phased.  I'm sick of adults littering here. Shame, indeed.
My porch spider lives. I thought she was dead when I found her dangling from her web one morning. I lowered her to a bush and she climbed under a leaf. Maybe she had just ate her husband and it made her sick. She's better now. She greeted me this morning and had a juicy June beetle to suck on. I'm so glad.