Trip to the Jungle (9-12/3/2007)

We set out for a 4 day trip to visit the 3rd Orphanage which is in a jungle region called Chapare. First we we're to pick up a team arriving at Santa Cruz airport from Chichago. This would normally take around 6-7 hours in a car. We we're in a bus and after 45minutes of driving we we're told the road was closed so we had to turn around and use the old road to Santa Cruz. So our journey took around 17 hours and we finally arrived at a nice hotel that we spent Saturday night at. The journey had some incredible scenery as the road followed a river for along time. There has been alot of flooding in Bolivia and has been one of the worst years for landslides which we saw alot of on our journey.

Trying to stay awake, we spent Saturday afternoon in Santa Cruz city for lunch and then afterwards we went quad biking. It was quad biking as it should be, you could basically go any where, including a river which Helen managed to lead us nicely into only to find we couldn't get out. The bike sunk and after some funny attempts with some local boys to help us out, we abandoned it and caught a round back on their quad bikes which we're probably the smallest things with engines I'd sat on, in fact I lay on him and Helen sat on me.
After picking up the team Sunday morning, we headed for the jungle,about 3-4 hours away. On the way we visited a monkey sanctuary which we have to say we didn't enjoy a great deal as these filthy little things kept jumping and crawling all over you, trying to rob your camera and money. The 3rd orphanage stopped being built due to the rain but the flooding had now gone down and so we could help start again. We visited the Church who is supporting it and also the builder with his family, Sunday night was spent at a hostel 40 minutes away. Monday morning we started work by hauling cut planks of wood from the jungle to use for building.

The team had also brought alot of clothes for the kids, so a meeting was arranged with all the kids in the village to come that afternoon. Unfortunatly our time was cut short at the jungle as Mike had heard rumours our route home was closed. So we left pretty quickly and headed back where we found a long line of trucks lining the main road.

(A tricky 3point turn for our driver)

After a bit of discussion Mike came back with the news that our road back was closed. After a further bit of investigation Mike came back with two options. We can either go back to Santa Cruz and back on the old road (which was also rumoured to now be closed) a total of around 24 hours of driving or we can take a taxi up to near where the road is closed, walk 300 metres across the closed part then catch another taxi to Cochabamba. It was decided that 300 metres was easy enough with our luggage so the guys from America repacked their bags with essentials and left the rest on the bus (which would hopefully return to Cochabamba the next day). We squeezed into 2 taxis and drove around 40 minutes, 20 of which was lined with trucks by the side of the road. The taxis stopped where they couldn't go any further and there we got out, keen to see what the problem was.

Well as we've come to realise in Bolivia, nothing is easy. We soon found our little walk was actually a little longer than quoted, in fact 300 metres became 3000 (3km). We finally reached where the problem which was an enormous land/mudslide. It was like half the mountain had given way. It was an incredible sight everything was gone in it's path. Bulldozers and trucks had been working the night previous to create the road again but still had a few days more. We then were told we had to walk around where the work is, up the mountain a little, through the landslide and down the other side. After acres of mud, awesome scenery, alot of rain and drenched luggage we arrived on the other side where the road appeared back again. It wasn't too far until we reached where we finally caught our taxi to Cochabamba ( a 2 hr drive). It was an unforgetable experience and something we may never see again.