LA SELVA (The Jungle)

Last weekend we had a wee field trip to Lima (well, an 18 hour bus ride isn't exactly 'wee'), to meet up with all our fellow gringos from around Peru, and then we headed into the jungle! Sounds exciting and exotic doesn't it? Imagine my disappointment when I discovered it was just like New Zealand. Check this out...

I don't know if you can see them but there's a whole bunch of ferns in this photo. There were also other trees that looked like Kahikatea and Rimu and other such NZ natives.

Bush walk: In some parts the earth was kinda red but further into the jungle it was just like the NZ bush, I swear to you it even smelt the same. I'm not alone in this, there were three other NZers there from the school programme and they all said the same thing. I would have taken more photos just to prove my point, but I didn't come all this way to take photos of New Zealand. If it wasn't for the occasional coffee and banana plantation I would have asked for my money back.

They did, however, also have some very authentic-looking locals...

These ladies live in the small village we stayed in for one night in Pichanaki. We had a wee bonfire with some jungle dancing and music and whatnot.

This guy is from an indigenous Indian community in Pichanaki. They dress up for the tourists and do cultural exhibitions of dancing, sports, and hunting, etc. of their community. It was fun. They were selling these hats but I couldn't find one that fit.

This chick is holding what looks like a large shuttlecock. It's for a game that's a mixture between badminton and volleyball. You play in teams of four and just hit it with your hands over the net, or, if you're me, you wave your hands around wildly and miss it every time until it gets to the point that they've given up being polite and just laugh at you and then cheer when you finally hit it.