Peru Day 5: No wonder they call it the Rainforest

With the open wall style lodgings we heard our neighbours get up at 3:30am for their final departure - keep it down! Then our wake up call from our rep, Delford (he did this in person) at 4:30am though to say that the first trip was cancelled until 8:00am because of the rain so more sleep.

Breakfast was disappointing though we both needed something plain for our dodgy innards. A small boat ride upstream to visit a parrot lick. It was a very muddy bank to climb onto then a 40 minute hike through 'secondary' forest. My choice of socks soon became noticed as my ankles rubbed more and more. The heat, lack of food and the dreaded diarrhoea from the morning got me down. By the parrot lick I was glad to rest but a bit miffed at the lack of birds. The stomach cramps and diarrhoea came back with a vengeance as I paced up and down praying for toilet roll, Luckily, Nico the German girl with us had brought some with her, so with some advice from Delford I legged it away for some brown relief - hopefully no one will find that mess for awhile!

Back at the viewing hut things had got more exciting as we spotted two toucans then two macaws. Both sets not interested in flying down to the lick as it was still too wet from the rain. Again, curse my money pinching ways for not buying a bigger camera lens as the colourful birds were just too far for decent snaps. Apparently macaws go in pairs and look out for each other in case eagles attack. Toucans are quite lazy as they only fly after its rained and cooled down, just like us Brits.

We walked back to the boat learning a thing or two about local plants. My ankles were getting really cut up by now, and with the baking midday heat, I was glad to get out of the wellies and have some food. The first course was cold, boiled potato, egg and curry sauce - blurrgah, avoid! Luckily, the second course of roast chicken and rice helped bung me up.

Nico gave me some plasters and iodine cream to patch up my poor ankles then we tried another siesta before our planned trip to a farm and pre-evening hike. The builders and volleyball playing staff tested our powers of sleep but it was the pounding rain that got us up. After that we decided to not go to the afternoon's excursion and rest in preparation for Machu Picchu.

We're getting used to the toilet situation of not flushing away the paper but could really do without the squits. We're now avoiding the provided filter water in favour of bottled from the bar. After speaking to our rep, Delford (who I've since taught him to say 'Rodney, you plonker!') we're also stopped taking the malaria tablets as he's assured us that no mosquitos carry it in the local area. This might have been the cause of both our stomach problems. The afternoon was just catching up with my journal and learning how to play chess with Kerry. Before sleeping we had to evacuate a rat who was more interested in gnawing the wooden floor than my oncoming foot!