After months of skirting the Amazon, we finally made the trip in Bolivia, where it's pretty cheap to visit. However we splashed out on a flight to and from Rurrenabaque ("Rurre") not wanting to take any risks on the notorious road there from Lima (parents be glad!): the prospect of sitting on a bus anywhere from 12-40 hours was not one we relished, particularly as we were visiting in rainy season. Even with the flight we were warned that cancellations and delays were common so with our only delay being about one hour on the way out, we felt quite lucky.

From La Paz, the highest international airport in the world at 4061m, we arrived into Rurre in the rain and touched down onto a landing strip surrounded by trees. As we came to a halt, I couldn't see an airport building. We saw two buses full of people and realised we were just doing a direct swap with them: there was no 'airport'. We were taken into the centre of town and the slightly soggy bags were unloaded off the roof. We checked into a reasonable hotel across the road then spent the afternoon finding some lunch and wandering the tiny town in the rain. At this point I was fully expecting to be wet for the next five days on our tour.

The next morning we woke up to dry weather and went to the tour company office to meet our guide for the trip, Eloy. He is the same age as me but we'd grown up worlds apart; his childhood was spent in a small community deep in the jungle of Madidi National Park (where we spent the first part of our trip), learning how to make animal sounds and hunt. He reckoned he can make about 70 different animal noises. We heard a lot of them and they were pretty incredible. Also his hearing was amazing and he picked up on so many sounds while Simon and I walked along almost oblivious.

We got into a long boat and headed up-river for two hours to our jungle lodge. The journey was beautiful as we went past rainforest, cliffs and hills. We arrived at the very comfortable lodge and were handed a glass of juice by an incredibly smiley lady. After a small relax in the hammocks, the first of our three-course lunches of the week was served. The food all week was great: a huge variety served buffet style (I'm not sure if there was a meal where a Simon didn't pass up on seconds).

That afternoon we went on our first jaunt into the jungle where we were out enjoying the sights and the sounds...and the humidity. As we walked, we passed through different types of forest where we saw different types of trees, almost like they were living in different communities. One of these was the Devil Tree which is colonised by red ants. The tree provides a nice home and good food for the ants and in return the ants use acid to keep everything away from the tree- including Simon- giving it a nice bit of space in the forest. Simon had a red bump on his neck for a good few days after hitting the tree one too many times to get the ants to come out.

Not long into the walk Eloy managed to hear a noise that we could not for ages. We crept towards it and I was really really hoping it was a tapir. Sadly it wasn't but we did find a tortoise which we got really close to. Apparently the sound was two of them fighting but the other one had scarpered. We also got to see yellow squirrel monkeys, lots of different birds, ants and butterflies and a preying mantis. Eloy also picked us some cacao fruits to try. You can suck the seeds inside which are covered in a sweet goo.

After an excellent afternoon we were grateful for a shower on our return: after so long in the Andes, the heat and humidity were killers. With dinner we drank a bottle of Bolivian red wine, given to us by the company we booked the tour through in La Paz. Not my favourite but it was ok!

At 6.30 the next morning, we were on a boat heading a bit further up river. We were dropped off for the start of five hours in the jungle. We walked towards a clay cliff which is populated by macaws and parakeets. We sat at the bottom of this cliff for a while watching the green parakeets fly and screech overhead. After a while, the magnificent red and blue macaws appeared; you knew when they were near as they made an even bigger noise. We also watched birds of prey circling, looking for some breakfast. After a while down below, we continued our trek up through the jungle towards a viewpoint at the top of the cliff. On the way we walked past some very fresh jaguar footprints and although we didn't see one, it was quite exciting knowing that one could be very close. Eloy also found us a group of wild pigs which were incredibly well hidden considering their size and the size of the group. After a tough climb in the heat- but thankful we could breathe properly again at 200m above sea-level- we reached the viewpoint where we sat for about an hour, savouring the amazing view of the rainforest and of the macaws flying around. They were now much closer so we were able to get some good photos of them sat on branches. Unfortunately trying to capture a photo of them mid-flight was nearly impossible.

On the walk back towards the boat we saw a White-Throated Toucan which was really far away which Eloy had spotted with his eagle eyes. We also saw massive Bullet Ants and Eloy testified that their bite was excruciating.

In the afternoon we walked into the forest from the lodge once again to look at some of the trees. We saw a huge Ceiba tree with a massive trunk and a mahogany tree- pretty rare these days. There are lots of trees from the fig family, some of which have incredibly long roots that run along the surface of the ground. The most incredible though was the walking tree, so named as it 'walks' 5cm per year by growing new surface roots from the trunk down, placing them on a new piece of ground. We also saw a few animals, the best of the afternoon being an Amazon Poison Frog, an innocuous enough looking small frog but with sufficient toxin in it to kill a human.

That night we went out for yet another walk (I slept so well that night!) to see what else we could find. Sadly no tapirs but we did see: two spiders; two frogs; bats; a capuchin monkey and the eyes of a caiman.

The next morning, we sadly left our jungle lodge and got back in the boat to Rurre. Back at the office we picked up Savva, a 17 year old Bolivian/ Russian for the next part of our trip into a savannah area called the Pampas. It took three hours to drive there and a very short boat ride to our lodge, once again very nice. The Pampas tour is more popular so the lodge is a lot bigger but it was quite quiet while we were there.

The Pampas reserve is a small amount of land either side of a river so most of the best wildlife-spotting is done from a boat. Even on our two minute boat journey to the lodge we were able to see caiman and pink river dolphins. That afternoon we went out for a better look where we saw lots of big caimans chilling out on the river banks, turtles sunning themselves on branches and dolphins popping up in the water, although with the water being muddy and the dolphins only popping out for a couple of seconds at a time, we couldn't get a really good look. We saw many birds including herons, kingfishers, cormorants and flycatchers. Also the ever present paradise bird with its Mohawk hairstyle. In the distant trees we were also able to spot Howler monkeys and Capuchin monkeys. One of my favourites was the Capybara, the world's largest rodent, looking like a giant guinea pig. We saw a Mum and her baby who didn't seem to care that our boat was so close. That evening as we were leaving the dining hut, Eloy spotted two Brazilian porcupines in the trees just outside.

The next morning we were out in the boat again where we saw all the same animals as the previous day but we were on a mission to find black caimans and yellow squirrel monkeys. We didn't see the caimans but we saw lots of the monkeys who came down from the trees to see us and a couple even got on the boat. It was really good but I felt that there were a couple of unecological practices going on to make this happen. The boat was driven into the bank and overhanging trees several times to get the monkeys to come out and find out what's happening which disappointed me as the company has an ecological policy to not disturb the environment and wildlife. Although our company didn't do it, I think other companies may feed the monkeys which may be why they come so close. Simon thinks they're just curious. Anyway it was still a good trip out.

That afternoon I went out on my first ever fishing trip! But in the rain. It had been too good to be true up until now so we were well overdue some. To begin with I was more successful than Simon, catching several fish including the odd one we could eat but then Simon trumped me by catching a massive Catfish and even a Piranha by accident: he threw his line way too short by the boat but somehow a Piranha latched on. A good achievement as the little blighters weren't easy to catch. You could feel them on the line, bring it up and realise they had craftily nibbled the beef off the hook. Although the fishing was quite fun, I didn't really enjoy the fish flapping around on the end of the line or when one jumped out of the container next to me. Savva found it hilarious every time I did a small shriek and kept trying to get me to touch the fish.

Arriving back very soggy, we ate our catch for dinner. The Piranhas had a disappointing amount of meat on them but the Catfish were yummy. After dinner we were back in the boat, minus the rain, to look at the caimans. All we could see of them were their eyes glowing a bright orange in the torchlight as the bathed in the river. Pretty eerie but also amazing to see.

Our last morning in the Pampas was perhaps the worst for me although Simon enjoyed it. Armed with wellyboots and a stick, we walked through tall grass until we got to a large field of plants and 30cm of smelly swamp water. We were here to look for Anacondas although in reality I was just looking at my feet, making sure my boots didn't get submerged. I was also quite happy to know that the chance of finding one of these massive snakes was very slim at this time of year. Fortunately we weren't out for too long before getting back on the boat and getting drenched again. The redeeming feature of this trip was on the way to search for snakes we got to see more of the dolphins than we'd seen before and they followed the boat for a while. We also saw lots more Capybaras, including some more babies.

After lunch, with the rain continuing, we were on our way back to Rurre. With so much rain, the first bit of road was a muddy slide where I was glad the car had seatbelts! Fortunately this came to an end soon but then we got to a closed barrier in the road, which was stopping lorries using the road in the rain. Our driver hopped out to test the ground around the side of the barrier and decided to give it a go. We hopped out to make the car lighter then watched for ten minutes as the driver wheel-span in the mud with various men pushing. We were happy when the car made it out and the rest of the journey was uneventful.

We really enjoyed our trip and felt like we'd been so lucky with the weather. Also we'd lucked out having such a small group which made wildlife spotting much easier. The lodges, food and guide were great and best of all we didn't get too wet!

After another night in Rurre, and filled up with French pastries from the great bakery there, we headed to catch our flight back. After checking in at the office, we were taken on the bus, to discover that there was an airport building after all, in the most rudimentary form! Here we were briefly scanned and our hand luggage given a cursory glance and then we were taken to the landing strip. We got onto a tiny plane with about 18 seats, where we could see the pilots and all the instrumentation and then we were off, back to La Paz and the end of our jungle adventure.

Katy