Manu Day 1: Cusco to Cloud Forest

As the van wound it's way through Cusco's narrow cobblestone streets with orange tiled rooves the sun was just starting to touch the tops of the far hills.  We were on our way to Manu National Park, one of the least touched parts of the Amazon rainforest.  It's been a dream of mine to visit the Amazon ever since studying it in school.  Thoughts of killer ants, poisonous snakes and battalions of mosquitoes couldn't deter me.  Ben, of course, was just wanting to get photos of everything, especially the ridiculously elusive jaguar.

Onwards through the Andes, with clear views of Ausungate mountain, over a 4,000m pass and time for a quick stop at some pre-Incan ruins.  It was clear that our guide for the first part of the trip, Miguel, was a keen birder as he quickly pointed out a pair of American Kestrels, then stopped the van to get a better look at one of them.

Ausungate mountain in the hazy distance

Pre-Incan funeral tombs

The famous view from the top of the Andes looking down across the rainforest was unfortunately covered in low clouds, so we piled back in the van and started heading down and down through the cloud forest.

Hazy cloud forest

We stopped for multiple walks down the road, seeing various birds including the rare grey breasted mountain toucan, hawks, hummingbirds, plus delicate orchids and a variety of fuschia.  As we descended there was more to see - a nesting solitary eagle (well in the distance), our first view of monkeys - woolly monkeys - and a flash of colour allowed me to spot golden headed quetzals which Miguel said were very unusual to see.

The only toucan picture through a tiny window in the leaves

Roadside hawk

Roadside hawk transforming into Gonebird

Brightly coloured bird of some sort

The last walk of the day was to see the famous Andean cock-of-the-rock.  This peculiar looking bird is the official Peruvian bird, due to it's colouration, and the males perform a curious display to attract females.  At one point we could see 8 males all dancing and calling, but no females.

Somewhat strange . . .

. . . but gorgeously coloured cock-of-the-rock

By this time it was raining in earnest and as we rolled into the cloud forest lodge and I did begin to question our decision to head into the rainforest for 9 days . . .

However, by dinner time the heavy rain had stopped and after dinner we went out on our first night walk.  Even before leaving the lodge grounds Miguel had found our first specimen:

Prince in waiting

We walked a short distance along the road, avoiding puddles and enthusiastically waving headlamps around.  The road was surprisingly busy with traffic, not quite as remote as we'd expected.  I was glad we weren't travelling on it after dark as it was quite interesting enough in the daylight.

There were plenty of bugs to gawk at, plus frogs to Miguel to point out.  He became rather excited when we could hear an owl, but no amount of spotlighting or playing owl noises on his ipod could reveal it.  We went to sleep with our first experience of the humidity - the cloud forest is still quite high and cool, but already everything was damp.  The night noises from the insects lulled us to sleep - crickets can be surprisingly loud!

Teenie frog

Slightly larger frog

Slightly larger frog in different pose

Some kind of katydid