First hike to the study site

Hey bloggers! Sophia here, reporting that we have all survived the first trip to the study site. It was about a 4 hour hike from La Esperanza and uphill for most of the way, we were lucky that it had not rained much, so the mud was easier to walk through. 

 

where we slept

On the first day, we hiked up one of the trails to start marking our survey points, we were quite high up the mountain when we heard monkey vocalisations, we decided to follow the sound, scrambling uphill and off the trail, I honestly do not know how Andrew managed it with his camera. But we made it and what a site, we saw a group of yellow-tailed woolly monkeys (Oreonax flavicauda) not too far away from us. The adult males are clearly distinctive from the females, due to their bright yellow hair tuft around the pubic region, which is contrary to some of the literature. They were so amazing to watch. We have also seen a few potential night monkey sleeping sites.

Peruvian night monkey (Aotus miconax)

The next day we continued our vegetation data collection along the trail, when it started to rain...it started light and soon became a torrential downpour, we were all completely soaked and had to return to the campsite, as it is too difficult to walk the trail in heavy rain. The rain continued for the rest of the afternoon and prevented us from going back.

cloud forest

On our last day before returning to La Esperanza we decided it would be better to split up into two groups, one group was to finish the vegetation data collection on the B1 trail (Nicola, Josie, Andrew and guide) and the other was to go to the B3 trail (myself, Asli and a guide). However, we did not realise that it would take over an hour just to get to the other trail and that we would have to boulder and climb through really awkward and slippery terrain. But we made it to the start of the trail and started to mark our survey points. All our hard work was paid off because later on we encountered another two groups of yellow-tailed woolly monkeys vocalising at each other, it was just unbelievable to see them so close.

yellow-tailed woolly monkey (Oreonax flavicauda)

The journey back to La Esperanza was a little bit quicker, (possibly due to it being mainly downhill) and although the rain held off during the day, there had been enough to make the mud even more slippery and tricky to walk through...the only footwear recommended for this terrain are wellington boots, anything else would just not survive, even hiking boots. The final part of the journey was the hardest, as it required walking uphill again. But we all made it back in one piece! :)


We're heading back for another five days on Thursday, so hopefully there will be more amazing photos to share with you and maybe even some video.