Day 22: Sacha Lodge - Monday 12th February 2018
Another pre-dawn start. This time we had a 30 minute walk through the forest to the Canopy Walkway. This walkway is suspended 36m above the forest floor, between 3 towers and extends for 275m. It is a most impressive place from which to view the tree-tops. While the walkway swings a bit, the towers provide stable platforms from which to view birds ... which we did for 3 hours.
After a cold shower and a change of clothes (these were definitely 3-shirt days) we had lunch - and today we did have a post-prandial siesta. We spent the later part of the afternoon being paddled in a canoe by Miguel (mainly) and Shanshu (occasionally), around the lagoon and into some narrow waterways leading from it. Here we had close encounters with several new species of bird; including: the diminutive American Pygmy-kingfisher which we watched catching a fish and then 'braining' it against a twig; a Rufescent Tiger-heron that exploded from the water just in front of the canoe - its plumage so cryptic that none of us had seen it just a few metres ahead; and a 3-toed sloth high in the trees above.
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After descending back to the forest floor we spent another 2 -3 hours seeking out whatever wildlife would come our way. This included 2 species of hermit and Spix's Night Monkey (Aotus vociferans). Genus Aotus is the only genus of nocturnal monkey; there are several species ranging from Panama through the tropics of South America. As is implied by its specific name, Spix's is sometimes known as 'Noisy Monkey'
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