Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #113 – A Labor of Love

First of all – thank you for so many inventive, creative and fun interpretations of last week’s challenge – Pick a Word! Fabulous!

Rusha Sams of Oh the Places We See is our host this week, and she has chosen to highlight all those people who work for a better society and a better world. A Labor of Love.

As so many of us do these days, I think of the health care workers, police and firefighters – all those brave people helping us in this unruly world. But my thoughts also go to all those who work for a sustainable world and helping vulnerable species to survive – because biodiversity is essential to us all. Without biodiversity we will all perish and our planet is lost. Even if we are living in a pandemic now, we know that other problems will not go away – we have to fight them all, simultaneously. Tough. But, the pandemic is also a result of how humans have abused and misused Nature and our only home, planet Earth.

In the header, the dotterel beach in Coromandel.

In 2016 we went to Ecuador, the Amazon Basin and the Galapagos Islands. Threatened already then by the oil industry and new settlers burning down the rainforest, but little did we know of the many fires that would arrive through mismanagement and the pandemic.

A vast piece of jungle was once bought by a man from the Netherlands who wanted to save it from getting destroyed. We stayed at his eco-lodge with local people guiding and lecturing about herb medicine and Amazon plants and animals. These people were born and raised here, lived here and knew the jungle like the back of their hand.

They took us out on crystal clear waters…
…silent canoe days
…and if not out on the waters – then bird watching high above the Amazon jungle.
Luis was one of our skilled guides, helping us find essential plants for cuisine and health. This was certainly a Labour of Love for him – a way of helping his people, animals and plants survive. He could also recognize and identify several hundreds of different bird sounds.
For Andi, his Labor of Love meant that several villages could survive – and thrive.
This journey is the most highly treasured one of all my journeys through 47 years. To see these people’s loving faces in preserving and teaching about their natural environment was a great joy and to learn how deep their knowledge is of Nature’s secrets was truly humbling. Knowledge and skills of this kind can only be yours if you are born and raised here. I am forever grateful to have met them all.

”We hope you’ll join us in sharing your interpretations of “A Labor of Love” whether you showcase a person or a group or an object notable for the labor or laborer involved.” Publish your post and add your link to the Comments section at the bottom of Rusha’s post. Please don’t forget to add the tag Lens-Artists so you can be found in the Reader.

Next week we will be back on schedule, and Amy will be our host for challenge #114. Until then – stay well and be kind. To yourself as well.

CFFC: Letters Ap

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Letter A – Needs to start with the Letters Ap

For Cee this week – one real and one fake (handmade) ”apa”…in English ”monkey”!

WPC: Dense

Ben, at WordPress, is asking us to show Dense in photos – and what could be more dense than the rainforest? Here, in Ecuador and the Amazon area, the forest was a dream for tree lovers like me.

Breathtaking views from the canopy

WPC: Ambience

Ambience – Nature is the master of this…I return to late evening canoeing along the narrow water ways of the Amazon basin. The darkness of the forest and the light still filtering in through the canopy. Hitting the tiny inhabitants of the river bed. The sounds of the rainforest tell you …you are not alone.

 

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CFFC: Dark and Light

Dark and Light for Cee’s challenge – much of that in the rainforest, but also the reflections on the poles every lodge was sitting upon. Here some bats resting after their night adventures.

 

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Amazonas – Goodbye and Happy New Year!

The very last shimmering hours at Sacha Lodge, we spent canoeing again – and finally, for the sunset over the Amazon, in a high tree tower up in a giant kapok tree.

Let us start with the canoe ride – full up with fresh food and ready for the last adventure!

Finally we reached the last path, hiking to the old kapok tree.

Slowly the sun was fading and the light smoothened out both the landscape and the minds of us six friends sitting in the kapok tree. Each one in his own world…knowing this was the last day, the last hours of our great adventure. The Amazon saying its goodbyes…and us contemplating life’s beauty, in this moment in time

No words needed – only the sounds of the rainforest. A sadness and a joy, a thankfulness and a hope for this wonder to survive, to be given to our children and grandchildren.

In the early morning, we left this Paradise. Of course it showed its most glorious face this day – for us to treasure and to keep in our hearts.

Sacha Lodge will go on helping the locals with free water taxi, school supplies and a medical assistance program – and ecotourism to positively influence the course of land management in the area.

On reaching the Napo River again – a tiny, but clear rainbow appeared in the sky –

I want to thank you all, readers, followers, everyone who finds joy in my posts – it is you who make me tick…I hope to see you again next year – 2017. All the best!

Amazonas – Almost Airborne!

The last days at Sacha Lodge, we spent most of the time 40 metres up – above the canopy of the rainforest. In fact, ”Sacha” means ”forest” in Quichua, the local language here.

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The biodiversity is extremely rich in the Amazon, and the list of birds sighted at Sacha, for example, is at 605 species – in an area of 5000 acres. 12 species of monkeys and plants somewhere in the thousands. Trees are about 100 species per acre – no wonder my treeloving spirit soared in the canopy!

Climbing down again and walking back to the lodge – Luis Andi shared some of his extensive knowledge of the medicinal plants in the rainforest. We had noticed him being an excellent scout, moving soundlessly on the narrow paths, but also an excellent birdman – he knew about 400 birds (and could sound like most of them!) I do not have to say he was born and bred in the Amazon. 90% of Sacha’s staff is made up of locals from Ecuador’s Amazon region.

We were all very impressed – to say the least – of our guides’ knowledge. There was not one single question about birds or animals that Pablo could not answer, and Luis and him were the perfect couple to guide us through the secrets of the tropical rainforest.

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But, now we were extremely hungry…knowing that a delicious lunch was waiting back at our lodge. We would need it before the afternoon and night adventures.

Amazonas Day Two – A Monkey Business

After having some (read MUCH) lunch, we were ready for the afternoon waterways.

Led by our excellent guides, Pablo Maya and Luis Andi, we spent hours under the dense vegetation exploring Anaconda Creek.

Water sallad was all over the lake – decoratively spreading its light green beauty.

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More magic tunnels – imagine the sounds of the Amazon rainforest touching you…gently

…and then the monkeys were all over us! Howler monkeys, cappucciner monkeys and most lovely of them all: squirrel monkeys. Jumping and feasting in whole squadrons…they even jumped right over the canoe – curiously observing us. Enjoy!

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Darkness descended early upon us in the Amazon basin. Around 6 pm it was time to return to Sacha Lodge after a long and eventful day.

Home, sweet home – by now Sacha really was our Home. The lights invitingly calling us…

Good night, this last night of the old year, 2016.

WPC: Resilient

Resilient – well, the crocodile species outlived the dinosaurs, and their relative, the caiman ”Lucy”,  lived under our breakfast lodge in the rainforest. She might survive us all…

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