Posts in “South America” Category

My second Peru blog takes place in the Amazon rain forest. Together with the NG Kids Expedition Team, we stayed in an open-air room with no windows or doors, so we really felt like we were part of nature. To get to the Posada Amazonas Lodge where we stayed, we had to take a boat on the Tambopata River, which eventually flows into the Amazon River. When we were on our boat ride, we saw the biggest rodent in the world, a Capibara, which was really cool to see.  We also saw a troop of squirrel monkeys and as you might know, I love monkeys.
 
It was a long day of traveling to get to the rain forest and they gave us lunch on the boat. To help the environment, our lunch was vegetable rice served in a banana leaf, so when we were done, we threw the leaf in the water which the fish got a free meal from. It's totally safe for the environment and leaves no garbage. By the time we got to the lodge it was getting dark. Once we got to our room it was really dark. The rooms were lit by candles, so me and Tyler wrote our blogs by candlelight, which was different.
 
The next day we went to a lake and took out a pontoon paddle boat so that we could quietly float on the water and see the birds.

We also went to spots where we could fish for piranhas. Our group caught two of them using meat as bait. Our guide showed us the piranha's sharp teeth, which was awesome.

Hello everybody. For this blog we are reporting from the Amazon rainforest.  
 
The first thing we did when we got there was take a 90-minute boat ride to our rainforest lodge. We cruised up the Tambopata River, which is a tributary to the Amazon. It goes for 5,000 kilometers until it meets the Amazon.
 
On our ride over, we saw some nice wildlife, like the capybara, which is the largest rodent on earth and is the size of a dog. We also saw a huge tree filled with lots of monkeys. Besides mammals, we also saw lots of birds, like macaws and toucans.

Hello people, I was just in Peru with the National Geographic Kids Hands-On Explorer Challenge Expedition. It was such an honor to be with the kids who won! Thousands of kids entered this contest and only 15 got a chance to go. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't enter. All the kids that won never thought they would be picked, so you should try it next year ... plus, it's really fun.

We met up with the group when they were flying from Lima to Cusco, where we all spent time together in the Sacred Valley. One of the days we were there, all of the kids participated in a "treasure hunt" with a group of local people who live in the highlands of Peru (we were at 14,000 feet!). Our first competition was hair braiding, since this is a popular traditional hairstyle in Peru. Our team did not do so well. The second competition was textile weaving. I learned how to how to do it from a local woman, but I wasn't so good at that either. I got to keep the bracelet I made though, which was a really cool souvenir from our trip.

 

We also had an event where we used slingshots to shoot at balloons and hats that were strung up in some trees. It was hard but really fun. One of the kids, Dewey, was really good at it. He shoots beebee guns at home, so maybe that's why he was so good.

Hello everyone. I was just in Peru, where we met up with the National Geographic Kids Hands-On Explorer Challenge winners. We spent nine days in Peru with them, which is really exciting. Some of you might have read their blog posts on this website over the last two weeks.
 
We met up with them at the airport in Lima where we flew together to Cusco. After we arrived, we took a bus to a traditional weaving center where they knit tapestries the way the Incas did hundreds of year ago using wool from alpacas. Before they could even start weaving, the women spun the wool using big wooden tops and then dyed it all different colors.
 
From Cusco we went on to the Sacred Valley, which was at almost 14,000 feet in altitude. Because most people are not used to that extreme height, some got altitude sickness. Stefan and I took medication against it, so we were okay. Our activity for the next day was a treasure hunt with a group of local people from a nearby village.