As of 12:00 my paper is turned in, my presentation is done, and I am through!
The rest of the day was spent cleaning up, taking a nice walk, and after dinner, heading back at out to the swamp.
A lot of the other REUs are headed out to the dingy little bar in town tonight. but there is no way I'm not going out to the jungle on my last night.
I'm a little bit sad, a little bit happy, a lot exhausted with the whole summer.
It is going to feel goooood, to relax on a beach with my wife in a few days.
It's only natural that I saw some cool animals before my time here is done.
My favorite bird
An animal to haunt my dreams
A weird insect
And even weirder moth
Some beautiful frogs
And even a new species!
Spilotes pullatus (Tiger Ratsnake) I'll be the first to admit that I tend to err on the side of caution. These snakes have a pretty nasty reputation and I totally wussed out when it came to grabbing this one. First of all, it was close to 2m long and the head/mouth was pretty darn intimidating. It totally held its ground, hissed at me and looked pretty 'bitey'. But like I said, I totally wussed out. At least I got the chance to see one, they're known for being highly aggressive and this one proved its point.
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At lunch we saw a basilisk that looked really familiar. I'd sworn I'd seen it before...
I was going to grab him to have a closer look...
And then I remembered where I'd seen this male before!
Oh no you don't!
I found this same male, in the same spot once before. And I remember too well how that turned out.
Not this time my friend. Lesson learned. I'll be just fine with a picture thank you very much.
"Fool me once...uhh, umm, you can't fool me again"
It's weird to think i won't be walking across this bridge anymore to go to breakfast...
Part of me feels like I've been here forever.
We took one of our last opportunities to take a group shot.
Here's what we looked like 8 weeks ago:
8 weeks in the jungle can be hard on an appearance...
Maybe a better idea of how we feel is more like this:
Mentally and physically exhausted, dirty, stinky, and constantly sweaty... All told, I think we had a pretty good summer.
I had a real interesting first at the swamp tonight...
I thought I would get away clean on this trip...
I was wrong....
Two!
Not one, but two bullet ant stings!
Little bastard was under my shirt and managed to get me twice before I could rip my shirt off and run around screaming.
Holy cow does that hurt! It's not as intense as I thought it would be, but it doesn't dull. It's been two hours since it happened and every minute or so it feels like I'm still being stung.
Not my ideal last night...
But it was all worth it. There was no way I wasn't going out to the swamp on my last night.
One more chance to soak it all up.
It started out with another caiman!
And then we found a turtle and caiman! Not sure what species of turtle. I'll just call it a BAT. Big-ass turtle!
After letting the turtle we caught another baby caiman, too precious! This one actually got it's teeth on me and even that was cute, it couldn't really break the skin. It felt like when a puppy tries to nibble on your finger. Yeah big guy, you all tough and ready to rumble?
As if the night couldn't get any cuter...
Baby turtle! The shell was still soooo soft. Not sure how old it was, but it couldn't be older than a few weeks. Too much!
You know what that meant...
Track the caimans down (we couldn't find the turtle again)...
Group shot!
I've said it before and I'll say it again... if I make my kids take half as many photos they're going to hate me.
Aside from the multiple bullet-ant stings...
Although, let's be real, I feel pretty badass to be able to say I was stung twice by a bullet ant as I caught a caiman!
A great way to end my experience here.
The first time I went out at night I was scared sh*tless. Then it starts to grow on you.
Eventually it's gotten to the point where I feel partially at home in that swamp at night.
It's hard to say goodbye, but at the same time...
Two more days until I see my wife again! I can barely contain my excitement.
We don't leave until 14:00 tomorrow so I still have one last jungle hike left in me...
Until then.
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