Right now I'm co-facilitating a Summer Teacher's Institute on Environmental Studies and Culture. Its held at The Lodge at Chaa Creek (www.chaacreek.com) which is an amazing jungle lodge/deluxe resort in the bush. We are staying at the "river camp" as opposed to the "resort" area... hence flying cockroaches, tarantulas, scorpions, foxes, and howler monkeys are seen, heard and experienced. Here is a short story for you. A blurb from the life...
I woke up yesterday morning at 4:45 am to the sounds of Jurassic Park... a howler monkey was right outside my cabin here at camp howling and calling sooooo loud. It was incredible. My eyes shot open and I knew immediately what it was somehow which made me smile. Because they woke me up, I had to pee, so when it stopped howling I went outside and squatted right near the steps of my cabin. I heard someone or something shuffling around in the bush and I thought it was a person, but no one was up. So I peed for a quick second but didn't even finish before lifting my shorts and running back to bed, realizing how close the monkeys were to me! The monkeys were right near though I couldn't see where they were.
Somehow I went back to bed and was having a morning/half sleeping dream when I then heard Terra call my name outside at about 6am. She said I needed to come see the monkeys. The whole campsite was asleep so I had a moment of quiet to watch 4 monkeys climbing around in the tree right outside my cabin. 3 bigs ones and a baby one, wrapping their tails on trees, eating leaves, dangling upside down, prancing around with such ease. It was truly amazing. Once they went out of site I grabbed a cup of coffee from the stove top and sat on the balcony of my cabin watching the jungle and writing... all were asleep except a few quite people and the camp was so peaceful and serene. I saw agouti (a small rodent), small foxes, an iguana, birds, butterflies... it was amazing.
Here is a link with photos from this camp and with a couple videos of the monkeys and their calls in the darkness...
http://summerteacherinstitute2010.shutterfly.com/
The password to enter this site is: belize
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