We walked off the ramp and across the runway into 100% humidity and sweltering heat – what a change from cool, dry, high Quito!

We retrieved our overnight bags from a communal pile on the runway and boarded a “4th class” public bus for what became a 3-hour kidney-mauling ride beginning with a mad dash to board the ferry across the Rio Aguarico (gold was once mined here). Through farmland on narrow, mostly unpaved oil-sprayed roads up and down steep hills over rushing rivers, we followed the Texaco pipeline road along the Rio Napo to Hacienda San Carlos near Coca.

There we boarded the Flotel Orellana for a 40km / four day trip downriver and back. The Napo is a major tributary of the Amazon at 1,075km in length.