Rio Claro, The Ameobas and Kidney Stones

We took off from Rio Blanco to drive over the Andes to the Rio Claro.  It is a very long drive through the mountains.  The views were beautiful, but the drive was treacherous.  We had numerous delays because of road construction.  Meanwhile, Bill was not feeling well.

We got to the lodge which was quite nice.  However, it is very hot.  Jose managed to score the only fan in the place for us since Bill was under the weather.  Scott and Chris were not there yet, but Arley was on the road, and found them.  Bryan decided to stay with them that nice, which was a wise decision.  The next morning Arley and I went into town to get drugs and the pharmacist told us Bill needed to see the doctor.  We were pleasantly surprised to find a doctor in town.  We thought we would have to drive 12 hours. 

So Arley and I drove the 12 miles back to get Bill.  We loaded him in the car and Arley blew through all the road construction screaming "hospital".  Here is the storefront.  It was a pharmacist and doctor all in one.

 

This is the outside sign.  We thought it was hilarious.

 

This was next door.

 

The put Bill on IVs, and gave him a bunch of pills. The next morning he still had horrible gas so back we went to see Dr. Martin.  More IVs and Bill was much better.  Here is Dr. Martin, Nurse Sandra and ambulance driver Arley. 

 

All was well, but then 30 minutes from Pereira where we were catching the plane, Bill passed a kidney stone.  By this point we were tired of rain, humidity and heat.  At least it was cool in Pereira.  We didn't see much of Rio Claro, but I did get to hike to the oilbirds and we saw the screamers on the way out of town.  The lodge was lovely and the food was pretty good!  I did get some good birds from our room, which was in the trees.