The Peruvian Amazon

A morning flight from Lima brought us to Puerto Maldonado, at the confluence of the Tambopata and Madre de Dios rivers, in the Amazon rainforest of Peru. Even though we associate the Amazon with Brazil, the river originates in Peru, near Bolivia.

We connected with our guide, Alejandro, from Amazon Planet, which is one of several eco-lodges in the area. We set off on an hour-long boat ride to the lodge. After settling in to our open-air (but screened) cabin, we were served the first of many sumptuous meals (lunch, in this case) of traditional Peruvian fare.

Amazon Planet arranges multi-day activity packages designed to introduce visitors to the rainforest. After lunch we walked the ecolodge’s trails, where Alejandro talked to us about the native trees, plants, insects and birds we were hearing (and sometimes seeing).

As dusk came on, we watched the 50 or so squirrel monkeys heading back to their beds for the night. Full dark is by 6:30pm, so we went on a night walk with Alejandro before dinner and saw SO MANY tarantulas outside their burrows at the bases of trees. We also got to see a nocturnal monkey (black-headed night monkey).Read more