Rio Madre de Dios

We started our journey into the Amazon with a 12 hour bus ride then a two and a half hour boat trip on the Madre de Dios river (Mother of God).

We then stayed two nights at the Tree House Inn staying in a tree house as the name suggested. Apart from the ocasional run in with poisonous spiders and ants in our tree house, it was lovely.

We went on a night safari a couple of times seeing lots of creatures you wouldn’t see in the day - Crickets, Spiders, Frogs, a Snake.

We also went river tubing as this tributary was too small for caymen or piranhas so this was safe to do.

Upon leaving Treehouse Inn we had another 12 hour boat ride down the Madre de Dios (mother of God river) until it met the larger Manu River when we turned upstream into the Manu National Park - see next post.

This stretch of river has been in the news recently as a previously uncontacted tribe (Matsigenka Tribe) had been coming to the shore of the river which is highly unusual. Amazingly we saw two groups from this un-contacted tribe (see photos), the men appeared friendly (waved) and the women and children a bit scared. Amazing to see them and share a moment in the heart of the Amazon Rainforest. I wonder what they thought of us cruising by on our motorboat? We reported our sighting at the government control point. To avoid contact and possible conflict they have banned all tourist groups landing on the inhabited side of the river.Read more