Travel Diary: Iquitos and The Amazon - Part One
Ama and I descend into the thick wilderness of the Amazon Rainforest.
Our journey to the Amazon began with a flight from Cusco to Lima, followed by a second flight to the northern city of Iquitos, a sort of last refuge of civilization before the vast, primitive, emptiness of the Peruvian Amazon. Although they took the better part of the day, our flights ran like clockwork and we found ourselves stationed at our hotel in Iquitos just after 8:00 pm.
We set out to find a spot for dinner to discover that Iquitos was still hopping at this rather late hour on a Sunday night. Families occupied the square where kids played on jungle gyms, rode the motorized train, and enjoyed ice cream treats with huge smiles. We watched the locals intently. Seeing local life is one of the best things I encounter when traveling, and this was the first time on this trip I truly felt as though I were seeing it played out.
The streets were clogged with incessant traffic that featured almost no passenger cars. Scooters, bikes, and Tuk tuks - a motorized scooter with a back seat and covering for one to three riders - made up for the overwhelming majority of human transport, while the remainder of the traffic was largely buses and trucks making deliveries.
After walking for about twenty minutes, Ama and I found a spot called The Yellow Rose of Texas. In addition to traditional Peruvian fare, they offered something they referred to as a burrito. I was wary of finding a genuine burrito in Peru, but we figured it was worth a shot. What arrived was an Asian fusion burrito on a Lo Mein pancake. The chicken and rice inside were smothered in a dark sauce that harkened more of a Hunan chicken than a Mexican burrito, but we managed to wolf it down and felt sated enough for bedtime. We ambled back to the room still intently watching the people and wishing we would have had more time to explore the city of Iquitos.
The following morning I awoke at a reasonable hour, and gathered my stuff together before heading down to take a brief walk and snap some pictures of Iquitos before we hit the river for the jungle. As I walked the morning streets, I said hello to passersby and watched taxi drivers, Tuk Tuk operators, street vendors, and shopkeepers beginning their days. I wished many of them hello in my limited Spanish, and smiled. Most returned the smile and responded, “Buen dia.”
I asked a group of Tuk Tuk drivers if I could take their photo and they were more than happy to play along. The young couple I met a few blocks down the street had a different answer. The young lady was keen to the suggestion, but the young man seemed to feel weird about the idea. I thanked them in my limited Spanish and wished them a great day.
By 9:00 am we were in the shuttle to our first stop before our boat ride up the Amazon.
Just outside of Iquitos sits the Dallas conservation compound. This non-profit is dedicated to taking animals that have been trafficked or injured by humans and nursing them back to health for release in the wild. During our brief tour, we learned about the mission of the group at Dallas and got see some of the patients in their clinic before they’re released back into the wild.
The first stop on the tour was a series of small water tanks that are the size of very large hot tubs. Inside each tiled pool were injured manatees of varying sizes. One juvenile even had a white mark on the top of his head where he had been attacked by a machete. In addition to manatees, we saw tapirs, cayman, capybaras, macaws, toucans, parrots, and a pair of monkeys. Some of the birds had even had the feathers yanked from their bodies. These poor birds are slowly attempting regrow the feathers necessary for flight. Assuming these birds can be nursed back to full health, they will one day likely live a life again outside of captivity.
Back in the van, we made the 45 minute drive out to Barrio Florida where we would catch our long boat for a 90 minute ride up the Amazon to our lodge. Exiting the marina at Barrio Florida, we made the short ride to where one river ends and dumps into the main artery of the amazon. The river in this spot of Peru is incredibly wide and serves as a water based superhighway. Traffic is constantly going up and down the river to a variety of towns, small cities, villages, and resorts. We saw longboats like ours carrying tourists, but also caught sight of a wide variety of water taxis, barges, and cargo ships.
After more than an hour on the Amazon, we turned right onto a small tributary and things began to quiet from the commotion of the main section of the river. The river began to get quite overgrown with bamboo along the edges of the water and much of the central portion of the river was littered with dense fields of lily pads and other greenery that at times made passage for our long boat a bit tedious. We passed a number of lodges and resorts as well as a host of small villages. It was nearly 2:00 pm when we arrived at Lodge Amak on the banks of the Amazon.
Once we had been given a tour of the grounds, we met our guide Carlos and some of the other terrific staff at the lodge. Ama and I checked into our cabana, a lovely little two room cabin up on stilts to account for the varying levels of the massive river nearby. Having settled in and dropped my stuff, I hopped back down to the common area to find a pair of cervezas for an early afternoon toddy.
Ama and I enjoyed our beers on the porch of the cabana and settled in to listen to the sounds of the jungle. We marveled at the peace and serenity of the place while just outside our yard lay the most immense and vast ecosystem on Earth. I studied the myriad colors of green that populated the leaves jutting from the forest. I listened to the birds making a variety of squeaking, honking, chirping, and beeping noises. One species of bird in the complex sounded very much like R2D2.
At 4:00 in the afternoon, we met Carlos at the edge of the river for a short boat ride further downstream to do a bit of fishing. Carlos ferried us through vast fields of lilies and bamboo that sat atop the Amazon. In many places along this stretch of the river, the greenery is so overgrown there is no visible top to the water surface. Several varieties of small birds with light, web-like feet were able to walk atop the lilies in search of bugs for sustenance.
After 30 minutes of travel we came upon a small cove where Carlos shuttered the motor and began to prep primitive fishing rigs for us to attempt to catch a piranha or two. The rods we used were honed sticks with a line fastened to the narrowest end of each rod. Each line is then equipped with a small sinker and a hook. Carlos then pulled out a bag of fish pieces to use for bait that he fixed to the hook for each of us.
Our traveling companions Bill and Monica from Connecticut had better luck than we did at first. Standing at the front of the boat, Bill pulled in a pair of the small fish with legendary teeth in relatively short order. Monica then moved up to use the same spot and was successful as well. Finally, I was goaded into taking a turn at the front of the boat as well and within a few minutes I had a piranha on the line. The small fish wasn’t even the size of a Blue Gill that would qualify as a keeper in the States, but it was a piranha and I had landed it in the boat! in the middle of the God Damned Amazon! I might as well have been Papa Hemingway in that moment.
After a few more minutes of fruitless fishing, Carlos drove us the 30 minutes back to the lodge so we would have time to clean up before dinner. Ama and I read and then enjoyed another beer together before heading down for the evening meal.
Amazingly, there were just five guests other than Ama and me at the Lodge during the first bit of our stay. We came down to dinner at the main gathering area in the lodge to find a trio of tables laid out for the seven of us. The dinner of chicken, rice, and a traditional Peruvian appetizer made of yucca, bacon, cilantro and a creamy sauce was exquisite.
I lingered after dinner a bit getting to know a couple from Britain named Ollie and Tosh, as well as a woman from Chile named Anita. The three were all in their mid to late thirties and were kind enough to let the late-middle aged American hang out for a bit. Ollie and I chatted about US politics and the current shitshow happening in my country. Tosh and Anita spoke to each other in blazing Spanish and I managed to keep up with about 10% of what was being said. Still, I was happy to listen and work on my second language skills.
Eventually, I made my way back to the cabana with the flashlight of my phone to lead the way through the jungle darkness. I listened intently to the frogs, crickets, insects, bats, and nocturnal birds as I strolled. Ama and I chatted for a minute or two before I crawled into bed for a short read and sweet dreams of the Amazon.
Cheers,
Matty C