Emerald Forest Expeditions

We had heard that Iquitos, as Peru’s fifth largest city, was a cheaper option for some more fun in the jungle. With the option of trips by boat up the Amazon river for between 1 to 5 days, and many jungle lodges to choose from in the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve, we decided to fly with Star Peru and see what all the fuss was about.

After some delay and a stop over in Tarapoto we finally arrived in the humid and dense heat of the tropical town. We were warned that the taxi drivers were pretty aggressive outside the airport, and yet it was sill surprising that they were so aggressive! Be prepared for them to be right up in your face until you relent.

We had booked into a hotel near the central plaza and so made our way there. It was a hotel / casino called Atlantis and it was pretty good, pretty quiet and pretty cheap. Tired after our long day we rested a while and then went out to organize our short time in the city.

Iquitos was a rubber-boom city whose appeal has since faded and been replaced with cloying pollution from the thousands of Chinese auto rickshaws motoring around the badly maintained streets. Originally the site of a Jesuit mission that was built to convert the indigenous people, Iquitos eventually swallowed up these local tribes after hundreds of years of fighting. The rubber boom in South America caused the city to swell in size to over 400,000 until the party ended when Asian rubber farms began producing at a faster and cheaper rate. Since then, Iquitos began to rot a little.

Located on the banks of the Amazon, Nanay and Itaya rivers, Iquitos is linked to the Atlantic and many boats ply their trade along this route. Dolphins and even bull sharks have been reported to have made it this far upstream. The city is otherwise inaccessible by road, as the only road out of the city goes to neighboring Nauta (another port) but no further.

We made it to the Flying Dog hostel and they kindly put us in touch with a jungle lodge called Emerald Forest Expeditions. The guide turned up half hour later and we arranged with him a three day tour beginning in two days into the jungle. More about them later.

We ended up also going to the Amazonian Indigenous Cultures Museum which was nearby the hostel and plaza, but it was a little expensive to get in. We did learn a ton of stuff about the customs and experiences of tribes all over the Amazon though, not just in Peru. Definitely a recommend.

Some of these tribes are just a few hundred strong, and although their cultures seem quite similar at a quick glance, they are actually very different when you scratch the surface. Many of the tribes use feathers, seeds and the like for self-decoration, they create similar looking musical instruments from the same trees and animals, and they all use bows, arrows and blowguns for hunting.

The small differences in length of blowguns or what type of poisons are used to catch fish (such as Barbasco, which the Shuar and Nukak people use) each signify regional differences in ecology. The first tribe we read about called themselves Kaapor, although they are called the Urubu Tapiii by their enemies, which means vulture barbarians. Groups are identified by the land they own, usually identified by which rivers they live along, and the Kaapor are no different. They were only contacted by the modern world in the 1920s when the government paid them off to get them to stop their cannibalism. One of the things that they share with all of the tribes we read about, is a strict adherence to separate gender roles.

As in all parts of the world, women are treated appallingly in the tribes of the Amazon. Young girls are often singled out at the time of their first menstruation, until it is over, and then pretty much used by either the chief or all of the guys in the tribe until she is married off to a life of work and child bearing. It is these cultural attitudes that contribute to the reputation of Iquitos as a haven for child sex tourists. We saw countless posters here, and elsewhere in the Amazon, warning against this behavior. The guide books even mention that it is common to see Western men promenading along the river front with their pre-teen ‘dates’.

Another exhibit told of the Kamayura from the upper Xingu river, who believe that when you die, you go to an exact replicate village where everything is the same, but everyone sleeps in the day and hunts and is awake at night. This village exists in the heavens, whereas the Kaipo believe the exact same myth, except the village is deep in the forest somewhere, and the dead can sometimes claim the living and make them come alive in the dead village. They believe spirits are scared of smoke, and so the men and women smoke furiously all of the time.

The next day, we had a full day of sightseeing, so we got up early and headed down to the Iquitos dock by auto rickshaw, where we chartered a boat to take us up the Rio Nanay to the Amazon Animal Orphanage and Butterfly Farm. The rickshaw cost around 6 soles, and the boat was only 40, which included the guy waiting and bringing us back. We hung around for a tour which is given by the volunteers who work there. The Pilpintuwasi butterfly farm was started by a German lady who still lives there, but it seems to be more of a zoo than an animal sanctuary. The animals are often purchased in the local Iquitos market (called Belen), where endangered animals are often bought and sold.

Because these animals have been kept around people for so long, the zoo, er, I mean animal sanctuary, argue that they should not be released to the wild. There are many such ‘animal reserves’ in South America, and no matter how well-intentioned, it is difficult to know whether it is a good thing to support them or not. Are they helping the animals? Or just helping themselves with the ticket prices?

The volunteers did a good job showing us around the place, and we saw many butterflies feeding on lumps of fruit in the butterfly garden. They seemed to like my hat, as they kept hanging off of it. Bald Uakaris were also being mischievous outside the butterfly enclosure, stealing tourist’s things, and opening rucksacks. Cheeky things.

We learnt that certain butterflies lay their eggs only on certain types of plants. Therefore, in the butterfly hatchery, they had the different types of plants where we could see the caterpillars and the chrysalises, some over 7 inches long! Some of the chrysalises were metallic-looking, just as pretty as the butterflies.

Afterwards we saw a variety of animals that we had not had a chance to see up close and personal before, including a beautiful Ocelot, a Pygmy Marmoset, and a Spix’s Guan. It was nice to see the different animals, and it was a good way to spend the afternoon.

We headed back to the Puerto Bellavista, which is where you can negotiate with a water taxi to take you to the zoo. This is where Francesca decided to try a Suri grub. These fat little grubs grow in palm trees that have been cut down, or fallen down, and left to rot. They are skewered like a kebab and then grilled on a BBQ. I felt they were too disgusting-looking to try, but apparently they are very nutritious. Francesca had a nibble, but maybe we got a bad batch because they tasted and smelled like horrible fish. There are some recipes online for these gross little dudes.

Later that afternoon, we had a bumpy ride in an auto taxi (rickshaw) out to the Amazon Manatee Orphanage, which is just past the airport. Unfortunately this place had no costs on display, so it was not very easy to say if they were overcharging us or not. Call in advance.

We decided to go in, and were pleasantly surprised to find a project to breed and look after local Tortoise and Otter populations. The main attraction though, were the River Manatees that were being looked after. We were even able to feed them the weeds that they like to eat, with their grasping mouths. The manatees are hunted still by the local population for food, and so are now listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN’s Red List. They are closely related to Hippos and Rhinos, and just like Whales, are mammals that returned to the water after their ancestors learned to walk on land. That is why they breath air. They do not like to be scratched though, so if you touch them, no nails!

As a bonus, we even saw some wild Titi monkeys in the tree, but they didn’t hang around for photos!

On the 10th October, we were met at our hotel by the guide who runs the Emerald Forest Expeditions lodge. He and his wife accompanied us to the lodge (she was cooking), and so we set off on the long journey up the road, out of Iquitos, to the town and port of Nauta. The taxi driver incessantly chatted to our guide, for almost an hour, as we chugged along past the pretty landscape, marred only by the build-up of the communities along the road.

In Nauta, we stopped whilst our stuff was transferred to a boat ready to take us to the lodge. We checked out the local fish market, which was covered in flies, dogs and children. After awhile we got on the longboat, with its outboard motor, and headed up the Rio Mara towards the Rio Amazon. This stretch of the river was not that interesting. Just a few naval ships, which Peru use as a show of force against the coca drug dealers. We passed numerous huts, and cleared areas. As with much of the wide Amazon river that we visited, there was not much beauty to see, and the boats are often positioned in the middle of the river where it is deepest, but where nothing can be seen on the far shore.

We eventually left the river to a tributary river, called Yanayacu. It was a few hours down this river that our lodge was located. We began to see a few more animals, such as the Black Collared Hawk, amongst the bushes and trees. The river was not so wide now, and so we could see any animals that might be there, such as Egrets, Herons, and insects.

We came across the lovely lodge, sitting high above the high water mark, on stilts. Within a few moments of arriving, we already started to see large tarantulas sitting on the palm tree ceilings of the lodge. Big hairy buggers, but pretty harmless if left alone.

We had some food, which was excellent every single mealtime. We wee then given some free time for bird watching and relaxing. We immediately found some Yellow-rumped Caciques, with their hanging nests, a group of large Horned Screamers hanging out in some reeds right by our lovely room, Wattled Jacanas, and even some Squirrel Monkeys jumping through the trees!

That evening we went on a jungle walk, and saw some pretty cool trees. Our guide, Julio, told us that we should not touch anything, as there were many things in this part of the jungle that were poisonous. Sure enough, we soon came across a tree called Hura crepitans, or jabillo, locally. This is the sandbox tree, whose sap is toxic and can cause illness in humans. It is covered in sharp spikes, but I am not sure why, as it has poisonous sap and bark, but you can bet we never touched it! Not long after this, we saw a huge poisonous Amazonian Giant Centipede. These aggressive little buggers are highly toxic, and our guide seemed pretty scared of it, so he cut off it’s head! I vehemently didn’t agree with this, but did not say anything to the guide. It was his lodge, we were to spend another two days with him, and he had already killed it. He would not have done so had we not been there, so I felt a little guilty over this, especially when I found out later that these creatures are rarely fatal to non-allergic humans.

The next day, we saw even more birds. Kingfishers, Toucans and Greater Kiskadees. We went out in the morning in a canoe, and paddled gently along the river. It was interesting to see that the high water mark was several meters above where we were. The whole forest would be flooded every year, and we wondered what affect this had on animal spotting in the area.

We did not see too many animals, but that night we saw a crab giving birth to loads of babies. We had grabbed it from the water and it used two of its claws to peel away its underbelly, and then out came all these little crab babies!

We also caught a baby caiman, which are hypnotized when you shine a light in their eyes. The red eyes glow in the dark, and you can quietly go towards them in the boat until getting within grabbing distance. Be careful though, they give a powerful bite!

It was a bit of a whirlwind visit to this eco lodge, and we had to return to Iquitos on the 12th December. On our way back, our guide grabbed a three-toed sloth out of a tree. Can’t say I was too happy about this either – not exactly the same level of consideration for the animals you find elsewhere.

The jungle around Iquitos was pretty brutal, with plenty of thorns, poisonous trees and animals, and many mosquitos. It was a pretty uncomfortable stay, and we had quite a bit of rain during some extremely powerful storms. The closest we came to seeing any animals on our walks was some Howler Monkeys, which we just could not reach due to the water everywhere, and a Jaguar footprint, fresh from that morning. The Jaguar remains as elusive as ever…

On our return, we stopped off at a little lake that was filled with the Giant Amazon Lily we had seen before. This time, however, they were in bloom, as so we got to see some of their pretty flowers. They only bloom for two nights, so this was a special treat. The first night they are white, and the second night they go pink, before falling away to the water.

We saw Cormorants, Vultures and even stopped for some food around where some Pink River Dolphins were playing, and then our jungle adventure was over.

We returned to our casino/hotel in Iquitos, and the next day Francesca went to the infamous animal market in the morning. This is where the hunted animals are bought and sold, especially tortoises and their eggs, creating the need for the breeding programs and rescue centers all around the city.

We returned to Lima. Iquitos had been hot, polluted, and there were not many animals that we saw in the wild. The jungle was the harshest part of the Amazon we had visited, and the weather had not been too great. Iquitos is considered a jungle outpost of Babylonian decadence with its people and animal trafficking, and history of bloodshed. I think this area is too built up from hundreds of years of exploitation to be good for animal spotting, but other reports from other visitors read differently. There are other reserves to try, and maybe a better time of year to go. You never know, we could be back in Iquitos again one day.