Скачать или смотреть Tahuayo Lodge, Peruvian Amazon (April 2015) - Day 1

Tahuayo Lodge, where we stayed five nights, is named after a tributary of the Amazon River south of Iquitos, Peru. In this area the Peruvian government has preserved a large section of the rainforest to protect the habitat of the red faced Uakari monkey. This extreme western section of the Amazon basin is extremely biodiverse and this area along the Tahuayo River is home to 13 or more species of monkeys.

To get to the lodge, we first had to fly from Lima to Iquitos. Iquitos is the world's largest city that cannot be reached by road. When we arrived, the area was experiencing one of the worst floods in history and the Red Cross had setup hundreds of tents along the main street to accommodate the displaced. At the airport in Iquitos the company that owns and runs Tahuayo Lodge, "Amazonia Expeditions," arranged for us to be taken from the airport by "tuk-tuk" to their main office in Iquitos where we met our assigned private guide named Christian who accompanied us for the remainder of our stay. I cannot say enough about Christian, but without him our Amazon experience may have been a disaster. Instead, for me, it was the highlight of our two week Peruvian 25th Wedding Anniversary vacation!

From Iquitos we went south by motorboat to the Tahuayo Lodge which usually took three hours, but because of the flooding we were able to take shortcuts which saved almost one hour. When we arrived at the lodge the eating room was closed due to flooding so they moved it to another building. The people that worked in the kitchen wore boots in one foot of water. Even with these conditions, I never heard anyone complain or not have a smile on their face. My wife was at first apprehensive, but fell in love with the place after taking a night boat ride. The southern constellations were something she had never seen and it was a breath-taking sight completely away from city lights. As the boat motored down the river, bats would swoop down catching fish. We spent time looking for the endangered Black Caiman which is the largest member of the Caiman/Alligator Family. It is the largest reptile in the Amazon. South America's "Orinoco Crocodile" is slightly larger but is not found south of Venezuela or parts of Colombia.