Travel ▻ South America ▻ Peru4-Day Deep Amazon Experience
4-Day Deep Amazon Experience

4-Day Deep Amazon Experience

4 days

4-Day Deep Amazon Experience
from $1020 USD

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We now offer a more intensive, deep Amazon experience, with three nights at the Heath River Wildlife Center lodge on the Peru/Bolivia border. Our Ese Eja Indian hosts add wisdom and knowledge to this incredible jungle adventure!

Scheduled departures start every Monday and Thursday. You have the option of adding a day to this extension, making it a 5-day trip (at extra cost). The excursions are in small groups with a bi-lingual naturalist guide, unless a private itinerary is booked.

Please note that all rainforest itineraries may vary slightly so as to maximize wildlife sightings, depending on the reports of local researchers and experienced naturalist guides.

Full Itinerary DETAILED ITINERARY >> ITINERARY IN BRIEF >>

Day 1: 4-DAY DEEP AMAZON EXPERIENCE / Arrive Puerto Maldonado; check in; boat transfer to lodge, begin jungle activities; overnight lodge (LD)

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Staff welcome you at Puerto Maldonado airport and we drive through this bustling Upper Amazon Basin city to the Tambopata River boat dock. Here we board a powerful motorized dugout canoe and set off to the nearby confluence of the mighty Madre de Dios River, where we head downstream for approximately three hours to the Peru-Bolivia border at the mouth of the remote Heath River. Even beneath the vast sky of this major Amazon tributary we glimpse the diversity of the riverine environment, with its forest-capped red-earth cliffs, alternating with low banks thick with Cecropia trees and giant grasses. Now, after brief frontier-crossing formalities, we motor for about two more hours up narrower and wilder waters, suddenly enjoying the intimacy of mysterious forest looming close on either side. Occasional views of native villages and children splashing by the banks, are interspersed with long, quiet stretches where we may spot herons, hawks, cormorants, Orinoco Geese, and perhaps a family of Capybaras -- the world's largest rodent, weighing up to 55 kg./120 lb, and looking like an enormous Guinea Pig. We reach our simple, charming and comfortable quarters at the Heath River Wildlife Center in time for dinner. (Please note that the lodge is located on the Bolivian shore of the Heath River, so passports are required to clear Bolivian passport control. Visas are not required!)

Meals: LD

Meals included: Lunch, Dinner
Mid-Range Accommodations: Heath River Wildlife Center

Day 2: Continue jungle excursions; overnight lodge (BLD)

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Today we make an early start to visit the lodge's most spectacular feature: the Heath River parrot and macaw lick. Here these colorful birds gather to eat a type of clay from the cliff-like river banks that neutralizes certain toxins in their diet. They congregate early each morning, sometimes by the hundreds, jostling and squabbling over the best eating spots on the clay lick. This noisy and unforgettable show can go on for two or three hours, and may begin with up to five species of parrot and two varieties of parakeet, followed by Chestnut-fronted Macaws and their larger, more boisterous cousins, the Red-and-green Macaws. This extraordinary wildlife display occurs at only a handful of sites in the Upper Amazon Basin, and nowhere else on the planet. Our floating hide platform provides comfort and complete concealment, so that we can eat a full breakfast here during pauses in the bankside spectacle. On our return we can land partway downriver and walk back along a section of the lodge's extensive network of forest trails. We encounter numerous gigantic Brazil-nut, kapok and fig trees, along with the scary strangler fig, whose life strategy is as sinister as its name suggests. Our guide will point out and explain the medicinal and commercial uses of dozens of plants and trees, while we keep our eyes and ears open for birds, or one of the eight species of monkeys found in this region. We might come upon a small herd of White-lipped or Collared peccary - two kinds of wild pig that are common in this area. For purposes of territorial marking they deploy a 'stink gland' so potent that they are often smelled long before they are seen. After lunch we typically hike along a major trail to a point where the forest abruptly gives way to the spacious plains of the Pampas del Heath, part of Bolivia's Madidi National Park. This unique environment -- the result of very poor soils, plus an extreme seasonal cycle of dryness and flooding -- is the largest remaining undisturbed tropical savannah in the Amazon, and is home to rare endemic birds and mammals, such as the Swallow-tailed Hummingbird and the highly endangered Maned Wolf. Shortly beyond the edge of the forest we can climb a raised platform that allows us a grand view of this vast expanse of grassland and shrub, studded with palm trees. We can continue another hour or so to a swampy area thick with Mauritia flexuosa palm trees, whose oil-rich palm nuts and hollowed-out dead palms provide vitally important food and shelter for nesting pairs of Red-bellied and increasingly rare Blue-and-yellow macaws. We aim to arrive toward dusk, when the macaws are returning from their day's foraging to congregate in this very special breeding site. We return to the lodge by night, using our flashlights, and perhaps pausing here and there in total darkness, to listen to the ever-changing orchestra of animals, frogs and insects, and to experience the magic of the night-time rainforest. We may come upon such bizarre nocturnal creatures as camouflaged frogs disguised as dead leaves, toads the size of rabbits, hairy tarantulas peering out of their dirt holes, night monkeys lurking among the tree branches, and a teemingly unpredictable array of other nightlife. After dinner some guests may choose to visit one of our mammal lick hides, in hopes of seeing a Lowland Tapir, the rainforest's largest mammal. 

Meals: BLD

Meals included: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Mid-Range Accommodations: Heath River Wildlife Center

Day 3: Continue jungle excursions; overnight lodge (BLD)

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Our third day at the lodge allows us to choose from a wide range of activities available in this exceptionally diverse tropical environment. Many people choose to make a second visit to the macaw clay lick. Later we can take a canoe tour around Cocha Moa, an oxbow lake that lies a short way downstream from the lodge. The reeds, fallen trees and forested shoreline of this lake teem with birds and other wildlife. Red Howler Monkeys may peer at us through the branches of the giant trees above us, while herons lie in wait among the fallen trees, cormorant-like Anhingas watch from the forest branches, and an Osprey may circle overhead. Flocks of brilliant Red-capped Cardinals gather on dead branches, and a colorful, primitive bird, the Hoatzin, hops its ungainly way along the swampy water's edge. After dinner we can board our canoe once more, for an evening of spotting for caiman, the Amazonian cousin of the alligator. This region is home to the endangered black caiman, and we nearly always pick out a few with our powerful spotlight as we patrol the river.

Meals: BLD

Meals included: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Mid-Range Accommodations: Heath River Wildlife Center

Day 4: Conclude jungle experience; return to Puerto Maldonado; check out; transfer to airport; depart (B)

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We leave at dawn for the return trip downstream. This is peak hour for wildlife so we keep a sharp eye on the riverbanks, often spotting families of Capybara, and perhaps being rewarded with a rare jaguar sighting, or a tapir swimming across the current. We reach the Madre de Dios River, re-enter Peru, and set off upstream for Puerto Maldonado, where we check out and are transferred to the airport for our flight to Cusco or Lima.

Meals: B

Meals included: Breakfast

Pricing

4-Day Deep Amazon Experience
from $1020 USD
*** Contact Us for other itinerary and lodging options! ***

NOTE: Prices are per person in U.S. dollars based on double/triple occupancy. All quotations are based on the current rates of park fees, VAT, other government taxes, and current exchange rates. Should any of these be increased or a new tax introduced, these increases will be added on even if your trip has already been paid for.

INCLUDES:
  • All accommodations per itinerary
  • All meals per itinerary (B=Breakfast, L=Lunch, D=Dinner)
  • All tours and entrance fees per itinerary (unless listed as excluded)
  • All transportation and transfers per itinerary
  • Transfer from airport to boat landing and return at end of itinerary
  • Transportation by boat/canoe to/from lodge
  • Three nights rainforest lodge
  • All meals listed (B=breakfast, L=lunch, D=dinner),
  • Bi-lingual naturalist/guides
  • Rainforest jungle activities
  • Rain boots during the rainy season
  • Group price is for set departures on Monday and Thursday
EXCLUDES:
  • International and domestic flights
  • Meals not listed
  • Beverages and alcohol
  • Tips for guides, drivers, hotel staff
  • Optional tours
  • Single room supplement
  • Personal expenses (visas, airport taxes, Internet, etc.)
  • Tips for your guides, boat drivers and lodge staff,
  • Transfers in Lima and Cusco
  • Domestic flights to/from Puerto Maldonado (approximately US$150/person one way)
  • Personal expenses

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