| Duration
6 days and 5 nights
Departures Daily departures
Activities Jungle excursion (see detailed program
below)
Airfares Not included, available upon request
Meals Included as specified below
Customizable YES, feel free to ask for extra
services
Not Included Entrance to the Protected Area of
Tambopata (USD $60.00 per person)
DAY 1 ARRIVAL & RECEPTION BY KIDS GUIDE
One of our regular naturalists with a feel for kids will be assigned
to your groups. If solicited, a separate guide will be assigned
to the rest of the family for regular activities.
Upon arrival from Lima or Cusco, we will welcome you at the airport
and drive you ten minutes to our Puerto Maldonado headquarters.
While enjoying your first taste of the forest in our gardens we
will ask you to pack only the necessary gear for your next few
days, and leave the rest at our safe deposit. This helps us keep
the boats and cargo light.
Skirting Puerto Maldonado, we drive 20 kilometers to the Tambopata
River Port, entering the Native Community of Infierno. The port
is a communal business.
The two and a half hour boat ride from the Tambopata Port to
Refugio Amazonas will take us past the Community of Infierno and
the Tambopata National Reserve´s checkpoint and into the
buffer zone of this 1.3 million hectare conservation unit. Boxed
Lunch
Upon arrival, the lodge manager will welcome you and brief you
with important navigation and security tips. Dinner
Caiman Search: We will be out at the river’s edge at night,
scanning the shores with headlamps and flashlights to catch the
red gleams of reflection from caiman eyes.
Overnight at Refugio Amazonas (Box Lunch, D)
DAY 2 THE CHILDREN'S RAINFOREST TRAIL: ANIA & THE
WORLD´S VOICE
Breakfast.
Adults will have Oxbow Lake Visit
We will paddle around the lake on a canoe or a catamaran, looking
for lakeside wildlife such as hoatzin, caiman and horned screamers,
hoping to see the otters which are infrequently seen here. You
will also be rewarded with overhead sightings of macaws.
Kids will take The Children's Rainforest Trail: Ania & the
World´s Voice
A short trail designed for children with the help of ANIA, an
environmental education NGO. Kids aged 6-12 hike with a guide
through a challenging (but short) trail where they follow maps,
solve riddles and find clues that will lead them to Ania’s
“gifts”. The trail teaches kids how people live in
the rainforest and leave a valuable message from Ania, “a
girl born in the depths of the rain forest to fill our hearts
with hope”. The concept, the story and the trail are trademarked
by ANIA, a nonprofit with the mission of creating 100,000 hectares
of “Tierras de los Niños” (Children’s
Lands) - private protected areas in the management of children.
Lunch
Adults will have a Farm Visit
Five minutes downriver from the lodge lays a farm owned and managed
by charismatic Don Manuel from the neighboring community of Condenado.
He grows a variety of popular and unknown Amazon crops - just
about every plant and tree you see serves a purpose.
Ethnobotanical Tour
Along this trail we will find a variety of plants and trees that
are used by the local population with at least the same variety
of purposes. We will learn about the medicinal (and other) uses
of Ajo-Sacha, Yuca de Venado, Uña de Gato, Charcot-Sacha,
Para-Para, among several others.
Kids will take The Children's Rainforest Trail:Ania & The
Forest's Treasure
Another trail designed by ANIA, somewhat longer, which requires
a five minute boat ride. Features include Ant City, the search
for the lost Brazil Nut, a shihuahuaco tree to climb and a visit
to Anias home near lake Condenado. Dinner
Video Presentations: Video presentations are available every
night at the interpretation center. Topics include the Tambopata
National Reserve and the macaw project.
Overnight at Refugio Amazonas (B, L, D)
DAY 3 CANOPY TOWER, BRAZIL NUT TRAIL AND CAMP
A thirty minute walk from Refugio Amazonas leads to the 25 meter
scaffolding canopy tower. A bannistered staircase running through
the middle provides safe access to the platforms above. The tower
has been built upon high ground, therefore increasing your horizon
of the continuous primary forest extending out towards the Tambopata
National Reserve. From here views of mixed species canopy flocks
as well as toucans, macaws and raptors are likely. Breakfast
A few minutes hike from the lodge is a beautiful old growth patch
of Brazil Nut forest that has been harvested for decades (if not
centuries) where the precarious remains of a camp used two months
a year by Brazil Nut gatherers can still be experienced. We will
be demonstrating the whole process of the rain forest's only sustainably
harvested product from collection through transportation to drying.
Four and half hours by boat from Refugio Amazonas, in the pristine
heart of the reserve, lies the Tambopata Research Center. One
and half hours into our boat journey, as we cross the confluence
with the Malinowski River, we will leave the final traces of human
habitation behind. Within the 700,000 hectare uninhabited nucleus
of the reserve, sightings of capybara, caiman, geese, macaws and
other large species will become more frequent. Boxed Lunch
Upon arrival, the lodge manager will welcome you and brief you
with important navigation and security tips.
Overlook Trail : A three to five kilometer hike will lead us
to overlooks commanding magnificent views of the Tambopata winding
its way into the lowlands. The forest on this trail, regenerating
on old bamboo forest, is good for Howler Monkey and Dusky Titi
Monkey. Dinner
Macaw Project Lectures: After dinner scientists will provide
an in depth look at the biology of macaws, their feeding habits,
the theories for clay lick use, their breeding and feeding ecology,
population fluctuations and the threats to their conservation.
Overnight at Tambopata Research Center (B, L, D)
DAY 4 MACAW CLAY LICK & FLOODPLAIN TRAIL
On most clear mornings of the year dozens of large macaws and
hundreds of parrots congregate on this large river bank in a raucous
and colorful spectacle which inspired a National Geographic cover
story. Discretely located fifty meters from the cliff, we will
observe Green-winged, scarlet and Blue-and-gold Macaws and several
species of smaller parrots descend to ingest clay. Outings are
at dawn when the lick is most active. Breakfast
This five kilometer trail covers the prototypical rain forest
with immense trees criss-crossed by creeks and ponds. Amongst
the figs, ceibas and shihuahuacos we will look for Squirrel, Brown
Capuchin, and Spider Monkeys as well as peccaries. TRC is located
within this habitat. Lunch
Pond Platform: Ten minutes upriver from the lodge is a tiny pond
with a platform in the middle. It is a great place to spot waterfowl
such as Muscovy duck, sun bittern and hoatzin along with the woodpeckers,
oropendolas, flycatchers and parakeets that call this pond their
home. Dinner
Night walk: You will have the option of hiking out at night,
when most of the mammals are active but rarely seen. Much easier
to find are frogs with shapes and sounds as bizarre as their natural
histories.
Overnight at Tambopata Research Center (B, L, D)
DAY 5 RAINFOREST TATOO
Breakfast. A three and a half hour boat ride brings us to Refugio
Amazonas.
Boxed Lunch
Rainforest Tattoo: Five minutes from the lodge lives Don Manuel,
who grows a variety of popular and unknown Amazon crops - just
about every plant and tree you see serves a purpose. At Don Manuel’s
farm, we will prepare a paste from the fruit of huito and achiote
to draw dark blue and red tattoos on ourselves. They last several
days. Dinner
Tambopata National Reserve Lectures: Nightly lectures prepared
by the staff of Refugio Amazonas cover conservation threats, opportunities
and projects in the Tambopata National Reserve.
Overnight at Refugio Amazonas (B, Box Lunch, D)
DAY 6 TRANSFER OUT
Breakfast. Transfer Boat from Refugio Amazonas to Tambopata River
Port to go to Puerto Maldonado Headquarters
We retrace our river and road journey back to Puerto Maldonado,
our office and the airport. Depending on airline schedules, this
may require dawn departures. (B)
END OF SERVICES
Please note that the program may vary slightly so as to maximize
your wildlife sightings, depending on the reports of our researchers
and experienced naturalist guides based at the lodge.
BOAT TRANSPORTATION
All our boats are 20 foot long, roofed canoes with 55 hp outboard
motors. Daily arrivals and departures from every port are scheduled
to meet every airline´s arrival and departure with a maximum
two hour wait.
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