| Duration
7 days and 6 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 TRANSFER BOAT - TAMBOPATA RIVER PORT TO REFUGIO
AMAZONAS
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 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, lays 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 3 TERRA FIRME TRAIL & PALM SWAMP TOWER
Macaw Clay Lick: 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. An entirely different habitat characterized by smaller,
thinner trees atop hills and slopes is covered by this five kilometer
trail. Saddleback tamarins are frequently found here. As we walk
near the limits of the swamp we will also keep our eyes open for
rare tapir tracks. Lunch
A thirty minute hike from TRC brings us to the palm swamp. Dead
aguaje palms serve as nests to Red-bellied and Blue-and-gold macaws.
An elevated boardwalk and scaffolding tower allow for eye level
observation of the macaws as they fly in and out of their nests.
Dinner
Overnight at Tambopata Research Center (B, L, D)
DAY 4 FLOODPLAIN TRAIL & POND PLATFORM
Time off to relax and enjoy the lodge surroundings, try out a
new trail, or repeat your favorite activity. 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
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, sunbittern 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 PALM SWAMP TRAIL & CREEKS TRAIL
Time off to relax and enjoy the lodge surroundings, try out a
new trail, or repeat your favorite activity. Breakfast
Growing on the remains of an oxbow lake and providing both arboreal
as well as terrestrial mammals with fruits throughout the year,
the aguaje palms are one of the most important food sources in
the rainforest. Demand for these fruits and great conditions for
planting rice, makes the palm swamp also one of the most threatened
habitats. Lunch
This is a different kind of Terra Firme forest, crossed by a
number of creeks that will eventually reach the Tambopata River.
Walking in the opposite direction of the river, we will focus
on forest and creek ecology. Dinner
Overnight at Tambopata Research Center (B, L, D)
DAY 6 OXBOW LAKE VISIT
Time off to relax and enjoy the lodge surroundings, try out a
new trail, or repeat your favorite activity. Breakfast
Three and a half hour boat ride brings us to Refugio Amazonas.
Boxed Lunch
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. 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 7 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.
|
