Notes from the Jungle

We spent two weeks in the jungle outside Puerto Maldonado, Peru in October. The following “mini series” of posts was written (mostly) on the 6 hour return taxi boat from Picaflor to Puerto. I typed it up last night and added a few ¨after the fact¨ notes.

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Notes from the Jungle: “Volunteering” vs. “Tourist-ing”

To be blunt, we decided on Picaflor because it was cheap.  As a “volunteer”, you paid only $15 per day instead of the $100 that “cheaper” jungle lodges ask.  As low budget travelers with dwindling bank accounts and without an aversion to hard work, it sounded like a good idea.  In the end, it worked [...]

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Notes from the Jungle: Buses

Jungle buses are rough, no way around that. They are however impressive in their perseverance. On the way in we could see the “road” by the additional external lighting these buses use. The way often turned into looking like little more than a wide path and we were constantly surrounded by walls [...]

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Notes from the Jungle: Boats

By one of our fellow ex-volunteer’s calculations, our return taxi boat was carrying 2 1/2 tons of corn. We also had about 300 stalks of plantains and a few hundred papayas on board.
Living on a river, boats are a way of life. There is no road here, no trails. If you want [...]

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Notes from the Jungle: Animals

Like all tourists, the main draw of the jungle was the chance to see some cool animals.  Though we were “working” and only spent a small part of our time walking around, we did see plenty of cool wildlife.
I was most impressed by the butterflies.  It seemed like every day we saw hundreds, most of [...]

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Going to the Jungle

This afternoon we’ll be taking an 18 hour bus to Puerto Maldonado.  From Cusco, our trip will take us over the Andes and drop us into the Amazon basin.  From the PM, we’ll be heading up river four hours to the Picaflor Research Center to do a little volunteering/playing in the jungle for two weeks.
As [...]

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