27–30 October 2024 – Ceiba Tops Lodge, near Iquitos, Peru

27 October

Our luck with the weather could not have been better. It began raining just after we arrived at the Iquitos airport and boarded the bus, and it stopped just before we stepped off the bus and onto the boat. When we reached the lodge, the skies opened again—right as we sat down for lunch.

After lunch, the rain stopped and we joined our new local guide, Luis, for a nature walk. The massive Ceiba tree—namesake of the lodge—was as impressive as the great kauri trees we once saw in New Zealand. The Ceiba tree is also called a Kapok tree and you may remember that kapok fibres provided the floatation for lifejackets in WWII. The trees are so big that I think one tree could have provided the kapok filling for all lifejackets used in the war!

We spotted plenty of birds and a few tamarin monkeys along the trail. Later, the group cooled off in the pool before retreating to the lodge for a pisco sour. What a lovely tour group we ended up with.

Then it rained steadily through the night.

The only ones in our group truly affected by the rain were Paul and Phyllis, whose thatched roof had a leak that dripped all night. The tour group arriving after us got the worst of everything: their flight into Iquitos was delayed several hours by a thunderstorm, and when they finally made it to the lodge, they were greeted by yet another downpour as they made their way from the boat to the lodge.

28 October

We were up bright and early at 6 a.m. for a planned birding tour, but with rain threatening, we shifted gears and visited the market in the nearby town of Indiana, Peru. (Not to be confused with Peru, Indiana!) I may not have the details exactly right, but I recall that the town’s founder had studied in Indiana in the United States and named this settlement after it.

Later that morning, we crossed to the far side of the river to visit a very small village and its school.

In the afternoon, we tried our hand at piranha fishing. Paul got a bite, but the rest of us managed only a few tiny catfish. On the boat ride back, we saw both pink and gray river dolphins. The pink dolphins truly are pink and live permanently in freshwater, while the gray dolphins swim all the way from the Atlantic—more than 2,000 km away.

After dinner, we joined a night walk where we spotted a small snake, katydids, frogs, turtles, and even a baby caiman.

29 October

Another early start—up at 6 a.m. for the canopy walk. Getting there was an adventure in itself: a boat ride to Indiana; a tuk-tuk trip to the Napo River; a second boat to the Explornapo Lodge; and then a one-hour walk through the forest to reach the canopy walkway. The platform is incredibly high, offering sweeping views of the canopy, though the birds are apparently most active at sunrise. (Perhaps we should have spent the night there!)

Back at the lodge, we were visited by a shaman who described traditional herbal remedies and performed a cleansing to sweep away our bad energy.

We ended the day back at Ceiba Tops Lodge with a swim, a drink, dinner, and another night walk.

30 October

We took an early morning birding trip by boat, spotted more dolphins, and returned once again to Indiana. In the afternoon, we visited a Yagua village closer to Iquitos, where we watched a traditional dance, tried a blow-dart demonstration, and even got to meet a pet sloth.

Iquitos has no roads connecting it to anywhere. It is essentially an island on the mainland, with everything arriving by barge or plane. That is changing, however, with a completed bridge and the upcoming construction of a highway to Brazil. The highway will pass very close to this Yagua village, and I’m sure their lives will change completely. Progress?

31 October – Departure

We left Iquitos and flew back to Lima.

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Amazon Summary

This will have to wait until I find my notebook with all my detailed notes. I couldn’t locate it at the cottage this past summer, so I assumed it must be in Victoria. Now that we’re home and it still hasn’t turned up, I’ll have to search more carefully when we return to the cottage. There’s no way I would have thrown it out.

After our Amazon stay, we continued on to Lima, then travelled to Cusco, Machu Picchu, and Sacsayhuaman. Thankfully, I still have all the photos—so I’ll share those and reconstruct the stories behind them.

25 October 2024 – Lima Pre-trip / Day 1

Machu Picchu and the Galápagos have always been on our bucket list, so it didn’t take long to say yes when our cottage neighbours, Mark and Cindy, invited us on an organized tour with them. In all our years of travel, we’ve never joined a tour like this, so I’m curious to see what the experience will be like.

The journey to Peru was long: Victoria → Seattle → Miami → Lima. The actual flying time was only about 11 hours, but with layovers it became 28 hours of travel. We met up with Cindy and Mark in Miami and continued on to Lima together. We arranged to arrive a day and a half before the tour officially began, just to get our feet under us.

A minibus arranged by the tour company picked us up at the airport and dropped the four of us at the Jose Antonio Hotel in Miraflores, an upscale district of Lima. We celebrated our arrival with the mandatory Pisco Sour—though I still think Sarah’s father makes a better one. Perhaps we’re simply used to the lemons he prefers, while Peruvian bars typically use limes.

The next morning, we walked along the Miraflores escarpment overlooking the Pacific. Despite it being a Friday, the paths were busy with people enjoying the ocean air. The terraced tennis courts were full, and the waves seemed perfect for beginner-intermediate surfers.

In the afternoon, we took the Mirabus double-decker tour as an easy introduction to the city. Lima has 11 million people, and it felt like all of them were driving—the traffic was astonishingly bad. It took us 1.5 hours to travel 9 km back to the hotel. Our driver, however, was remarkably calm, suggesting this is simply daily life here. We later learned that the traffic was worse than usual for two reasons: (1) each district has a road-improvement budget that must be spent by December 31, so construction ramps up in the fall, and (2) a main access road to the coastal highway was closed for repairs, forcing everyone onto alternate routes.

Lima’s historic centre dates back to 1535, shortly after Pizarro’s conquest of the Incan Empire. The early churches, convents, and civic buildings were first constructed in the mid-1500s and have been rebuilt or added onto many times after “Ring of Fire” earthquakes. It was startling to remember we were in the Americas; in Canada, aside from a few old forts, virtually no continuously used buildings predate the early–mid 1800s—almost 300 years younger than central Lima.

I’m fascinated by how different cultures developed across the continents. According to Dr. Google, the Incas, Aztecs, and Mayans built strong central governments and cities with millions of people, with even earlier cultures preceding them. Meanwhile, North American Indigenous groups developed smaller, family-centred social structures. Climate must have played a major role—surviving harsh northern winters leaves less time for building giant urban centres. One day I’d like to spend more than a few minutes reading about this!

We met the rest of the tour group and Ivonne, our local guide, on Saturday morning. After lunch at a local restaurant, six of us took a trip to Pachacamac, a major religious centre founded long before the Incas. You can trace the site’s history through the changing construction materials used over the centuries.

As interesting as Pachacamac was, the shanty towns around Lima captured my attention even more. If I understood correctly, about four million people live in these informal settlements that ring the city. Homes typically begin as a single brick room and expand over time as families grow and can afford additions. Eventually the city installs water and sewer services, and residents start paying taxes. The worrying part is Lima’s seismic risk: when (not if) a major earthquake hits, these largely handmade brick structures will be dangerously vulnerable.

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26 October — Lima, Day 2

We met the full 11-person tour group on Saturday morning. Other than Mark and Cindy, we were all strangers—Americans from various states, plus the two of us. It’s a different way to travel. With group tours, you gain a knowledgeable guide and everything is arranged for you; you simply “hold onto the rope” and go. The trade-off is that we did very little research before arriving—something we’d normally consider essential for independent travel. We did read Turn Right at Machu Picchu by Mark Adams, but really should have done more.

We repeated our walk along the Miraflores cliffs, then after lunch, six of us took a small bus to Pachacamac. The site, founded around 400 AD, was once a major spiritual centre—about a thousand years before the Inca Empire. You can see the layers of history in the evolving building styles and materials.

Again, the shanty towns left the biggest impression. About four million people live in these sprawling settlements, building their homes gradually as money allows. Eventually the city formalizes services and taxation. But being on the “Ring of Fire,” Lima is highly vulnerable to earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic activity. When a major quake hits, these homemade brick homes could collapse, putting millions at risk. Yikes.

After the tour, a young guide shepherded us to the airport, reminding us roughly 50 times to go to Gate 3, and then snapping a group photo as we headed into security. Larry joked that the photo was probably for her supervisors—as proof she had successfully delivered her “package” of 11 tourists, much like an Amazon driver. Job done!

Next stop: the Peruvian Amazon.