The Traveling Hillbilly Arrives in the Amazon

As we fly into Puerto Maldonado in the southern Amazon region of Peru, I notice how green everything looks from the plane.   Everything is so lush and tropical.  I half expect to see a T-Rex traipsing through the jungle knocking down the trees!    The river looks like a dirty brown ribbon wrapping its way around and through the jungle.   I wonder if that is same the river I’ll be going down soon.    The pilot announces the current temperature, which translates to 88 degrees Fahrenheit.  I can feel the humidity already!   Surprisingly, it’s not raining.  When I checked the forecast the day before departure, it looked like thunderstorms every day in the Amazon and rain every day in Cusco!

The airport is very small.  It reminds me of the one in Siem Reap, Cambodia.    It’s a much different experience than the arrival in Lima!   There is much less chaos.     I’m very excited for the trip to begin!

I’m even more excited when I see the bus we’ll l be taking.   It’s one of those smaller, rustic buses where all the luggage goes on top.   I feel like we are heading off on an African Safari.   We have to take the bus 45 minutes, through dirty and very muddy roads, to the “port.”   The port is basically a set of wooden steps that lead down to the river.  At the port, we board what is basically a motorized canoe and start our 2+ hour boat ride to our lodge, located deep in the jungle.

A couple hours in to the trip with no sign of wildlife.   I am anxiously waiting for my biggest fear to be realized.   I just know that a snake is going to fall out of tree into the boat.   Luckily, the river is wide and we have a canopy over the top of the canoe, so hopefully we’re safe.  And yes, the dirty brown ribbon I saw from the plane is the exact river we are heading down.  Again, it reminds me of a prior trip.  It’s similar to the river raft ride, Huckleberry Finn style; I did in Chang Mai a few years ago.  But this time, there are no elephants.