Parque Nacional Manu

Straight after coming off the Inca Trail, we headed deep into the Amazon jungle for a 4 day adventure. The area of the Amazon to the north of Cuzco is the Parque Nacional Manu, widely regarded as the most pristine piece of rainforest left in the world. We were collected nice and early again on our first morning to head off on the road out of Cuzco. After a quick stop for some traditional jungle breakfast, a hearty breakfast complete with rice and chicken and a large helping of very spicy chilli salsa, we arrived at our first point of interest. It was an ancient pre-Inca burial site which had been destroyed by the Incas when they arrived and had been rebuilt in places in the 1960s. The name translates from Quechua as Flame Town as the site could be seen from down in the valley when it was being burnt to the ground. The site contains numerous burial towers that used to contain various valuable metal and pottery sacrifices and it is believed that when the Spanish arrived and Incas fled to the jungle they took these precious items with them and the famed city of El Dorado is somewhere in Parque Manu. Our guide claims to have spoken with an indigenous man who has seen it!! From there it was down through Paucartambo on the edge of the Jungle and into the Highland and Cloud Forest. We were able to go for a walk along the road and the valley below looked immense, dense ranforest with cloud rising up through the branches of the trees. Our guides were excellent and would prove to be all tour. They were able to pick out many numbers and varieties of animals just through the sounds they made, although I was unable to hear any signs of wildlife. It was here that we encountered various birds including Peru´s national bird, the c*** of the Rock. Its quite a magnificent bird with a startling red head and black wings. We also encountered monkeys for the first time on our trip. Two different species, the grey, wooly monkey and the small yellow squirrel monkey. That was cool, they are so agile jumping through the branches and I think everybody gets excited when they see a monkey in the wild. We continued on the road through the cloud forest passing more wonderful jungle and getting out to spot wildlife whenever our guides heard it from the car. Our first night was spent just past a jungle village in a cool little lodge. Its cool seeing the people living their lives in the jungle with forest at their doorstep. The next day we continued by car until we arrived at a small coca plantation farm. The farmer kept as pets a coati and a pecary who continually fought with each other, a scarlet macaw, tiger heron and small capuccin monkey. We saw the plantation and had it explained to us the process of growing and harvesting the leaves. Our guide then found a natural pesticide and Banjo and I had our faces painted bright orange. From there we headed to the Rio Alto Madre de Dios, or old mother of God and got in our boat for our excursion up river to our lodge. On the way we passed many water birds and were lucky enough to see more squirrel monkeys and brown cappucin monkeys swinging from the trees near the waters edge. After arriving at the lodge and unpacking the boat we headed into the jungle for a trek around the forest. Some of us had temporary tatoos drawn with the juice of a blue plant...its meant to last 10 days but its been nearer two weeks and Ive still got mine!! We saw tonnes in the jungle, trees that were 100m high and sounded like they were made of steel when hit with the machette, lots of birds including macaws, vultures and many colourful birds, more monkeys and insects including some gorgeous butterflies. We also tried the fruits that the monkeys were eating and they were pretty good, not filling but very sweet and nice. That evening we embarked on a night tour of the jungle which is really cool. We saw lots of spiders, gold, wolf and a couple of huge black tarantulas. There was frogs and toads everywhere as well and we were even lucky enough to see a large owl perched in a treetop looking down at us. We visited the house of the parents of our two guides deep in the forest and they were very welcoming and allowed us to have some of their green coconuts which were better than the ones on Copacabana beach it must be said. That night we spent at the lodge in the middle of the jungle with the chorus of frogs and insects singing us to sleep. The next day involved a longer jungle trek with one of our guides in the pouring rain whilst in the afternoon we went fishing in the river. The morning was lots of fun despite the rain and we explored many of the trees as the animals obviously arent as active in the rain. We still saw monkeys and a moth that was enormous. I tried climbing a couple of vines but didnt get very far up either of them and more made a mess of my top. Our guide explained how everything in the jungle is useful, whether it is for eating or building material or using as a poison or medicine, pretty much every plant or living creature can be harnessed by the local people. He also explained that there is still a couple of tribes living in the jungle who are yet to come in contact with the "civilised" world and are still savage in their nature. It is incredible to think that with all the technology we have today, there is still people who remain untouched and long may that continue until they choose for it to be different. Fishing in the afternoon proved a total failure for all in the group except thankfully for our chef who caught a huge catfish, it must have weighed 11kgs, I reckon. It was massive, and thank goodness he caught it as that was our dinner! After the fishing we went caiman hunting, well we went with torches, one of our guides went with his white undies and his hands. Thankfully perhaps we had more luck than he did. We saw lots of eyes in the water but he was unable to get his hands on any, reckon they could see the tighty whities a mile away. We were very, very lucky to see a tapir ahead in the distance however. The largest land mammal in South America and one that is very rarely seen. We had the catfish for dinner and it tasted fantastic. The food all trip had been awesome and the portions so filling as well. The last day was spent entirely travelling, first up river in the boat and then by bus back to Cuzco. It was still an excellent day though and we got great weather for sitting in the boat watching the river birds and the jungle go by. It was a great 4 days in the jungle and we saw loads. We were very lucky in that we had two excellent guides who were able to spot many animals and tell us all about the environment that they had grown up in. The company we had used was Bonanza tours and they were excellent. They were very accomodating for everybody in the group and we had some picky people in the group, and overall the service that they provided was fantastic. Loved it, if I could have back to back adventures like this and the Inca Trail all the time then I would be a pretty happy guy.