We decided not to travel north to Iquitos as our budget and diary did not quite work out.  30 minutes by plane (with a pilot who is a failed Peruvian taxi driver (think of the video game Out Run!)) is Purto Maldonado.  On arrival in this tropical jungle town you are immediatly hit by the humidity and the fact that there are no cars.  Every corner you turn is like the opening scene from Easy Rider with hundreds of people on motorbikes.  Sometimes a family of 4 or 5 will pass by on one bike!  The other method of transport is by motorkar which is like a tuktuk with a motorbike.  The only people required to wear a helmet at all in the town are the drivers.  Away from this chaos we took a small wooden boat with an outboard 2.5 hours down river into the Amazon basin. 

Arriving at the Eco Amazonia lodge we are delighted to find that our jungle experience is exactly as you would expect.  Tropical birds scwaking (!) in the tree's, a huge wooden lodge with adjacent swimming pool, welcome drinks and amazing accomodation bungalows including our own hammock room.  Jungle heaven!  before dinner we headed off to monkey island where we were greeted by wild tourist! monkeys.  Lucky enough to see a black spider monkey with here 2 week old baby, hope you can see from the photo's. Got stranded for 55 minutes across the river from the lodge with a broken outboard.  !2 in the boat and all mossi fodder at dusk!  Called for help for ages, when it arrived in the form of a new boat they were apologetiv for the delay but Peru had been playing football against USA and they had to wait for the final result!!!  after dinner went Cayman spotting and drifted back to the lodge silenlty listening to the jungle sounds and star spotting.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES!  at 1 am we were hit by a frio (spelt something like that) a freak weather condition that happens without warning about 5 times a year.  It rained torrentually for 18 hours and temperatures dropped. As the jungle is tropical there is no glass in the windows only mesh to keep out the mozzies, tropical it was not!   All play cancelled for today but our guide Raphael kept up entertained with mystical tales of the jungle, it's plants, animals and Shaymens. The jungles has everything for survival, food, housing, medicine and clothing and many tribal families still survive today using traditional methods. There is a lifetime of knowledge to survive in the jungle and most of the modern products we have today have come from here and new ways are still be researched. Raphael told us how he had jumped on a passing ferry at 11 to find the gringo's who had visitied his village as they facinated him so much.  He was a homeless shoeshine boy until making it as a guide.  Returning to his jungle village at 17 his family had believed he was dead and threw a  three day party.  On the 3rd day his father came to him and told him how proud he was , then gave him the whipping of his life! 

Day 3 - clear sky's and a slight increase in temperature. Breakfast by candlelight at 5 am as the power only goes on at 5pm then off at 10pm. Today we went to lost lake.  Walking in the mud and paddeling the canoe. There is so much wildlife and fawna and we were lucky to see several things including monkeys, birds and a tarantula!

Ended the day on the verandah looking across the river in hammocks with Ruth and Martha from NZ and Jos from the Neatherlands. Listening to the jungle sounds of monkeys etc.  We washed the conversation down with a bottle of red wine. Life is good!  p.s. saw a rat the size of a possum, walked right past us!

Awoken at 5 am by the howler monkeys, they holler through the forest at dawn and even though they are about 2 k's away they sound so close.  Up early again and off the airport headed for Cusco.