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This area is located in the southeastern corner of Peru, near the
border with Bolivia and Brazil. It is the most accessible rainforest from
Cusco.
This
area, known as Antisuyo during the Inca Empire, has had a history of resource
extraction beginning with the rubber boom, logging, and gold prospecting, and
more recently, oil exploration. Despite all this activity, however, 98% of
the territory is comprised of virgin forests. It is the territory with the
lowest population density, 60,000 inhabitants in 80,000 km2 (19,768,400
acres) of jungle. There are three protected areas located in this territory
including Manu National Park and Reserved Zone, Tambopata-Candamo Reserved
Zone and Bahuaja-Sonene National Park. Together they comprise 3.5 million
hectares (8,648,500 acres) of protected rainforest ecosystems, and represent
the greatest and richest area for biodiversity in the world.
Puerto
Maldonado The
capital of the region is Puerto Maldonado, a fairly small town founded in
1912, which is the most important town of the southern rainforest. It is
located at 210 m.a.s.l., at the junction of the Tambopata and Madre de Dios
rivers. River access is available from the towns of Covija in Bolivia (6 hours) and Assis in Brazil (242
km.). Despite its commercial history, Puerto
Maldonado has grown slowly. Recently, both government and non-government
agencies have proposed the development of tourist services and attractions in
Puerto Maldonado, "The Capital of Biodiversity". The government is
interested in making this area an important destination for travelers. This
year, a new airport building was constructed as well as a new road access to
the city.
The
height of the tourist season in Puerto Maldonado is from May to November. Lots
of young people walk around the Army Square and nearby streets and restaurants,
pizza places, ice-cream shops and discotheques provide the opportunity for
enjoyable stopovers before and after visits to the rainforest.
Puerto
Maldonado is the starting point for trips to Tambopata, Piedras and the lower
part of the Madre de Dios Rivers regions. There are daily flights from Lima
or Cusco. For the more adventurous traveler, there is a dirt road from Cusco
that takes a minimum of three-days by truck with the predictable discomforts
and delays.
Sandoval Lake is an
exceptional place to observe a diversity of wild fauna including macaws,
small parrots, herons, kingfishers, hoatzins, caimans, turtles and giant
otters. We have two lodges to accommodate different preferences in comfort
and price. Sandoval Lake is located 8 km (4.97 miles), or about one hour
away, from Puerto Maldonado (including 15 minutes by speedboat down the Madre
de Dios river).
Valencia
Lake offers excellent opportunities to watch birds and observe nature. It is
located 60 km (37 miles, 3.5 hours by boat) from Puerto Maldonado, close to
the Bolivian border, down the Madre de Dios river. On this trip it is
possible to visit nearby indigenous communities. You can also visit salt
licks and do some gold-panning and fishing!. There are several trails around
the lake which lead into the rainforest. You will need to camp during your
visit to Valencia Lake.
Heath
Pampas they are located near the border with Bolivia and contain large
grassland areas of over 100,000 has. There are no forest, only shrubs. The
fauna is very rich and two endemics species can be found here such as a type
of fox known as mane wolf and a type of wetlands deer. This is the only area
showing these unique features within the Peruvian rainforest and because of
this, it was initially considered as a National Sanctuary and more recently
was made part of the National Park Bahuaja Sonene.
Native
Communities we can find here more than five language groups and over thirty
racial types spread out throughout the entire province. Some of these groups
live away from their original clans and have mixed with the outside population, but there are still large groups who live in their own reserves
or communities. There are also several groups with whom contact has not
yet been made. These groups live in the north part of the province and do not
wish to establish contact with the white man in fear of their weapons and
illnesses. These are nomad groups. Right now, efforts are being made by a
special movement so that this area can be officially declared as a
Reserve in order to ensure the peaceful survival of these groups and avoid
the extermination of their resources in the forest. This special movement is
known as CAR, which stands for Regional environment commission of Madre de
Dios. The ethnical group known as Harankbut was the last one to get
integrated into the western world. This happened starting the year of 1954. The
rubber industry could never beat them. Nowadays you can visit their
territories as part of a one-day tour, which starts in Puerto Maldonado and
takes you to the native community known as Amarakaeri.
Other
Lakes
Exist
many lakes that they do not form part of the tours routes, generally those
are smaller than Sandoval and Valencia Lake but have great quantity of fish
and fauna. The better way of visiting them is taking the option of
Special expeditions or Taylor made programs
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