4 DAY REFUGIO AMAZONAS LODGE

After breakfast, we will paddle around the lake on a canoe or a catamaran, looking for lakeside wildlife such as hoatzin, caiman, and horned screamers, hoping to see the otters which are infrequently seen here. You will also be rewarded with overhead sightings of macaws.

Canopy Tower – recommended activity

A thirty-minute walk from Refugio Amazonas leads to the 25-meter scaffolding canopy tower. A bannistered staircase running through the middle provides safe access to the platforms above. The tower has been built upon high ground, therefore increasing your horizon of the continuous primary forest extending out towards the Tambopata National Reserve. From here views of mixed species canopy flocks as well as toucans, macaws, and raptors are likely.

Farm Visit – recommended activity

Five minutes downriver from the lodge lies a farm owned and managed by charismatic Don Manuel from the neighboring community of Condenado. He grows a variety of popular and unknown Amazon crops – just about every plant and tree you see serve a purpose.

Ethnobotanical Tour recommended activity

Along this trail, we will find a variety of plants and trees that are used by the local population with at least the same variety of purposes. We will learn about the medicinal (and other) uses of Ajo-Sacha, Yuca de Venado, Uña de Gato, Charcot-Sacha, Para-Para, among several others.

Night Lecture – recommended activity

After dinner, nightly lectures prepared by the staff of Refugio Amazonas cover conservation threats, opportunities, and projects in the Tambopata National Reserve.

Overnight in Refugio Amazonas Lodge.

Meals included: B, L, D

Parrot Clay Lick – recommended activity

After breakfast, a fifteen-minute boat ride and sixty-minute walk from Refugio Amazonas is a clay lick used both by parrots and parakeets. From a blind, you will see parrots and parakeets descend on most clear days to ingest the clay on a bank. Species such as Dusky headed and Cobalt winged Parakeet descend at this clay lick. With luck, we will also see some or all of the following species in the early morning rush: Mealy and Yellow-crowned Amazons, Blue-headed Pionus, Severe macaw, and Orange-cheeled (Barraband`s) Parrot. We visit the lick at dawn, when parrots are most active, or in midmorning or early afternoon when they are active.

Brazil Nut Trail and Camp – recommended activity

A few minutes hike from the lodge is a beautiful old growth patch of Brazil Nut forest that has been harvested for decades (if not centuries) where the precarious remains of a camp used two months a year by Brazil Nut gatherers can still be experienced. We will be demonstrating the whole process of the rain forest’s only sustainably harvested product from collection through transportation to drying.

Mammal Clay Lick – recommended activity

Twenty minutes walking from Refugio Amazonas is a peccary clay lick. These wild rain forest pigs show up in herds of five to twenty individuals to eat clay in the late morning. Chances of spotting them are around 15%, but well worth the short hike. Other wildlife also shows up including deer, guan, and parakeets.

Evening free.

Overnight in Refugio Amazonas Lodge.

Meals included: B, L, D

Leave Refugio Amazonas to take a boat back to Tambopata River Port and then to Puerto Maldonado headquarters. Finally, you will be transferred to the airport to take your flight Puerto Maldonado – Cusco/Lima (departing after 11:30 hours – booked on your own).

Meals included: B