Peru's amazing Amazonica

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PUERTO MALDONADO, Peru -- Long, narrow and partly covered outboard boats bring visitors, baggage and supplies from this river city and regional capital to the jungle cabins and suites of Reserva Amazonica. The river -- the Madre de Dios, or Mother of God -- is the road.

For 45 minutes on a brilliant day, we putter about nine miles down the fast-moving, at times churning, brown river. This is excitement, the thrill of being in an unfamiliar place far from home and urban spaces -- of being on a big river far away from anywhere.

There is wonder in being here under a big blue sky with a sea of jolly clouds floating overhead. The bottoms of the clouds are flat, like giant puffs of meringue placed over a jungle pie to float, perhaps, over the Andes and other nations and over oceans.

Puerto Maldonado is the drop-off point for exploring the Amazonian area of Peru along the mighty Madre de Dios. Here, the Tambopata river flows into the Madre de Dios on its power roll through southeastern Peru and northwestern Bolivia to become the Madeira river in Brazil and enter the Amazon east of Manaus.

Puerto Maldonado's population is said to be about 67,000, but it does not seem that large. Perhaps the wide streets and low buildings of the frontier city contribute to the deception. The city, though, accounts for more than two-thirds of the population of the 85,000-square-mile Madre de Dios department, one of 25 such administrative divisions in Peru.

By land, Puerto Maldonado is a five-day drive in a very sturdy vehicle -- like a truck -- from Lima, Peru's capital. By air, it is a two-hour flight from Lima, or 45 minutes from Cuzco, the longest continuously inhabited city in South America.

Downstream, the days and nights at Inkaterra's Reserva Amazonica are filled with strange noises that seem quite gentle compared to the violence of an Amazonian thunderstorm one evening. The sounds may come from five species of monkeys, a Brazilian tapir, jaguar or capybara or, from the bird world, four species of macaws, two kinds of parrots, a cobalt-winged parakeet or Cuvier's toucan. Hyla koechlini, a frog named for Jose Koechlin, founder of the Inkaterra nature travel business, may join in the serenade.

There is an occasional buzz from mosquitoes, but they don't penetrate the net around my bed. Screen wire adds protection from other critters. Mr. Koechlin has assured us there are no mosquitoes here carrying yellow fever, but my shots are still valid for that disease and typhus.

The Madre de Dios is more than 20 feet below its last flood stage, I am told, when its waters spilled onto the ground beneath the cabins of Reserva Amazonica; the buildings rest on stilts about four feet from the ground.

The flood plain is vast for such a mighty river in the rainy season. The dry season, May to October, is an ideal time to visit and also is the only time that night excursions on the Madre de Dios are available at Inkaterra.