Upon our arrival from Lima or Cusco, we will be welcomed by the refuge's guides at the airport and taken to the refuge's headquarters in Puerto Maldonado (10 minutes away from the airport). All of the refuge's guides are scientists, tourism practitioners or members of the community. We advise you to take with you only the necessary luggage for your stay. We will ride along Puerto Maldonado (20-kilometer ride) to the port of embarkation. This will be a 2:30-hour boat ride that will take us through the indigenous community of Infierno and up to Tambopata's National Reserve checkpoint and into the buffer zone. The reserve covers an area of more than 1 million hectares. For lunch we will provide you a lunch box. We will be greeted by the manager, who will also give us some advice for our stay. Dinner. We will go out at night and have a boat ride through Tambopata river. We will be scanning the shores with headlamps and flashlights to spot the red gleams of reflection from the caiman eyes. Accommodations for the night at Refugio Amazonas.

We will have a 30-minute hike from Refugio Amazonas to the Canopy Tower (25 meters high - 82 ft). The access to the platforms up high is safe thanks to a banistered stairway. The tower was built on a higher ground, improving the visibility over the horizon of the primary jungle until Tambopata's National Reserve. You will be able to observe different bird species, like toucans, macaws and birds of prey, among others. Breakfast. We will continue our tour walking around. We will find a variety of plants and trees, that are used by the locals for diverse purposes. We will learn about the medicinal use (among other uses) of the garlic sacha, "yuca de venado", cat's claw, charcot-sacha, para-para, among others. Lunch. We will have a ride on a canoe or a "catamarán" boat around the lake in search of the resident species, like hoatzins (known as "shansho" in Peru), horned screamers and caimans. We will wait to see the giant otters, although they are not frequently seen in the zone. We will also observe some macaws and parrots flying over the lake. Dinner. We will have a nocturnal lecture prepared by the staff covering the preservation issues, the opportunities and the projects at Tambopata's National Reserve. Accommodations for the night at Refugio Amazonas.

Breakfast. We will have a 15-minute boat ride and a 60-minute walk from Refugio Amazonas to a parrots and parakeets collpa (a clay river wall). We will visit the collpa at dawn because in this time of the day the birds are the most active. They can also be seen there at noon or in the afternoon, though. Lunch. We will walk for a few minutes from Refugio Amazonas to Bosque Castaña, a beautiful forest of Brazil nut trees. The trees have been harvested for decades. We will notice the precarious remains of a camp used two months a year by the Brazil nut gatherers. We will observe the complete process of production (from collection, through the transportation, to the roasting and shelling). 20 minutes away from Refugio Amazonas we will find a peccary collpa (known as "sajino" or "huanganas" in Peru). These rainforest wild pigs show up in herds of 5 to 20 animals. They arrive to the collpa especially in the morning to eat some clay. Dinner. We will have the opportunity to do a walk at night, when most of the mammals are active, although difficult to see. Accommodations for the night at Refugio Amazonas.

Breakfast. We will transfer you by boat from Refugio Amazonas to Tambopata's port. We will transfer you from Tambopata's port to Refugio Amazonas' headquarters in Puerto Maldonado. We will transfer you from the headquarters in Puerto Maldonado to the airport. 

*Please be aware that, depending on the departure time, a very early check out might be necessary.