Peru Guide
The Jungle
Arrival
Flying to any of the main jungle towns is surprisingly cheap and can save an arduous few days' journey overland. Once you've arrived, a number of excursions can be made easily and cheaply, though the best experience comprises a few nights at one of the better jungle lodges. For a more intimate (but often tougher) experience, it's easy enough to arrange a camping expedition and a guide, travelling in canoes or speedboats into the deeper parts of the wilderness.
A costlier option is to take a river cruise on a larger boat, with one of a few operators based in Iquitos. This offers two significant advantages: firstly, the boats are comfortable, with good service and food; and secondly, the programmes take you to remote areas in style, and can then penetrate the deeper forest (such as the rarely visited Pacaya Samiria National Reserve) in well-equipped speedboats. Unlike lodge-based operations, both canoe expeditions and cruises aren't fixed to specific locations, so they can customize programmes and routes. Both accommodation and tours tend to work out cheaper during periods of lower demand according to the annual cycle of US and European holiday seasons, though growing trends in ecological tourism and psychedelic, or jungle mystic experiences, are now bringing groups throughout the year.