Peruvian Amazon - Part 1: Wildlife, Culture, and First Impressions from the Jungle
The Amazon Rainforest remains one of the most iconic yet least understood travel experiences in the world. In this episode, David Brodie and guest Chris Christensen from the Amateur Traveler Podcast explore what it actually feels like to arrive in the Amazon, moving beyond expectations to uncover the scale, rhythm, and reality of life in one of Earth’s most remote regions.
Drawing on firsthand experiences from both the Peruvian and Ecuadorian Amazon, the conversation highlights the immense size of the rainforest, the seasonal shifts that shape daily life, and the balance between wildlife encounters and cultural immersion. From river level changes to village life, this episode offers a grounded perspective on what makes the Amazon such a distinctive and transformative destination.
Topics Covered
• Cultural Identity & Atmosphere – A living landscape shaped by river cycles, indigenous traditions, and evolving modern influences.
• Getting Around – River-based travel and seasonal accessibility define movement through the region.
• Food & Local Life – Agricultural cycles, fishing practices, and subsistence living tied to water levels.
• Wildlife Expectations – A realistic look at biodiversity, including birds, reptiles, and occasional mammals.
Final Thoughts
The Amazon is not a conventional travel destination. It rewards curiosity, patience, and openness to a different pace of life. For travelers seeking meaningful encounters with nature and culture, the Peruvian Amazon offers an experience that is both humbling and unforgettable.
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Transcript
A trip to the Amazon is one of those things that a lot of people dream about, but very few actually take.
Speaker A:And even fewer really understand what it's like until you get there.
Speaker A:The river, the jungle closing in around you, and that feeling of being so far away from anywhere else you've ever been before.
Speaker A:Today, we're digging into that experience and that feeling and what it's like when you actually get there.
Speaker A:I'm going to be joined by my good friend Chris Christiansen, the host of the Amateur Traveler podcast.
Speaker A:And Chris has just come back from the Peruvian Amazon and I was not too far away on the Ecuadorian side.
Speaker A:We're going to be talking about our two different Amazon experiences, but really digging into what it's like in Peru, getting into the wildlife, the culture, and what makes this one of the most unforgettable trips you can take.
Speaker A:Then in our second episode, we're going to be breaking down the logistics a bit more.
Speaker A:How you get there, how to plan it, what it's like to travel by river cruise in the Amazon, so you can help plan your own trip.
Speaker A:So join us today as we head off to the Amazon.
Speaker A:Chris, I understand you have recently got back from your first trip to the Amazon.
Speaker A:And was this also your first trip to Peru?
Speaker B:It was, in fact, my first trip to Peru.
Speaker B:So I've been to the Amazon, but I haven't been to Machu Picchu.
Speaker A:There you go.
Speaker A:And tell me a bit about it.
Speaker A:What, what, what brought you down there?
Speaker B:Well, so I was working with G Adventures, and basically they were offering that I could go on any trip that they do, which is challenging.
Speaker B:Actually, when you go to their website and you start thinking about where you want to go, that is a difficult choice.
Speaker B:And for some reason, going to the Amazon and doing a cruise on the Peruvian Amazon just spoke to me.
Speaker B:It just seemed like something that I want to do and my wife was not going to be able to travel with me, and it's something that she did not want to do.
Speaker B:And so that was just a little past her comfort zone, or at least what she perceived it would be, but easier than I thought it would be.
Speaker B:Actually.
Speaker B:It was one of my biggest surprises for the Amazon.
Speaker A:There you go.
Speaker A:Well, as it's funny, we have both had very similar experiences because I was, I was just got back from Ecuador from going the Amazon there about a week ago, and it was similar where I was going to an adventure travel event where it was a lot of hiking a lot.
Speaker A:It was not a trip.
Speaker A:My wife would've been super Excited to do so.
Speaker A:It was a similar, similar sort of experience.
Speaker A:And I found the Amazon to be, well, a remarkable experience.
Speaker A:And I'm curious, what was your feeling when first kind of first arriving, your first impressions?
Speaker B:I was surprised by the scale.
Speaker B:I mean it's something, you know, right.
Speaker B:It's something that you're aware of how big the area is.
Speaker B:I mean the whole Amazon rainforest area is quite large.
Speaker B:But I was, I didn't realize how much of Peru is rainforest.
Speaker B:How much of Peru is that side of the Andes.
Speaker B:And so for instance, we were in one small, small.
Speaker B:We are in one reserve, natural reserve that's half the size of Costa Rica.
Speaker B:So it's not a small place.
Speaker B:And this was just only part of the Peruvian Amazon.
Speaker B:And so that was probably the first thing that was surprising.
Speaker B:And then the other thing that was really surprising was the whole river level thing that there is high water season and there is low water season and the difference between them may be 40ft and all of the things that that means.
Speaker B:So this area, this park that we're in that is half the size of Costa Rica in high water season is underwater, 5% of it is underwater.
Speaker A:And so when you're there is this, is this high water.
Speaker B:We were about halfway from high water season to low water season, which turned out to be a very good time to go.
Speaker B:So we were there in July and so the water had receded.
Speaker B:So that is all now out of, you know, not covered with water.
Speaker B:The people can actually go fishing because the fish aren't hiding in the tre as they do in high water season.
Speaker B:High water season is for the people there a time of want.
Speaker B:And so they're eating their, their salted fish from last high water season or last low water season rather during the high water season.
Speaker B:And they can't grow crops because there's just not land around.
Speaker B:And so as soon as these sand banks uncover, they start running in and planting their crops there.
Speaker B:Their rice and their corn and all of these things.
Speaker B:And they've got five months basically to grow their crops and, and then to store them for the rest of the year.
Speaker B:And it's some of the most fertile soil in the world because they're basically all of this soil that has been washed down from the Andes and is just freshly added into these sandbanks.
Speaker B:And they make advantage, take advantage of this time and then really don't have the time in the, in what would be our winter, their high water season to do that.
Speaker B:So this was more cultural than I anticipated.
Speaker B:This were more village Visits.
Speaker B:There were more people just in general around that area, even in the natural preserve, you know, at the, at the borders of it especially, than I expected.
Speaker B:The whole, you know, how life is affected by these changes in the river were very interesting and how the people were adapting to that.
Speaker B:And then there's the wildlife.
Speaker B:And the wildlife is, you know, just very cool in terms of sloths and monkeys and lots and lots and lots of birds.
Speaker B:And so it was something that kind of like an African experience where you may not go for the birds, but you spend so much time looking at macaws and egrets and hawks and all of these things that you become a birder, even if you didn't start that way, especially as a photographer.
Speaker B:It's really fun to, to try and take pictures of these wild animals, including, you know, the world's smallest monkeys and all sorts of things like that that are.
Speaker B:You're seeing along the way.
Speaker A:Really interesting and.
Speaker A:Well, I'm interested to hear about the wildlife encounters because one of the things I found, and it's interesting, I'm, I'm just.
Speaker A:The map here where me and you were, was actually quite nearby because I was in the far southeast of Ecuador, which is kind of a.
Speaker A:Under the radar.
Speaker A:Not a lot of tourists going to that part of the Amazon or that part of Ecuador.
Speaker A:And it's very close to the Peruvian border.
Speaker A:And we were only about two and a half, three hours, I think, at one point from Peru, where we were.
Speaker A:But one of the things that surprised me is, you know, we think of the Amazon, you do think of wildlife encounters.
Speaker A:And at least in the portion of the Amazon that we were in, I mean, it was, it was rainforest, it was alive, but it was primarily 99% of what we saw was insects and birds and amazing and beautiful, but we weren't seeing any mammals.
Speaker A:They had, I mean, they were saying that the, the region that we were in had largely been, you know, hunted out and there just wasn't a lot of mammal life in that area.
Speaker A:I'm curious what it was like on the other side of the border where you were in Peru.
Speaker A:I know you, you mentioned sloths, you mentioned monkeys.
Speaker A:What were the real standout wildlife encounters when you were there?
Speaker B:So in terms of seeing in the wild, you know, was the.
Speaker B:It was the porpoises, the, the pink and the gray.
Speaker A:See the pink dolphins.
Speaker B:Dolphins.
Speaker B:Rather very cool.
Speaker B:You know, pink dolphins are harder to photograph.
Speaker B:They don't jump as high out of the water normally.
Speaker B:So we were seeing those, we were seeing the, you know, I Don't know how many different types of monkeys.
Speaker B:We had the Michael Jackson monkeys with the white hands and we had the squirrel monkeys.
Speaker B:I'd say we saw four different types of monkeys on multiple times.
Speaker B:Sloths on multiple occasions, including a pet sloth in one of the villages we went to.
Speaker B:Which is adorable and not something you should do, but you understand why people might want to have a pet that only poops once a.
Speaker B:Once a week.
Speaker B:But which is an interesting characteristic of sloths and.
Speaker B:But we didn't see, for instance, we're not seeing jaguars, we're not seeing tapirs.
Speaker B:When we were in the wild though, we didn't see.
Speaker B:We did go to a animal rescue center at the end of our trip and saw some of these animals that we did not see in the wild, like tapirs and also the, you know, the world's largest rodent and things like that, which are, you know.
Speaker A:Capybara.
Speaker B:Capybara, yes, the world's largest rodent, the capybara.
Speaker B:So we did see those.
Speaker B:The size of a medium sized dog, but not in the wild.
Speaker B:So much, much more difficult to run into those sort of things.
Speaker B:We did see an anaconda.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:Which I could have gone without seeing.
Speaker B:But we, we walked.
Speaker B:We saw one on our two jungle treks that we saw one that was sunny, just had shedded its skin.
Speaker B:It was fairly placid up until someone got too close to it and then made a mock strike which caused us all to jump quite far, strangely enough.
Speaker A:Well, I think, I mean certainly the, the wildlife encounters and the natural environment is a huge part of what people.
Speaker A:Draws people to the Amazon and to this part of the world.
Speaker A:The other that you touched upon.
Speaker A:And I found this to be the.
Speaker A:Even the much more compelling part was the cultural experiences and the, and the local interactions.
Speaker A:And I'm curious what, what that was like on your trip and, and the type of cultural experiences that you had.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So we visited a couple different villages, got to see some projects that they were working on.
Speaker B:Like the village that was trying to introduce reintroduce some butterflies and had a butterfly farm basically.
Speaker B:Or the village.
Speaker B:You know, every time you visited a village there'd be opportunities for handicrafts to buy handicrafts.
Speaker B:We visited with a shaman, a woman shaman, which is unusual and heard about her life and training and the sort of things that she was treating and how she was treating with different plants and such from the rainforest.
Speaker B:So we went in a dugout canoe ride with, at one village with various members of the community.
Speaker B:So got A chance to visit with some of the people from the various villages.
Speaker B:So, yeah, it was an interesting opportunity.
Speaker B:They also then were our local guides when we did the two overland excursions that we did.
Speaker B:So we had local guides who are helping basically spot some of the animals or plants or whatever that we were going to be seeing along the way.
Speaker B:So they were the ones who were up a little further ahead of us saying, oh, look, there's a tarantula, or, you know, here's a particular type of frog or bullfrog or something like that as well.
Speaker A:And I said, I mean, on the Ecuador side of the border, I'm curious.
Speaker A:Peru is the same.
Speaker A:I mean, those local indigenous groups have very much still preserved their traditional way of life and their, their traditional culture to, to a pretty, pretty great degree.
Speaker A:I mean, there were even in some places uncontacted groups that obviously we didn't, didn't encounter.
Speaker A:But, but we're not far from getting into that, that part of the Amazon.
Speaker B:So in the reserve we were in, there are uncontacted groups, but we were not obviously contacting them.
Speaker B:But I would say most of the villages we were going to.
Speaker B:If you use the word village and you use the local people, it's easy to get the wrong mental picture.
Speaker B:I mean, these people were living in houses, dressed in regular clothes.
Speaker B:The houses were up on stilts, obviously, as the, you know, as that river water is going up and down.
Speaker B:Last year, for instance, their stilts were not quite tall enough, and the houses were flooded by about a foot of water in a particularly high water, High, high water year.
Speaker B:So that part was interesting.
Speaker B:Both our naturalists were from the area.
Speaker B:They basically had grown up, you know, without running water, without electricity and such.
Speaker B:But things have changed in many of those villages.
Speaker B:We saw solar projects in one village, and we saw one village that had a water treatment plant from Engineers Without Borders, or say a water treatment plant that's a little over.
Speaker B:It was a little exaggerated, but a water purification facility, you know, to try and deal with some of the waterborne illnesses.
Speaker B:Obviously that is a problem there.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:The other wildlife experience I didn't mention was fishing for piranhas.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:Take, take a little meat, put it on a hook, stir up the water with the tip of your fish and then put in your hook and wait for a nibble and then jerk and see if you catch a piranhas.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And most of the group did catch piranhas, fairly small piranhas, fortunately.
Speaker A:Now, I know piranhas can eat you, but can you eat Them.
Speaker A:Do you, do you actually eat them once you've fished for them against one?
Speaker B:One can.
Speaker B:They're, they're kind of a bony fish and, and the ones we were catching were fairly small.
Speaker B:They can get larger but they larger fish are more hiding.
Speaker B:They can eat you.
Speaker B:That's actually true.
Speaker B:You know, all that Hollywood exaggeration.
Speaker B:They really can strip, you know, a water buffalo or something like that in a minute.
Speaker B:But they don't prefer that sort of, they prefer fish.
Speaker B:And so if unless they have run out of fish, then it's not really something that you have to worry about.
Speaker B:We did have one experience where we went for a swim in the river and that was a little interesting.
Speaker B:We were in a black water river.
Speaker B:Did you get any blackwater rivers?
Speaker A:We didn't.
Speaker A:We did a whitewater rafting trip, but no black water rivers.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker B:So yeah, blackwater in this case in, in this region.
Speaker B:They're talking about a region that there is so much plant life in the river that there's not oxygen for the fish.
Speaker B:And so you're not going to tend to have fish in that river and therefore you wouldn't have something like piranha.
Speaker B:You wouldn't necessarily have something like anacondas or whatever.
Speaker B:So it's a relatively safe place to swim.
Speaker B:Now you can have lungfish.
Speaker B:One of the interesting things, you know, these ancient fish that are still in the rivers there that look like they're out of the primordial ooze can come up for a breath and so they can live in these rivers that are non oxygenated that the, the fish with gills can't live in.
Speaker B:But we, we only saw those in captivity.
Speaker B:We did not see those in the wild.
Speaker B:The you know, six foot long longfish, but fascinating area.
Speaker A:So that's it for part one.
Speaker A:We're going to be coming back next week in part two of my discussion with Chris Christensen, getting a little bit more into the, the details of travel to the Peruvian Amazon, kind of how to get there, what some of the logist, what the experience really on board a ship is like and really breaking it down for you so you can plan your own trip to the region.
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