If there were an international poll on what image comes to mind when people think of Peru, a sweeping panorama of Machu Picchu would surely win. Running second would be a highland campesino in a broad, colorfully woven dress and, in distant third, the white hat and poncho of a rider atop a coastal paso horse. Fewer people would think of an Amazon native paddling down a river in a dugout canoe, or a flock of scarlet macaws flying over rainforest.

Surprisingly, nearly 70 percent of Peru is jungle, and there are few places in the world where the Amazon basin is as accessible, biologically diverse, and comfortable as it is in Peru. In as little as three hours after boarding a flight in Cusco, travelers can be boating down a chocolate-brown river with the jungle rising on both sides like a canyon of green.

Guaranteed animals to see, on nearly any jungle trip, are monkeys, pig-sized aquatic rodents known as capybara, alligator-like caimans, pirañas, and hundreds of kinds of birds. Large mammals, like anteaters and jaguars and tapirs, require at least a day’s travel into more remote areas, and even then are a long bet.

Seeing these animals through all the greenness of the rainforest is a serious challenge, but being on a river or lake with good binoculars and an experienced guide greatly increases the odds.

With the new generation of well-outfitted ecolodges, the experience of visiting Peru’s Amazon can also be very comfortable. There are dozens of well-run lodges that operate in Peru’s Amazon, ranging from stylish bungalows with electricity, hot water, and tile floors to simple wood rooms with cold water and a mosquito net over the bed.

Most of the lodges are clustered around Iquitos in the north and around Cusco farther south—though there are important differences between these areas. The lodges arrange all transport and often use a combination of converted four-wheel-drive trucks and huge canoes rigged with shade canopies and powerful outboard motors. Food is included in the package prices and tends to be a simple and nutritious combination of beans, rice, fish, and local foods such as manioc root or heart of palm.

Common features of most lodge programs include early-morning bird-watching, a visit to an oxbow lake and/or macaw clay lick, day hikes through the forest, piraña fishing, and evening boat rides to spot caiman. Some lodges also have canopy walks, zip lines, or observation towers, which is an exhilarating way to see birds and the jungle canopy up close.

A visit to a shaman for a talk about medicinal plants, or to a local farm, can be an added bonus to a jungle trip—though some village visits around Iquitos are awkward, staged affairs. A key component of any jungle trip is a knowledgeable, English-speaking guide, whose job is to spot wildlife and introduce the extraordinary web of connections among plants, trees, animals, and insects.

Peru’s Amazon, though under siege from oil and gas drilling and illegal logging, continues to host the world’s greatest biodiversity—1,800 species of birds, thousands of trees, millions of (mostly undocumented) insects, and rare, endangered megafauna like the black caiman, giant otter, pink river dolphin, and harpy eagle. Humans have been part of the web of life for at least a thousand years, and small pockets of isolated, “no-contact” groups continue to live in areas of the Manu Biosphere Reserve and the Lower Urubamba Basin.

Tourism does bring change, but there is little doubt that responsible ecotourism is immensely better for the Amazon than the more traditional industries of gold mining, illegal hardwood logging, bush meat hunting, and exotic animal commerce. The integration of native peoples into Peru’s ecotourism industry is a positive and necessary development that has come about largely because of win-win deals struck between lodges and native communities.

The communities agree to stop hunting and cutting down trees and, in exchange, the lodge uses the land and provides funding for health care and education. Some lodges share profits or transfer ownership back to the community after a certain number of years. The net result of all this wheeling and dealing is that peoples’ minds are turning to conservation and more and more rainforest is being preserved. By visiting, you are helping to preserve the Amazon as well.

The Best of the Amazon

• Wildlife
• Canopy Walks
• Explorer’s Inn
• The Tambopata Research Center
• Reserva Amazónica
• Manu Expeditions
• Tahuayo Lodge