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CITIES
PUERTO MALDONADO
- Puerto Maldonado
- Manu National Park
It is said that the Amazon forest is the only place
that gives one the sensation of witnessing the dawn
of time. Thousands of visitors are drawn to the diversity
of the area’s forests and rivers, arriving in
the city of Puerto Maldonado, the capital of the department
of Madre de Dios, ready to set out on a journey filled
with excitement and discovery.
The city was founded on July 10th 1902, was named after
explorer Faustino Maldonado, who paddled up the Madre
de Dios River to the point where it comes together with
the Tambopata River. Puerto Maldonado is the gateway
to three national parks in the Peruvian Amazon featuring
an extraordinary diversity of wild species of flora
and fauna: the Manu, Bahuaja-Sonene and Tambopata-Candamo
 .
The Manu National Park is the largest
protected natural area of its kind in Peru and spreads
across the departments of Cuzco and Madre de Dios covering
the entire Manu River watershed.
A boatride down the Tambopata or
Madre de Dios Rivers takes one to the Bahuaja-Sonene
(Tambopata-Heath) National Park, while the heath River
leads to the Pampas del Heath, a unique savanna area
wedged in the heart of Peru’s tropical rainforest
and a haven for unique animal species.
The Tambopata River leads to the
Tambopata-Candamo Reserved Zone, which is famous for
featuring the greatest diversity of species of mammals,
trees, insects and birds on Earth.
Festivals in Madre de Dios, such
as San Juan in June or Tourism an Ecological Week are
good reasons to taste regional dishes and take a refreshing
dip in Lake Sandoval or go fishing on Lake Valencia,
while visitors can spot countless species of plants,
fish and fauna in general.
MANU NATIONAL
PARK
The Manu National Park located in
the tropical rainforest of the departments of Cuzco
and Madre de Dios is Peru´s greatest natural reserve,
both for the number of species that it harbors as well
as the diversity of eco-systems to be found there. It
was established as a National Park in 1973 across a
surface of 1,532,806 hectares and declared a Mankind
Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987.
The reserve covers the entire watershed
of the Manu River, running across an extraordinary range
of altitudes, running from 4,300 masl (14,104 miles)
in the high Andean plain down to 200 meters (650 feet)
in the Amazon Basin. The area is home to dozens of tribes
such as Amahuaca, Huachipaire, Machiguenga, Piro, Yora
and Yaminahua as well as others that have yet to make
contact with outside world. The park is also a haven
for more than 20,000 plant varieties, 1,200 butterfly
species, 1000 bird species, 200 species of mammals and
an unknown quantity of reptiles, amphibians and insects.
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CESAR P. RIOS