Until Tarapoto
After Lima we go to the Amazon. Direction Yurimaguas then Tarapoto and finally Lagunas. The bus route is long, even very long. After a bus night we arrive at Tarapoto. Right out of the bus our goal is to go very quickly to Yurimaguas, and there it gets complicated.
We are in a city but in the jungle. It is very hot, very wet the sun burns and I sweat to death. There is no bus. After complicated discussions we finally understand that we have the choice between the collective taxi or find a pickup and to tighten with the guys in the back corner. Fresh! After hours waiting for our taxi to be full we leave on a road that meanders through the mountains. The equatorial landscape looks really wild with its dense vegetation.
Yurimaguas the border of the Amazon
After a few hours we arrive at Yurimaguas. We find a cheap hotel and we make a little walk to visit and find how to go to Lagunas. This time it is a much smaller city with its white central square and Spanish colonial style church. Not far, by sinking in an alley we arrive by chance facing the river. It’s a real Amazon river! It is broad and brown, mud color. It’s nice, a real adventure movie atmosphere.
In the evening we meet a couple of French in the hotel who leave for Lagunas them too. Lagunas is a village at 14 hours from the only accessible by boat. We decide to go take the boat the next day with them.
In the morning we still have time to go for a walk in the market and buy what we need for the trip. It’s the last city before really sinking into the jungle so we enjoy it. We risk staying there for at least 1 week. The market is hyper concentrated, it pawns and we jostle. There are really funny green fruits like big beans, others round and covered with scales like a snakeskin. There is a turtle for sale. And we come across astonished a woman with a little crocodile on her head. Rather exotic all that.
A very special boat on the Amazon
Accompanied by the French, we arrive last to the boat. Here the boats are not like the others, all in wood, 2 bridges, and especially covered with hammocks. Here no berths. Each one brings back his hammock and installs it between the posts provided for this purpose. There are days of crossings for those who want to reach the city of Iquitos, it is better to be comfortable.
We arrived last on the boat and we have more free space to install our hammocks but Sylvain is doing well and I sit at the top of the stairs. In case of a fall I will break my back but I will not fall happily.
