Tambopata

Tambopata and its massive wilderness reserves are accessed from Puerto Maldonado, at the confluence of the Madre de Dios and Tambopata rivers in the Amazon Basin. The riverside city serves as a gateway to what very well may be the world's most expansive and bio-diverse jungle rainforest habitats. With a combined area of more than 3.6 million acres the Tambopata-Candamo, Bahuaja-Sonene, and Pampas del Heath National Reserves represent two distinct and enormously complex eco-systems. The staggering array of wildlife species includes hundreds of different mammals, amphibians and reptiles, over 1300 types of butterflies, more than 600 different bird species, and the Colpa Colorado macaw clay lick, the largest on the world, which frequently attracts hundreds of the spectacularly colored birds per day.

The rainforests here abound with hardwood trees and jungle foliage, sheltering many of the Amazon Basin's most fearsome predators, endangered species that are rapidly dwindling in other Amazon habitats. Healthy populations of Jaguar, Giant Otter, Harpy Eagle, anaconda, tapir, white-lipped peccaries, and spider monkeys continue to populate this Mecca for eco-travelers and bio researchers.