When to go & weather

Weather

A number of jungle areas of Peru are accessible to the traveler. In the southeast, near the Bolivian border, there’s Puerto Maldonado, a port at the junction of the Ríos Tambopata and Madre de Dios. Puerto Maldonado is most easily reached by air (particularly from Cuzco) or by an atrociously bad dirt road (an uncomfortable two- or three-day journey by truck). South of Puerto Maldonado are numerous lodges and campsites in the Reserva Nacional Tambopata and in the Parque Nacional Bahuaja-Sonene.

North of Cuzco, and fairly easily accessible from there, is Parque Nacional Manu, one of the best areas of protected rainforest in the Amazon.

In central Peru, east of Lima, is the area known as Chanchamayo, which consists of the two small towns of San Ramón and La Merced, both easily accessible by road from Lima, and several nearby villages including Puerto Bermúdez and Oxapampa. From La Merced a paved road continues to the boomtown of Satipo, a major coffee-growing area.

A very rough jungle road goes north from La Merced, and past Puerto Bermúdez, to the important river port of Pucallpa, the capital of the department of Ucayali. Most travelers going to Pucallpa, however, take the better roads from Lima via Huánuco and Tingo María, or fly.

Further north, in the department of Loreto, is the small port of Yurimaguas, reached from the north coast by road. Further northeast, and accessible only by riverboat from Pucallpa or Yurimaguas, or by air from Lima and (possibly) Tarapoto, is Peru’s major jungle port, Iquitos.

Wherever you go in the Amazon Basin you can be sure of two things: there will be rainforest and it’s going to rain. Even in the drier months of June to September, the area gets more rain than the wettest months in the mountains.