Iquitos

Pilpintuwasi Butterfly Farm & Amazon Animal Orphanage

Amazonian Manatee (sea cow) Orphanage

The Morey and Cohen houses still stand on the Prospero street, which is the main street. Worth photographing.

La Plaza 28 de Julio, the biggest square in Peru, there are very good 'Chifa' Peruvian Chinese restaurants around the square.

One of the major attractions of Iquitos and the AmazonRain Forest is the native tribes.

Visitors beware:

There are several so-called 'serpentarios' in and around Iquitos, most notably two called 'Las Boas'. Even though these places claim to be 'animal rescue centers', they are illegal operations, where animals are exploited for monetary gain. Tourists are charged inflated entry rates of up to 40 soles per person, to see some animals that are often malnourished and sick, and kept under horrible conditions. As these places pay handsome kick-backs to boat owners who bring them tourists, it occurs regularly that tourists who hire a boat to take them to Pilpintuwasi, Monkey Island, or the Caiman Farm, are actually dropped off at one of the serpentarios. Don't be fooled, ripped off and cheated out of a visit to one of the better places; and don't support crime against nature with your money. Make sure you avoid the serpentarios.

Pacaya Samiria National Reserve

The river Amazonas and the Amazon rainforest

Ex Hotel Palace

Fundo Pedrito

The riverfront is just one block from the Plaza de Armas. In the low water season it will retreat and thus not be terribly visible. The waterfront walk also seems to be the place where local high schoolers go to canoodle, so if you stroll it be prepared to see lots of this. There is a somewhat big crafts market right below the walk, called Anaconda Center.

The Plaza de Armas is a mix of mostly modern and rubber boom styles. Cities like Iquitos turned into one long party during that age, where no expense was spared, nor eccentricity nor luxury lacking. As part of the legacy of this rubber boom age of abundance, Iquitos still bears traces of the extravagant taste of the rubber barons: mosaic tiles in Italian-style palaces, the bustling riverside walkway or the Iron House, a famous residence designed by Gustave Eiffel that was built from metal sheets. It was carried by hundreds of men through the jungle. There are a few street performers, a fountain, some statues, and one Catholic church. It is quite busy on a Saturday evening.

Today, in the city of Iquitos, the modest local homes -not without a certain kitsch charm- exist alongside French mansions, today largely used as public offices. When rubber seeds were smuggled out of the country, the rubber industry moved to Malaysia, signifying the end of the rubber barons. The memory of this past filled with abundance, however, lives on in the eccentric buildings which testify to an exuberant and wild era.

Centro de Investigaciones Allpahuayo del IIAP (CIA-IIAP)