The first morning of our expedition through the Peruvian Amazon started early, with an exploration of a tributary of the Marañón River. Pahuachiro is a small stream that flows into the main river, and here we had our first morning searching for wildlife. Many of us were blown away by the diversity of birds. We were also amazed to learn about the dynamic nature of a river, which can fluctuate up to ten meters between low water and high water.
Some of the birds that we saw included slate hawks, roadside hawks, black-collared hawks, wattled jacanas, several species of kingfishers, and the amazing russet-backed oropendolas with their amazing calls.
After breakfast, we went on the first of our jungle explorations. This time we went on a walk into the non-flooded forest.
Later on, Delfin II sailed upriver to another tributary of the Marañón. We arrived at Yanayacu River, which means “black water” river. As soon as the ship tied up to the shore, we could see pink and gray river dolphins all around the ship. Local children played in the river by splashing around and pretended to spear fish with sticks from their small dug-out canoe.
Later we embarked our skiffs again, to look for more wildlife up the Yanayacu River. We saw two species of terns; the large-billed tern and the yellow-billed tern. Or guides impressed us by finding three-toed sloths on the distant trees. We had more excellent views of pink river dolphins and encountered a small flock of orange-winged Amazon parrots not too far away from us.
We ended the day with a wonderful dinner, followed by live music from our galley and dining room crew. It was a nice surprise to see how talented our musicians are, and how fantastic it is to experience Peruvian music, right at its birthplace.
