- 3 months ago
This series explores some of the most fascinating and hard-core boat journeys on the planet. We undertake epic journeys by boats in some of the toughest environments on earth. During our journeys we look at how the technology of boat travel has been adapted to survive, trade with and connect isolated communities.
Holly Morris embarks on a 250-mile, 3-day journey through the remote Peruvian Amazon by cargo boat, sharing space with over 200 locals and heading to Iquitos, the largest city in the Peruvian Amazon. Marooned in the jungle with no road access, Iquitos flourished a century ago during the Amazon rubber boom. Holly explores this history and meets an indigenous tribe whose ancestors were rubber tappers. She concludes her journey in the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve aboard a historic steamboat, surrounded by spectacular wildlife, including the rare Amazonian pink river dolphin.
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TVTranscript
00:00I'm in Peru traveling down one of the most remote stretches of the Amazon.
00:04My destination is the historic city of Iquitos, which grew incredibly rich a century ago during
00:10the Amazon's rubber boom.
00:11Today it's the biggest city in the world that you can't drive to, marooned in the middle
00:16of the jungle.
00:17Getting there isn't easy, but it's definitely going to be a great adventure.
00:31My journey starts from Urimaguis, at the end of Peru's road network.
00:36Traveling downriver for days through the jungle, I finally arrive in the remote city of Iquitos
00:41before returning upriver to the spectacular Pacaya Samaria National Reserve to search for
00:47rare wildlife.
01:03Situated on the edge of the Amazon rainforest, Urimaguis is a busy frontier town with a population
01:09of around 50,000 people.
01:14There's plenty of noisy traffic here, but happily I won't be seeing any more of that for a while.
01:23Gracias.
01:24Okay, in terms of getting to Iquitos, this is the end of the road.
01:36It's boats from here on out, 250 miles downriver.
01:41If all goes well, it should take about two days.
01:44The boats from here to Iquitos don't usually depart according to a regular schedule.
01:50They just leave when they're fully loaded with passengers and cargo, which makes planning
01:54a trip in advance tough.
01:55Although, I've been given a useful tip.
01:59Okay, you could hang around here for days waiting for a boat to leave, but not if you're
02:04smart.
02:05You get on the vegetable boat.
02:06That's the one I'm going for.
02:08All right.
02:09This says it's leaving at 530, which I believe, because look at this, all eggs.
02:14These are never going to last on deck, because let me tell you, it is hot here.
02:18It's about 98 degrees, 98% humidity.
02:20We're going to move fast.
02:22We're going to move fast.
02:34Oh, okay.
02:35Hi.
02:36Um, uh, uh, what time do we leave?
02:39What time does the boat leave?
02:41For sure?
02:44Yeah.
02:45Okay.
02:46Um, how much for the trip to Iquitos?
02:48Can I see the cabin?
02:55Okay.
02:56All right.
02:57Two options.
02:58Sleep on the deck in a hammock or get your own cabin.
03:01I'm going to check that out.
03:02All right.
03:03Okay.
03:04Cabin number nine.
03:05Looking good.
03:06Oh my.
03:07This is a metal box.
03:10Okay.
03:11Cabin number nine.
03:12Looking good.
03:13Oh my.
03:14This is a metal box.
03:17It's very, very hot in here.
03:20Any possibility I could have the whole place?
03:23Just for me?
03:24Yes.
03:25But I have to buy both beds.
03:26Yes.
03:27150 per bed.
03:28300 total.
03:29So about a hundred bucks.
03:30Yes.
03:31Okay.
03:32Good.
03:33Take it.
03:34There's my lock.
03:36Lock up and pay the cap, all right?
03:40All right.
03:44Even though it's great to be safe and to be able to lock my stuff up, my oven-like cabin
03:48might be too hot to sleep in, so I want to get a hammock as well.
03:52They do look comfortable, and since I've got some time to kill before the boat leaves in
03:56a few hours, I head to the town market to buy myself one.
04:00Yeah.
04:01Hello.
04:02Buenos dias.
04:03Yes.
04:04I need a...
04:05A hamaca?
04:06Hamacas?
04:07Si.
04:08Tengo de cincuenta.
04:09Okay.
04:10Este gasta quince.
04:11Yeah.
04:12Air-conditioned version.
04:13Veinticinco.
04:14Esta treinta.
04:15Thirty.
04:16De cuarenta y cinco.
04:17Okay.
04:18I like this one.
04:19Esta es la más bonita.
04:20Yeah.
04:21Esta esta cincuenta.
04:22Cincuenta.
04:23Fifty.
04:24It's a little...
04:25Hasta cuarenta y cinco.
04:26Cuarenta y cinco.
04:27Si, a cuarenta y cinco te voy a dar.
04:28Okay.
04:29Yeah.
04:30Deal.
04:31As well as a hammock, I need to buy a few other bits and pieces.
04:48Three meals a day are included in my boat fare.
04:51Hopefully not including some of the food that seems to be popular here in the market.
04:56But I do need to buy my own things to eat and drink with on the boat.
05:00All right.
05:01This boat trip is sort of a DIY experience.
05:04I got to bring my own utensils.
05:05Hi.
05:06Hola.
05:07Could I buy some, um, plato?
05:09Si.
05:10Plato tengo cuatro soles.
05:11Good plato.
05:12Okay.
05:13Posillos.
05:14Así tengo sol y medio.
05:15All right.
05:16My own cup.
05:17Tenedores, sol y medio.
05:18Not sure what they're serving on board, but I'm prepared.
05:21Okay.
05:22That's it?
05:23Cuántas?
05:24Son cuatro, cinco cincuenta, ocho cincuenta.
05:27There you go.
05:28Gracias.
05:29Gracias.
05:47Hola.
05:48Hi.
05:49Hi.
05:50Hello.
05:51Is the boat leaving soon?
05:53Yes.
05:54It is?
05:55Yeah.
05:56Mañana a las días de la mañana.
05:57Tomorrow?
05:58Yes.
05:59But I thought it was leaving at 5.30.
06:01No.
06:02Mañana en la mañana.
06:03So much for my vegetable theory.
06:05So what do you do?
06:06Just hang out?
06:07Yes.
06:08Have a hammock?
06:09I have a hammock.
06:10Yes.
06:11But I don't really know how to hang it.
06:12That's my problem.
06:13Can you help me?
06:14Yes.
06:15All right.
06:16Yes.
06:17All right.
06:18All right.
06:19Just tie it a knot?
06:20Yes.
06:21All right.
06:22All right.
06:23All right.
06:24Just tie it a knot?
06:25Yes.
06:26All right.
06:27Oh, it's a little high.
06:28A little high.
06:29I have to take a running leap into it.
06:31Is it stretched?
06:32Yes.
06:33It's good.
06:34Yeah, it's good.
06:35All right.
06:36Yes.
06:37It's cold.
06:38So much for the vegetable boat always leaving punctually.
06:41Hour after hour, well into the night, more and more vegetables are loaded on board.
06:48For the sake of the people in Iquitos who'll be eating them, let's hope they stay fresh despite
06:54the delay.
06:55Oh, well.
07:20Oh, well, well, it's dark and hot.
07:26My bag's still here, so that's good.
07:29And I think I'm going to head back to the deck.
07:43All right, this is it.
07:45It is definitely cooler out here, but lights are on.
07:51Kids are playing.
07:53The vegetables are still being loaded.
07:55I'm not feeling totally optimistic about a good night's sleep,
07:58but it's better than the hot box.
08:00We'll give it a try.
08:02I only wish I brought some earplugs.
08:14It's been an interesting night.
08:16My takeaway from the night is there's a particular skill set to sleeping on a hammock on a boat deck in the Amazon.
08:25I haven't quite acquired that skill set yet, but we got through it.
08:29And here we go, hopefully today sometime.
08:36I'd like to get moving.
08:38The boat should have left well over 12 hours ago, but at least prospects seem good for an imminent departure.
08:44From the look of it, no more vegetables are being loaded on board.
08:47Uh, it's all loaded?
08:52Yes.
08:52Okay.
08:54Whoa.
08:55Look at this.
08:57Floor to ceiling, wall to wall vegetables.
09:00Mangoes, carrots, melons, lettuce.
09:04Now I can see why it took so long to load this boat.
09:08But nothing else can fit in here, so I think that means we're going to take off soon.
09:13One thing's for sure, though.
09:15With all this food on board, we're certainly not going to starve if this boat happens to break down
09:19on our long journey downriver through the remote jungle.
09:22Finally, the boat really is ready to leave.
09:29All right, the moment of truth.
09:31They're pulling back.
09:33A little gangplank.
09:34There we go.
09:37We're finally taking off.
09:40Say goodbye to land.
09:41Two, two and a half days, we'll make it to the city of Iquitos.
09:45If all goes well.
09:46Out of the more than 200 people making the trip to Iquitos aboard our boat,
10:14there are a handful of foreign travelers,
10:17but the vast majority of passengers are local Peruvians.
10:21At just $25 in a hammock for the two and a half day journey,
10:24it's a cheap way to travel,
10:26especially when you consider that three meals a day are included in the price.
10:29The captain jumped in his little boat, went out to a village, came back with that,
10:48the biggest captain I've ever seen, and now the chef's preparing it.
10:52It'll serve dozens, maybe a hundred people for dinner.
10:56Not all of the critters on this vessel are for eating.
11:15These are pets.
11:17They seem hungry because they're trying to eat my fingers.
11:21Very sweet, huh?
11:22There you go.
11:38Outside on deck, the view remains unchanging, hour after hour,
11:42making it easy to forget that we're making any progress at all.
11:46And forward progress really is slow.
11:49Due to the extremely flat landscape, the river meanders in big loops back and forth through the Amazon jungle.
11:57Initially, we're actually traveling down tributaries of the main Amazon River.
12:02To start with, we're traveling down the Wayaga River before joining a bigger tributary, the Marignone.
12:08Finally, for the last part of our journey, we'll be on the Amazon itself.
12:12Although it's 250 miles in a straight line from Yurimaguos to Iquitos,
12:18the distance we're actually traveling is more like 500 miles, due to all the river's twists and turns.
12:27The Wayaga River we're on today, although wide, isn't nearly as easy to navigate as it looks.
12:33Its meandering route creates frequent shifts of the main navigable channel.
12:37And in some places, it's very shallow with treacherous sandbanks, as a fellow passenger explains to me.
12:44Now, what are they doing out there?
12:46Up there, they are measuring the depth of the river because it's quite low there.
12:51That's why they're using the long stick to be checking the deepest part where these, I mean, the ship can be navigating down the river.
12:59This is a heavily laden boat right now, so if we go over a shallow, we just basically run aground?
13:04Yes, sometimes. Sometimes, not often, but sometimes when these, I mean, kind of boats can be stuck in the sandbar.
13:10It can stay, depending, for one month.
13:13A month.
13:14Yes, or two months until the water can start coming up.
13:18That's a new season, isn't it?
13:19It's a new season, yes.
13:21Okay, that's not an option. What's our second option?
13:22The second option, it is, we can take a lot of these, you know, cargoes out, and so the ship can float up and move.
13:31The other way, how typically we do here, is wait for other ferry boats that can be coming up or going down the river,
13:38that can help us to pull the boat to the deepest part.
13:41So this really happens sometimes?
13:43Yeah, this really happens sometimes.
13:45We have to be prepared for surprises and adventure on the Amazon.
13:49An adventure.
13:49Exactly.
13:50Okay.
13:51Yes.
13:52All right.
13:52Just be prepared.
14:19Okay, I'm trying really hard not to swing, but I keep banging into my neighbors here.
14:32Nobody seems to mind, but let's see how it goes.
14:37Although most of the cargo and most passengers on our boat are staying on board to Iquitos,
15:06the boat does make quite a few stops at villages en route for a few people to get on and off,
15:12and for small amounts of cargo to be offloaded or brought on.
15:16The villagers also take the opportunity to sell us some of their local delicacies.
15:21What do you have there?
15:25Ooh, can I have one?
15:28One, so?
15:29Mm-hmm.
15:30Okay.
15:31All right.
15:32We've got some grubs from a village girl.
15:37She brought them on board.
15:38Breakfast?
15:38They're from palm trees, and they're sort of big, fat, formerly squiggly grubs that have
15:59been cooked in palm oil.
16:03I might not have another, but it's good to try one.
16:10It's only a short stop, but while we wait on board for cargo to be loaded or offloaded,
16:15in this case, plantains coming on and rice being taken off, we've got time to spot some
16:20of the Amazon's unique wildlife, river dolphins.
16:25Oh, that's a huge one right there.
16:29We've stopped.
16:30Oh, see those dolphins?
16:32We've stopped at a confluence of rivers, and there's slower-moving water, so that's why
16:36the dolphins hang out here, because there's fish.
16:39Oh, look at them.
16:40See them surfacing right there?
16:42It's so strange that there's dolphins in a river, isn't it?
16:46Oh, whoa.
16:47Whoa.
16:50Here in the Peruvian Amazon, there are two different species of dolphins.
16:55Most of the river dolphins here are the more commonly seen gray ones, but we also get a
17:00couple of tantalizing glimpses of the unique and rarely seen pink river dolphin, which is
17:05found only here in the Amazon.
17:08Oh, there's a pink one.
17:09Out of nowhere, pink one.
17:14Right there.
17:15As we travel downriver, most of the time we're surrounded by jungle.
17:28But throughout the day, we continue to pass a number of remote villages.
17:33Usually we carry on by, only stopping at the larger villages, where there's enough cargo
17:38to be taken on and off our boat, so as to make stopping worthwhile.
17:51This boat is actually flagging us down mid-river, telling us they want to come on board.
17:55The thing is, with the smaller villages, they have to board while we're moving.
18:00We don't stop for them.
18:01They've got empty barrels, and they want to put them on board, send them to Iquitos, where
18:06they'll get filled with fuel or sugar cane rum or something, and eventually they'll come
18:10back to this local village.
18:11All right, that was a tricky landing.
18:19It's a real art form to come on board, do this exchange, all without stopping.
18:25We are moving, moving, moving.
18:32The languid pace of our boat, the endless, unchanging view, and the heavy, humid heat makes
18:38me and seemingly most other passengers on the boat really dozy.
18:46I sleep through the heat of the day for hours, and wake up only just in time for dinner.
18:53That's where dinner is?
18:56Okay.
18:58What's for dinner?
19:00All right, we've got some rice.
19:01There's a lone fried egg.
19:03I think that might be mine.
19:04I'm a little bit late for dinner.
19:06Looks like the chicken soup is all gone.
19:09This man has to cook for 300 people sometimes in this small kitchen, so this is impressive.
19:16Very nice.
19:18Gracias.
19:18Can't believe this spot isn't taken.
19:33You can have dinner anywhere you want on this boat, but this is the place for me.
19:38Having slept through much of the day, I'm now wide awake and looking for some evening entertainment.
19:56The first things don't look promising, but then I'm in luck.
19:59Yeah, you want to show me?
20:00Yeah, you want to show me?
20:00No.
20:00Okay.
20:01At the back of the boat, hidden behind some vegetable boxes, I find the captain and crew playing poker.
20:07Okay.
20:12A little blackjack, yeah?
20:1321?
20:14Okay.
20:15All right, all right.
20:16Who's dealing?
20:16All right.
20:17This is not how they do it in Vegas, people.
20:20Cut the deck, captain.
20:21Cut the deck.
20:23All right.
20:24Am I dealing?
20:24All right.
20:25This version of the game seems to be played one against one, without face cards.
20:30And from what I understand, the rules are that you win if your cards add up closest to the maximum, 21.
20:35Okay.
20:37Four.
20:38Teen.
20:41All right.
20:45You know, I didn't expect you guys to be so easy.
20:48Ante up, everybody.
20:53I'm feeling lucky.
20:55Oh, this is great, you guys.
21:05Oh, he played five souls, huh?
21:08He's playing five souls.
21:10I'll match your five, and I will raise you five.
21:16Wow.
21:19I think he's bluffing.
21:21Okay.
21:22Five.
21:24Fourteen.
21:25Three in week.
21:25Three in week.
21:26Okay.
21:38Let's go.
21:39I have to say, I always sleep better with a little fresh cash in my pocket.
21:54Sleep like a baby tonight.
22:04First thing on what should be our final morning of the journey,
22:07we wake up to something that I hadn't expected at all, dense fog.
22:18We must go in slowly, otherwise we maybe can crash with sand bank, you know.
22:23So that's the reason we just leave the boat move by the currents.
22:27That's the experience of the boat driver.
22:31So we already left a day late, and now this fog probably means significant delays.
22:38A couple hours at least, yeah, or more maybe.
22:41If the weather continues, it could be another day.
22:44Another day.
22:45This is like the definition of you have to go with the flow, right?
22:49Yes.
22:50It's a whole philosophy around this trip.
22:53We've come into shore again.
22:55They're not comfortable being in the middle of the river.
22:58Because if you go in the middle, it's so foggy, so you can be lost sometimes.
23:03Lost?
23:04Yeah, lost.
23:04Not lost.
23:05I mean, can't you just go downriver?
23:08Sometimes when you are not looking the bank, you cannot see the direction.
23:12Yeah.
23:13So maybe you think that it's maybe on the left, you can go on the left, but sometimes doing a circle.
23:19Oh, jeez.
23:19Maybe you can be going upstream again.
23:22This is getting more complicated.
23:24So it's better we just stay close to shore.
23:26Close to shore, not so fast, so slowly.
23:29No drama.
23:30No drama, yeah.
23:31Okay.
23:33We stay but calmed in the fog for a couple of hours or so, but then the heat of the day
23:38gradually kicks in and the sun burns it off.
23:43Luckily, we haven't been delayed too long and should still be able to reach Iquitos tonight.
23:48Before we get there, however, our long journey downriver has finally reached a pivotal moment.
23:57In this river that we are leaving behind, that is the Maranya River.
24:03In that river that you can see, that is the Ucayali River, we are exactly here in the confluence of the two river that forms the mighty Amazon.
24:13So this is it.
24:13This is the spot.
24:14This is it.
24:14This is where it begins officially.
24:16Yes.
24:17Uh-huh.
24:17How far to the Atlantic?
24:18About 2,000 miles to the Atlantic Ocean.
24:21Unbelievable.
24:21It's a huge amount of water.
24:23I read somewhere that if you added up the next eight biggest rivers in the world, all of the water in those rivers,
24:30it wouldn't equal the amount of water in the Amazon.
24:33Yes.
24:33Is that true?
24:34Yes.
24:35It's astonishing.
24:38The main reason for the extraordinary amount of water in the Amazon is, of course, rain.
24:43The rainy season has just begun here.
24:48The storm behind me may or may not catch up with us, but if it does, look out, because when it rains here, it pours.
24:56As it turns out, we escaped the rain for now.
24:59With just a few hours to go before we get to Iquitos, I used the time to get up to speed with the city's remarkable history just over a century ago,
25:07when it was at the center of the Amazon's rubber boom.
25:09It's an amazing story.
25:13A few rubber barons, it seems, became incredibly rich selling natural rubber to the world.
25:20As the best quality rubber could only be obtained from trees growing in the Amazon,
25:24the region's rubber came to be worth a fortune once bicycles, motorcycles, and cars were invented,
25:30all running on millions of rubber tires.
25:32How ironic that today, Iquitos is the biggest city in the world that you can't even drive to.
25:39After so much time on the river, I'm excited to almost be in Iquitos, another hour or so, and we'll be docking.
26:04And I want to figure out more about the rubber boom history here, because after all, that's why such a huge city exists in the middle of the jungle.
26:14Finally, we see the lights of Iquitos in the distance.
26:19Remarkably, despite being so isolated in the jungle hundreds of miles from the nearest connecting road,
26:24the great city we're about to arrive in has a population of around half a million people.
26:34We are sliding right in, threading the needle into this port.
26:41These guys really know what they're doing.
26:51Landfall, Iquitos.
26:53After quietly floating through the remote Amazon jungle for the past three days,
26:59it's an astonishing contrast to be on the streets of Iquitos,
27:03surrounded by crowded, raucous nightlife.
27:05they're surrounded by the rocks we crossed the country of Iquitos,
27:16and they're standing for a long-term mountain,
27:17and they're walking the mountains,
27:19they're walking the mountains of Iquitos,
27:19they're walking the mountains of Iquitos,
27:20and they're walking the mountains of Iquitos.
27:21They're walking up the hills,
27:23and I'm walking up at them.
27:24Oh, yeah!
27:28Oh, yeah!
27:29What's the tourist?
27:31Everything, everything!
27:33Oh, yeah!
27:34One, two, three, four, six, ten, ten...
27:37Ten dollars!
27:38Dile que tú vas a escoger!
27:40Thank you!
27:41That's mine!
27:42That's mine!
27:43That's mine!
27:44That's mine!
27:45That's mine!
27:46That's mine!
27:47That's mine!
27:49That's mine!
27:51That's mine!
27:53Listen to the sound of that rain.
28:07It was pouring out.
28:09But that, I expect.
28:10I am in the middle of the rainforest.
28:12But what I didn't expect was what my hotel looks like.
28:15I mean, check this out.
28:16This is rubber-boom-era money at its finest.
28:19It's got these huge high ceilings and chandeliers.
28:24And the tiling down here is gorgeous.
28:26It's inside and outside.
28:28And it was all imported from Europe at great expense way back then.
28:32But the real kicker is right here, this bed.
28:35As much as I loved my hammock on board, I was pretty happy to see this last night.
28:52With its population of around 500,000, Iquitos today is bigger than ever.
28:57But its heyday was undoubtedly during the rubber boom in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
29:03Back in the old days, when all the world's motor vehicles so badly needed the Amazon's natural rubber,
29:09Iquitos grew hugely wealthy from the rubber trade.
29:12And today, all the grandest and most beautiful buildings in Iquitos date back to that time.
29:17I'm given a tour of the city's extraordinary rubber boom history by a local American expat, Scott Humfeld.
29:26This is one of the more ornate buildings in Iquitos.
29:30It's the Cohen Company.
29:32They were exporters and importers.
29:34They exported rubber and imported other things from Europe.
29:37The building was made with tiles imported from Portugal and Italy.
29:41Yeah, very intricate.
29:43You know, the intricate steel work.
29:45Uh-huh.
29:46And now it's a grocery store.
29:47It's a grocery store, huh?
29:48And a good one.
29:49One of the better designed grocery stores.
29:51Yeah, an elegant grocery store.
29:54Nearby, on the main square, is the city's most unusual rubber boom building, the so-called Iron House.
30:01Said to have been designed by Gustav Eiffel in Paris, it was assembled here in 1890 after being shipped piece by piece from Europe.
30:10So you can see how this is indeed iron.
30:13Oh, yeah.
30:15And it's no longer a rubber warehouse, which the bottom was.
30:19It's a pharmacy, where they do sell rubbers.
30:21Of course.
30:22But rubber added an incredible amount of uses, from waterproofing, to tires, to gaskets, and help allow the industrial revolution to really take off.
30:33So it's an incredible, valuable product.
30:35And at the beginning, it was all here, essentially.
30:38It was all here.
30:39Yeah.
30:40So that's why this whole region went.
30:42Yeah, it was a huge boom.
30:44A few people made a lot of money.
30:46The rubber barons would send their laundry back to Europe to be laundered, because the river water is considered dirty here.
30:53They would bring over canned foods from Europe, because they weren't used to the fish and the other products that are eaten by the local people.
31:00So they kept sort of their own version of Europe here, rather than adapting to the local conditions.
31:06Maybe not all wise decisions.
31:07I mean, an iron house in this climate.
31:08Definitely not.
31:09I mean, an iron house in this climate.
31:10Yeah.
31:11Foolhardy.
31:12Very hot.
31:13The most famous of all the rubber barons in Iquitos was Carlos Fitzcarraldo, who was the inspiration for the 1980s movie Fitzcarraldo.
31:23One of the interesting things about Fitzcarral was he was looking for an area to tap rubber that hadn't been exploited beforehand.
31:31And he knew of an area, but it wasn't accessible by a river that he knew of.
31:35So what he did was he hauled his ship over a mountain.
31:38In the movie, they dragged the entire ship over the mountain.
31:42In real life, he took the ship apart.
31:44He enlisted a large number of indigenous people.
31:47And by enlisted, I mean he had rifles and threatened them with death.
31:50And a number of people died in doing that.
31:52But he was able to get the ship in pieces over the mountain.
31:55Yeah.
31:56And then from there, he found a river route to bring the rubber down to Iquitos to where it was shipped out to Europe and the United States.
32:02So it was a success.
32:03I don't think the indigenous people would see it that way.
32:05Yeah.
32:06But for Fitzcarraldo it was, and he made a fortune.
32:08Uh-huh.
32:09Carlos Fitzcarraldo was very wealthy, but the richest rubber baron in Iquitos was probably Julio Arana,
32:15whose Anglo-Peruvian Amazon rubber company was listed on the London Stock Exchange.
32:20Here, we have Arana's Bank.
32:23Uh-huh.
32:24It's now the Amazon Bistro, which is a French-Belgian restaurant.
32:27That was unusual, right, that one of the rubber barons had his own bank?
32:31I mean, they didn't all have their own bank.
32:32No, I believe he's the only one that did have his own bank.
32:34Uh-huh.
32:35And he had it centrally located here on the waterfront area.
32:38Right.
32:39Because this was where the rubber ships came in, carrying the rubber from the outlying areas where it was collected,
32:44putting it on the bigger ships to ship back to Europe and the United States.
32:48This was a very busy area with boats coming and going all the time.
32:52Can this all be water?
32:53Because we're just at the beginning of the rainy season, so the river is still low right now.
32:57So water comes all the way up here?
32:59Water comes all the way up to the bottom of this wall.
33:03Today, more than 100 years after the rubber boom, only a handful of the hundreds of steamboats
33:08that once hauled rubber along the Amazon to and from Iquitos still survive.
33:15Thankfully, Dr. Richard Bodmer, an Iquitos-based conservationist, has helped preserve some of the last remaining steamboats.
33:22He's turned one into a historic boats museum.
33:26This is a Ayapur.
33:28Uh-huh.
33:29Ayapur was built in Hamburg, Germany in 1906.
33:32Uh-huh.
33:33What happened during the rubber boom is that the rubber barons had so much money.
33:38Every time this boat would go out for one month collecting rubber,
33:41it would come back with about $2 million in today's value in its hull.
33:46Two million. My gosh.
33:48And so that's how lucrative it was.
33:50So they were able to buy the top-of-the-line boats, the best boats built.
33:54None of this could have happened without the steamboat, correct?
33:56That's right. None of this.
33:58Because the currents of the river are so strong that you couldn't go up river without the steamboats.
34:03And when they first came in the 1850s, everything changed here.
34:07Right.
34:08And for the first time you could have commercial activities in the Amazon.
34:11The steamboats built Iquitos.
34:14Given the time of year, we have to clamber down to where the Ayapurah is beached in the mud.
34:19But with the rainy season begun and the Amazon just starting its annual rise of more than 30 feet,
34:25it won't be long before the area floods and the Ayapurah floats again.
34:30It's the whole helm of the Ayapurah with many of its original features.
34:35Uh-huh.
34:36Over here we have a whole steam horn.
34:38Every time the Ayapurah would come back to port, it would let everybody know that it's full of rubber.
34:43And so they'd blow the horn.
34:45Well, please, if you'd like to blow the horn.
34:47Give it a go here.
34:48Give it a go.
34:49Give it a go.
34:56That's a nice sound.
34:58Sound of rubber money, huh?
35:00That's a rubber money.
35:05So here's a little exhibit on the Ayapurah.
35:07Uh-huh.
35:08You can see how they're loading up rubber onto the Ayapurah.
35:11Those are the rubber balls?
35:13That's right.
35:14They would weigh about 50 kilograms each.
35:17And you'd put them in the hull of the boat because that's where you want the weight.
35:20It's much fancier than I expected.
35:23You know, it's a working boat, right?
35:25I expected it to be a little bit more, I don't know, austere or something.
35:28Yeah, it has been restored a little bit.
35:30And this would have been the area, actually, where they would have kept the wood for the boiler.
35:35That's why in the Amazon you find that towns are very evenly spaced.
35:39And those towns are evenly spaced because that was a collection point for the timber.
35:44Like getting their gas tanks refilled.
35:46That's right.
35:47So this whole room would have been filled with timber in order to make it to the next point.
35:52You can't run out.
35:53That's right.
35:54If you run out, that's what you call running out of steam.
35:57Yeah.
35:58There you have it.
36:00Lots of working boats ferried rubber to Iquitos and the world beyond.
36:07But the really hard work was done by the tappers who collected the rubber out in the jungle.
36:12Here we can also see the different utensils used by the rubber tappers.
36:16For example, how they cut the trees.
36:18Here we have a few small rubber balls.
36:21Given that the Amazon's indigenous tribes knew the forest better than anyone, many were recruited as rubber tappers.
36:28There was cases, and especially on the Putamayo River, where atrocities were discovered against the indigenous people.
36:37And it was on the Putamayo where you had the rubber bearing Arana.
36:42Oh, yes.
36:43I've heard about him.
36:44And there was a Canadian traveler, Hardenberg, who went down the Putamayo.
36:48He discovered that employees of Arana were mistreating indigenous people.
36:53And there you can see a photograph of indigenous people in shackles when they enslaved them.
36:59And he reported whippings and actually burning people alive and killing people.
37:05Did it change anything?
37:06The Peruvians investigated, and the British investigated, because the company was registered on the British stock market.
37:12When they investigated, they had a court case in London.
37:17The result of the court case was Julio Rana was found guilty, but he was only fined one penny.
37:22Justice not served, then.
37:25Justice not served, then.
37:30I'm interested to hear the native people's side of the story.
37:33Early the next morning, I meet up again with Scott, who's taking me on a short boat trip from Iquitos to the nearby Bora Indian village of San Andres.
37:44From Iquitos, we head upriver along the River Mamon, a tiny tributary of the Amazon.
37:51Just half an hour or so after leaving Iquitos, we arrive at San Andres.
38:08There's a small set of drums so we can announce to the village that we are arriving.
38:28It's the polite way to do it.
38:30We're here.
38:39They know we're here.
38:40As it turns out, we're not the only visitors today.
38:46Benefiting from the proximity of Iquitos, the Bora make a decent living putting on dance shows for tourists,
38:52who, like us, come to visit them from the big city.
38:55This is my friend of course.
39:18Mucho gusto. Enjoyed the dancing very much.
39:22This is the chief of the tribe, Raphael. This is his son Walter.
39:33Raphael, I'm interested in the rubber boom history. I'm wondering if you could talk to me about that.
39:52Is there any personal stories from Raphael's great-grandfather or something that he might know?
40:22This was Arana's men who did this.
40:47And are there any rubber trees around here?
40:54Can I look at one?
40:57We have one close. If you like, we can see it.
41:02Yes, is it possible? Yes, yes.
41:04Okay.
41:17What is rubber tree in the local language?
41:32Kuma.
41:33Kuma.
41:34Kuma.
41:35Amu.
41:36Amu.
41:37Amu.
41:38Amu.
41:39Amu.
41:40Amu.
41:41Amu.
41:42Amu.
41:43Amu.
41:44Amu.
41:45Amu.
41:46Amu.
41:47Amu.
41:48Amu.
41:49Amu.
41:50Amu.
41:51Amu.
41:52Amu.
41:53Amu.
41:54Amu.
41:55Amu.
41:56Amu.
41:57Amu.
41:58Amu.
41:59Amu.
42:00Amu.
42:01Amu.
42:02Amu.
42:03Amu.
42:04Amu.
42:05Amu.
42:06Amu.
42:07Amu.
42:08Amu.
42:09Amu.
42:10Hard to believe this is what it was all about, all the bloodletting.
42:18It was about this quiet white liquid that's dripping over here, liquid gold.
42:27It really is shocking to think how badly the indigenous people were abused
42:31during the short 30-year span of the rubber boom.
42:34Many thousands suffered and died.
42:37Today, the beautiful old buildings of Iquitos are the rubber barons' most obvious legacy.
42:43But for the all-too-many workers who were enslaved and abused to make the rubber barons rich,
42:48the collapse of the rubber boom couldn't come soon enough.
42:52The rubber boom ended in 1912, but the beginning of the end was some 35 years earlier
42:58when the British smuggled 70,000 rubber tree seeds out of the region.
43:01They took them to Malaysia and started plantations.
43:04Now, compared to here, where trees were scattered all over the forest,
43:08plantations were easy to manage and had a much bigger yield.
43:11So it took a few decades for those trees to mature, but when they did, the market here evaporated.
43:17Prices plummeted by 90 percent, and the Amazonian rubber boom was over.
43:22Buildings like the one behind me never built again.
43:24It's now time for me to move on from Iquitos.
43:33For the last part of my Amazon River adventure,
43:36I've joined up again with conservationist and historic boat enthusiast,
43:40Dr. Richard Bodmer, for an expedition deep into the remote heart of the jungle,
43:44where he's helping to conserve the region's spectacular wildlife.
43:48From Iquitos, we're heading 100 miles or so back upriver
43:55to the vast Pacaya Samaria National Reserve,
43:57where we're joining Richard's research team on the Samaria River.
44:03At the mouth of the Samaria River, Richard's historic research vessel,
44:07the Clavero, is waiting for us.
44:09Just hop off, huh?
44:13Get on the Clavero.
44:16Hola. Mucho gusto.
44:17Hola, hola.
44:18Nice to meet you.
44:23These are my quarters.
44:25I love all this wallpaper.
44:27All right.
44:30Heading deep into the National Reserve.
44:39Built in France for the Peruvian Navy back in 1876,
44:47the Clavero is incredibly historic.
44:50Originally used to explore and defend the country's Amazonian frontier during the rubber boom,
44:55today it's said to be the oldest boat still navigating the Amazon.
44:59As the largest protected area of seasonally flooded forest anywhere in the Amazon,
45:11the Pacaya Samaria National Reserve is a vital refuge for many animal species that depend on this unique habitat.
45:20Around 50,000 indigenous people also live in the reserve,
45:24allowed to hunt and fish on their traditional lands
45:26in return for helping co-manage and preserve the wildlife.
45:35One such co-management project Richard is helping with
45:38is the conservation of the reserve's turtle population.
45:43We'll check in with the park guard here
45:46and arrange things for the release of the baby turtles.
45:50They've recently hatched from the artificial beach that they have here.
45:53From the guard station, we collect nearly a thousand baby turtles
45:58that are now old enough to be released into the wild.
46:03To take them upriver to the designated release spot,
46:06we're using the Clavero's small launch.
46:08Well, this is a good place to release the turtles.
46:16Okay.
46:17So we can start.
46:19Yeah, how do we do it?
46:20Might be easier to lift a whole bucket of them.
46:22Okay.
46:23Should we do that?
46:25Oh, that's one.
46:26We have a lot of turtles to release here.
46:29Look at that.
46:29Oh, they're excited.
46:31So go ahead and grab a turtle.
46:32Mm-hmm.
46:34And put in the water, and it swims away.
46:37There's over 900 of them.
46:39Yes.
46:39Big job.
46:40976, I think.
46:44976.
46:44They aren't hunted as adults, are they?
46:46In the past they were,
46:47but now for the people to get involved in the turtle program,
46:50they can no longer hunt the adults,
46:51and they can no longer take the eggs.
46:53If the local people are taking care of the environment,
46:57are taking care of the endangered species,
46:58as a forest, then they're allowed to sell some of these baby turtles in the pet market,
47:04and that gives them an economic incentive to do all that conservation.
47:08It's been very successful for the local people
47:11and particularly successful for these river turtles.
47:14Oh, okay.
47:15So in eight years' time, these turtles are going to start to reproduce,
47:18and then you're going to have larger numbers here.
47:21It's nice to have a good news environmental story coming out of the Amazon.
47:25I mean, this is 976 little bits of potential swimming off into their future.
47:32That's right.
47:33Each one baptized by Holly.
47:34Yeah.
47:35Yeah.
47:55It's the last morning of my trip through the Peruvian Amazon,
48:13and I wake up to a spectacular sight.
48:17Swimming all around the boat are lots of the rare and unique pink dolphins,
48:20which I only got tantalizing glimpses of earlier in my trip.
48:24The full jungle experience has really come to life.
48:30You can hear the dolphins rising and blowing,
48:34and the birds are just everywhere.
48:37It's truly amazing.
48:38It's time to leave the clovero behind to start my long return journey home.
48:53But Richard says we've got one last chance to see some more pink dolphins
48:56back at the mouth of the Cimmeria River.
48:58There's often a lot of fish at the confluence,
49:03so it's a favorite place for the dolphins to feed.
49:06As it turns out, we're really in luck.
49:09Oh, there's another two.
49:11Oh, yeah.
49:11Look at that.
49:13Oh, my gosh.
49:15They're beautiful.
49:15Oh, look at that strange behavior.
49:22You see that tail, how it's moving?
49:24That's very rare, very rare.
49:26That's dolphins mating.
49:28And we only really see it at the mouthfear during this season.
49:32And you can see how they're just moving around,
49:34the tails coming up and rolling their bodies over there.
49:37That's really interesting, really rare to see.
49:43What an unbelievable way to end my trip.
49:47Mating pink dolphins.
49:48Now there's something I wasn't expecting to see.
49:57My journey down the Amazon has been kind of epic.
50:00First making it all the way to Iquitos,
50:02then experiencing the jungle and all its crazy biodiversity and majesty.
50:07And I've loved exploring the human drama,
50:10last century's rubber boom,
50:11and today's interface of people and the environment.
50:15The Amazon is truly a unique place,
50:17and I feel lucky to have gotten even a glimpse of it.
50:20Last century is one of aväder mixed anditnesses.
50:21One of the mysteries ofna Вс Mai ha had difficulties with mind.
50:25That's all for its stellar traffic uncertainty.
50:27But I've had a bunch ofHeart pipe pops in here for the holidays.
50:29We know you guys walk out.
50:30We know we'll win it.
50:31Yeah, we know it's really hard for them,
50:32and I don't know we've gotten怕 out if that's a decree.
50:33Well, we just need anything.
50:34And I'll tell you,
50:35and there's the way we're making it!
50:37I gotta wait for you now for the next couple.
50:38I want to wait to take it!
50:40sweiseI think of anything we can just bring it up now before the world.
50:43I know!
50:48This has been a little controversial message!
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