The trip began with a not unexpected turn. David forgot his passport at his home on San Juan Island. There he was in Seattle getting ready to fly to Lima the next morning without his passport. Fortunately, he called a small plane pilot he knows on the island and hired him to fly his passport to Seattle. The pilot arrived with the missing document at midnight, six hours before David’s departure.

John’s departure was less eventful, leaving his home near Cordoba, Argentina a day before a nationwide air traffic controllers’ strike.

John and David both arrived in Lima at about midnight, meeting up at the airport Starbuck’s and staying up all night, taking the 5:20 am flight to Iquitos.

We took a beat-up old taxi across town to the hotel, surprised by the profusion of three-wheeled rickshaws powered by motorcycles, called moto-taxis.

We checked in at La Casa Fitzcarraldo and chatted with Walter Saxer, the Swiss owner who came to Iquitos in 1971 as the executive producer of the movie Aguirre: Wrath of God, starring Klaus Kinki and directed by Werner Herzog. In 1977-81, Walter was also the executive director of the movie Fitzcarraldo, also set in the Peruvian jungle. He developed the 11-room hotel to house actors and staff for the movie. Walter regaled us with tales of the unusual relationship between Kinski and Herzog.

John checking in with receptionist at Casa Fitzcarraldo.

We had lunch with Fernando Flores, the Miami-based travel agent who had helped us set up this adventure. The restaurant overlooks a branch of the Amazon which stretches brown and green into the horizon. The town reminded us of the Guayaquil we both knew in the 60s and 70s, sort of rundown but with a certain charm.

We had paiche, a very large river fish, with fried manioc, shredded heart of palm, and fried bananas. Downtown, we saw the house of Julio Cesar Arana, the worst slaver of the rubber boom era, and the steel house designed by the same Eifel of the tower fame. The house was shipped in pieces was destined for Bolivia from France but somehow ended up on the central plaza of Iquitos.

Eifel House

 Back at the hotel, we rested and were awakened by a happy hour fiesta right outside our window. There seem to be a group of young gringos staying here, one of whom is Sara, who has lived here for several years studying the conditions under which the mosquitos transmitting dengue fever thrive.

Early tomorrow morning, a moto-taxi will take us to the Belen central outdoor market where there will be on display, we have heard, a profusion of river fish and other exotic tropical plants and animals.