From Arequipa I went on to Cusco, also a beautyful place, althrough the most touristy city in the whole of Peru. You can't walk 5 steps on the main square without at least 10 people jumping at you to offer massages or paintings. There are lovely small cobblestone streets to walk up to some higher points where you can have a good view over the city and down to the "Plaza de Armas". I was lucky to find a group to go to Manu National Park for a 8-day trip, making sure that we really get into the reserved zone instead of just lingering around the "buffer zone", as I wanted to get my share of primary rainforest. So the 3 of us + guide, cook and driver set out for a bit of a jungle adventure. First we passed through cloudforest and saw the "Cock of the Rock", the red male birds of that species seemed to dance with each other. The next day we continued to "Port Atalaya", where we boarded a little ship to continue down the "Madre de Dios"- River, spotting capybaras ( giant guinea pigs) and lots of birds on the way. After arriving to the lodge for the day, we set out to explore the surrounding rainforest, first thing we discovered was a jaguar and a tapir trace. We walked to a clay place that is known for tapirs to show up eventually, but we didn't have any luck that night with spotting one, all we saw was a oppossum that made us all jump, taking it for a rat that passed right in front of our heads. The next morning we got on our boat before sunset and went to the MACAW CLAY LICK, where hundreds of birds stop to lick the clay to help them digest the seeds they eat. It's just not possible to capture with my camera what I saw there ( with the help of my binoculars and a good telescope) -lots of macaws, parrots, parakeets, hawks and a yellowheaded vulture. On the way back to the lodge we spotted lots of different monkeys far up in the high trees. In the evening we gave the Tapir clay lick another go, and we were rewarded by even spotting two tapirs. The next day we got ourselfes back on our boat, we left the "Madre de Dios"-River, and sailed up the Manu River to get into the Reserved Zone to our tented camp where more fauna and flora waited to be discovered: one day we set out on a little wooden catamaran on the salvatore lake to watch an otter-family having breakfast, a caiman was swimming along, and of course loads of colourful birds were passing by ( tucans,hoatzens). We did a lot of walks in the rainforest, had showers with the brown water of the river and on one day got our share of what the rainforest is named after. It was really a brilliant trip, I already miss the sounds of the jungle and the silhouetts of the macaws-birds passing over our heads.