Antares Amazon Lodge And Tours - Iquitos Tours — Hotel in Nauta

Ever since I was a child, it was a dream of mine to visit the Amazon. I have watched numerous TV shows, documentaries, and movies about its pristine jungles, amazing plants and animals, indigenous tribes, and the powerful Amazon River itself. ||I turned 40 earlier this year and that is when I finally really knew that I could make my dream come true sometime in 2024. I started to research Peru and decided to visit the Peruvian Amazon as I could combine my trip to Peru with a visit to Machu Picchu as well. ||When it came to the Peruvian Amazon itself, I decided to fly to Iquitos instead of going through the route from Cusco since I knew this would have fewer tourists. The real challenge came when I had to shortlist a place to stay in and a tour. After spending a long time researching and reading about different tour organizers, I came across Antares Amazon Lodge on Tripadvisor. I went through the less than 50 reviews on here and went through the photos on here. All reviews were stellar and although I never booked a place/tour with such less reviews, something compelled me and I did. ||I messaged Alan and we started chatting on WhatsApp. He told me about the price, and the expeditions they offered, sent me some more information, and said I could book the complete package for 50% and pay the rest later. I made the first payment a week later and there was no turning back. ||I landed in Iquitos on the 10th of May. Alan picked me up at the airport and we drove to a town called Nauta about 60 minutes away from the airport. We then took a boat from the port. Two hours later, we were at Antares Amazon Lodge. Yes, it takes close to 3 hours from Iquitos Airport to get there but read on so I can tell you why it was worth it. ||We spent 6 days and 5 nights at this magical place. The accommodation is on the banks of the Amazon River and you see Pink River Dolphins and Grey Dolphins a lot right from there. There was an orphaned Capybara named Mario, a Scarlett Macaw called Aurora at Antares Lodge, and a rescued Capuchin called Martina across the bank to greet us every day. Before I got here, I never imagined that I would type that in a sentence. ||The accommodation was basic but luxurious considering that this place is so deep inside the Amazon. There was electricity through Solar Panels and Wifi as well. Alan gave us a menu of the things that we could choose to do during our time there. We chose everything from a full-day tour at the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve to a night ride to spot Caimans. ||If you are looking for an unspoiled piece of paradise in the Peruvian Amazon, Antares Amazon Lodge is the place for you. This section of the Amazon is pristine and most days of our expeditions, there weren’t even other people in sight let alone tourists. ||I will be doing absolutely no justice to this experience if I don’t speak about the people who run this place. Alan and his family manage this lodge with familial love. They all grew up in a village nearby and this portion of the forest was bestowed to Alan by the Village Chief to protect, nurture, and conserve. That is exactly what Alan is doing. Alan and his cousin are expert trackers and can see things in the jungle that you’d never be able to spot otherwise. Alan is kind, courteous, well-spoken, patient, and extremely knowledgeable about all the species of plants and animals around that area. His cousin and the rest of the family always had a big smile and went out of their way to make us feel comfortable. We got three meals a day. The food was delicious. We’d get fresh fruits, bread, eggs, juices, rice, meat, fish, spaghetti, etc, and every meal was really tasty. ||Every day, we’d take the boat to go through the jungles to look for wildlife and saw plenty. Sloths, Poison Dart Frogs, Monkeys, Lizards, and many different kinds of birds, insects, butterflies, and other species. I highly recommend the night boat ride to spot Caimans. I have never seen the Milky Way with my naked eye before. Alan walked up to me on our last day there with an Anaconda in his hands. He found it just slithering behind the lodge. What a way to give us the perfect send-off. ||This is a place with no gimmicks. No one will be waiting there to garland you with a tame snake, to please you with a dolphin jumping in front of your boat with fish they’ve been trained to catch or to hand you a monkey to eat out of your hands. Antares Amazon Lodge and the people here are as authentic as possible. As someone who loves and respects wildlife, this place was more than I ever imagined. I loved every minute of my stay there and will never forget my time there. ||Thank you, Alan, and thanks to your wonderful family for this experience. Although this is the longest review I have ever written, words still fall short and seem too little to capture how whole I feel. I hope other people experience the magic of Antares Amazon Lodge...

We spent a week with Alan and his wonderful family at the Antares Amazon Lodge. Overall they did a phenomenal job across the board! The facility was kept clean, and located in the thick of the rain forest. Even in the immediate area around camp there's plenty of wildlife to be seen. I have to say I believe this to be the best way to see the most of the Peruvian Amazon in the shortest amount of time. Nothing quite like living in the heart of it to see the most!

In total we saw 7 different kinds of primates (including the pygmy marmoset, the worlds smallest new world monkey), 80+ different kinds of birds, 20+ species of mushrooms, ~12 species of frog/toad, giant river otters, pink and gray river dolphins, 3 toed sloth, pink footed tarantulas, Spectacled Cayman crocodile, and even a rare yellow footed tortoise! This is far from a comprehensive list as there was far too much to keep track of.

Getting there: I arrived in Iquitos on a Sunday around 3:00pm, and met my parents at our hotel for the night (Studio 69, another solid recommendation). The following morning Alan, with his wife and kids, picked us up and we made the 2 hour drive to Nauta, followed by a 3 hour boat ride upstream to the lodge. This travel boat is completely enclosed from the elements with plenty of windows for ventilation making a pleasant ride despite any weather (though we had a nice overcast sky for our journey). This may seem like a long and daunting journey just to get there but definitely worth it!

Our stay: Most of our interactions were with Alan himself and Johnny as our guides. Between the two of them we were in excellent hands! Despite being dry season and the river dropping noticeably even in the short time we were there Alan and Johnny worked together to get us across what I would've thought was impassible terrain more than once! While the entire family (read as staff) was attentive and excellent Johnny and Alan made it their mission to find whatever our ask for the day was no matter the obstacles. One examples of this, though there were too many to list, include an almost overland journey (due to dropping river levels) in our longboat at night resulting in not only getting much further down the small creek than any of us expected but also Alan departing the boat and catching, by hand, a small Cayman for us to meet and hold before releasing back to the wild. Both Alan and Johnny demonstrated a clear passion for sharing their homeland with us and was absolutely what made the entire trip worthwhile! On top of having a wide array of knowledge and suggestions, they were very open to anything we wanted to do/see and dedicated themselves fully to realizing our goals.

While it is absolutely a lodge, with individual cabins to rent, the overall feeling of our experience was much more intimate. Akin to a home stay; everyone really welcomed us in and made us feel like a part of their family while we stayed with them.

Getting back: The journey back to civilization was much shorter, the same covered boat took us back downstream to Nauta, this time with the current only took about an hour, followed by the same ~2hr drive back to Iquitos. Again we had a buffer night at a hotel (again Studio 69), highly recommend doing this as it was really nice to have the time to see Iquitos as well as acclimate back to the real world before heading home.

Antares Amazon Lodge comes with my highest recommendation. I highly encourage anyone curious to see the wonders of the amazon to make the trek to visit my new friends Alan, Johnny and the...

For our trip to the Amazon, we wanted to get well out of the city and stay in a lodge that allowed easy access to tracts of jungle teaming with wildlife and natural beauty. Having visited the Amazon in Ecuador before kids, we were keen to share with our two boys an experience they’d never forget. Antares delivered on these, many times over. After driving two hours to Nauta, we transferred to boat for a 2.5 hour upstream journey to Antares, located on indigenous land. Run by Alan and staffed by members of his community, the accommodations are simple, but well maintained and comfortable. Insect screens protect you from the onslaught of mosquitoes while you are eating meals, lounging in the hammock room, or sleeping in your room (also equipped with mosquito nets, so we slept very comfortably). Octavio cleaned our rooms every day, he had fun creating new designs everyday with the towels (even incorporating some of the kids toys; we returned from our afternoon journey looking forward to seeing what he has created). In the evenings he lit mosquito coils in our rooms and the hammock room to make sure we could be comfortable. Alan has a ton of experience guiding visitors through the Amazon, it shows in his ability to spot a sloth 100 meters away hanging in tree, pluck a baby caiman alligator out of the water in the dark, or find a poisonous frog hiding clumps of leaves on the forest floor. Alan has a list of dozens of activities and excursions he’s prepared to take you on (and he let us choose which ones to go on when; our kids, for example, were really keen to go piranha fishing, so we did that first), and we got through many of them (but not all! A great excuse to go back!). In between excursions our kids swam in the river (there are no caimans or piranhas in that section of the river), hunted for frogs and tarantulas (finding both), carved spears with Dennis, our boat driver and expert fisherman, and picked fruits. We got to transplant baby palm trees and plant them, and cut sugar cane (and eat it!) from the water’s edge. Meals are prepared from fresh ingredients that are flavorful and filling. Every meal includes a fresh juice sourced locally: mango, passion fruit, citrus (citrus trees grow abundantly on the property). If you go with kids, we recommend bringing snacks to help sustain them during long excursions. We were prepared with snacks, insect repellent, rain ponchos (although they provided them, so we didn’t need to bring our own), flashlights, and binoculars (and we used everything). As part of the experience Alan brought us to his community where he grew up, introduced us to his mom, and walked us through his village. We felt truly blessed to get to know Alan and his community. We highly recommend...