The cloud forest on the road down from Paucartambo is the first act, and it holds the Andean cock-of-the-rock. Males gather at traditional display leks at dawn, and the sight of a dozen scarlet birds bouncing and calling in the mist is the single most reliable spectacle of the whole trip. This stretch is also the best for mixed tanager flocks, quetzals and woolly monkeys.

The oxbow lakes of the Reserved Zone — Cocha Salvador and Cocha Otorongo above all — are the wildlife heart of the lowlands. Salvador is the largest and holds resident giant river otters, watched from a catamaran raft; hoatzin crowd the margins, and black caiman lie along the banks.

The river beaches and clay banks are where you scan for jaguar. Manu produces regular sightings of cats resting on the sand in the dry season, and capybara, tapir tracks and macaws at riverside clay licks come with the same slow boat work.

The lowland forest trails and canopy platforms add the primates: Manu holds more than a dozen species, including emperor tamarin and the spider and woolly monkeys that vanish quickly from hunted forest.

The dry season from May to August is the window — rivers are navigable, beaches exposed, trails passable. Dawn dominates, particularly for the lek and for macaw activity.

Practicalities

Entry to the Reserved Zone requires authorisation from SERNANP, arranged for you by a licensed operator; there is no independent visiting. Most trips run overland from Cusco — a long, spectacular descent of a day or more — and return by light aircraft from Boca Manu, or run the whole thing by road in both directions on a cheaper itinerary. Budget a minimum of five days; shorter trips that advertise Manu often only reach the cultural zone downstream, which is not the same place.