Iquitos, a city located on the Amazon River in the northeast of Perú, is generally considered the world's largest city that can't be reached by wheeled vehicle. Instead access points are through boat, and more recently, flight. The city was first settled by Jesuit Missionaries in the mid 1700s. It was developed heavily in the 1800s by the Peruvian government as a method of "Peruvianization" of the jungle, which at that time was populated almost exclusively by indigenous tribes with no loyalty to a Peruvian state. The Peruvian border with Brazil was not determined until 1851, 30 years after independence, and even then the borders were rather fluid. To lay a firm claim to Iquitos, the government built schools, a naval base and a trading post there. In the early 1900s, caucho, rubber, was discovered, and the city became the site of a rubber boom, attracting much growth of infrastructure and a hoard of young immigrant men looking to make a fortune in rubber. Many of these men stayed in Iquitos after the rubber boom and married indigenous women. The city now is a grand mix of indigenous peoples and ethnically mixed peoples. In the jungle outside of the city, indigenous village life and practices continue, with a mix of modern practices thrown in.
Although surrounded by the creeping jungle and solid amazon, this city is always moving. Motor-taxis fly down the streets, swerving only to avoid one of the many motorcyclists that drive with such maneuvers that they just seem to appear next to you. The very few cars there were transported in by either bus or airplane and are generally used as either taxis or to transport materials around the city.
During the high water season, the water rises about four feet, making the houses in Belén, a district of Iquitos, appear to be floating on the water. All of the houses are built with two stories, so that when the water rises, the family can move themselves and their belongings to the second floor. (You can see one of the bottom floors pictured below.) At that time, all of the transportation through the district is by canoe only.
We visited during the low-water season, so instead of a mountain of canoes floating towards us, we saw the full Belén market, stretching all the way to the river and bustling, like the rest of Iquitos, with movement of mototaxis, motorcycles, dogs. People weave their way through the market, pushing to the front to ask for a pound of banana, or gossiping with their neighbor about the latest relationship updates.
This bustling market sells every sort of Amazonian animal: palatable, appealing, legal - or not so - you can find it in Belén. The size of fish ranged from my smaller than my palm to half my height, sold in heads, fins, quarter body, body, and chunk. Big beetle larvae are friend and speared through a stick (which I did actually try. It was disgusting). Turtles are splayed open, their shells filled with a stringy insides and coagulating blood. And although we didn't see any, the market also sells highly endangered jungle monkeys, a very rich ingredient in traditional foods of the region.
The shops on the side, facing away from the main market, were the most interesting. Here you can find all manner of goods - single used nails, un-matching hinges, hammocks of wild colors and designs, plastic flashlights, used machetes, pirated movies and music, stacks of batteries, plastic containers and buckets, toiletries in small packs, doorknobs, bags for transport, varying lengths and widths of rope - all piled in old, stained wooden boxes covered in dirt and grime.
The city of Iquitos opens up to the Amazon itself. Transport up and down the Amazon and to the Amazonian villages is through large canoe or motorized boat.
After spending a few days exploring Iquitos, we rode one such motorized boat (or taxi as the locals call it) to a lodge in the Amazon itself (see the next post for descriptions of those fun adventures).
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