La República del Perú is a country that is easy to fall in love with its friendly and colorful people, magical history, and a varied and beautiful landscape. Peru is a geographic area three times the size of California with three distinct regions: The Andes with its wild and rugged peaks, deep ravines and roaring rivers; the Atacam Desert, the most arid land area in the world; and the emerald rainforests engulfing the headwaters of the Amazon River.

The people of Peru are found to be friendly and accommodating. Although it is a very poor country by western standards, the literacy rate is an amazing 92%. There are around 25 million people in the country, a majority of whom are of Indian (45%) and Mestizo (42%) decent. 90% of the people practice Roman Catholicism, inherited from the Spanish conquerors 500 years ago.

The official languages are Spanish and Quechua with a recognized regional language, Aymara. The national currency is the Nuevo Sol (100 céntimos).

Read more about this amazing country at the following sites:
travel.state.gov/peru.html
www.peruemb.org/
www.virtualperu.net/

THE AMAZON
The Amazon rainforest is the home of over 300 species of mammals, thousands of freshwater fish, tens of thousands of trees and nearly a hundred thousand other plant species. There are so many species of insects that experts agree they will never find them all. New species of wildlife are still being discovered today.

Read more about the Amazon and its people in the following links:
www.changemakers.net/journal/99march/salguero.cfm
archive.greenpeace.org/amazon/background/amazon_people.html

Cool facts about the Amazon River:

  • It is the largest river in the world (in overall size and volume). It is 4075 miles in length starting only 120 miles from the Pacific Ocean in the Andes. (This is exceeded only by the Nile River of Africa with a total length of 4170 miles).
  • The average discharge of water into the Atlantic Ocean by the Amazon River is approximately 175,000 cubic meters per second, or between 1/5th and 1/6th of the total discharge into the oceans of all of the worlds rivers!!! This discharge is 4-5 times that of the Congo River, and 10 times that of the Mississippi River.
  • The Rio Negro, a tributary of the Amazon, is the second largest river in the world in terms of water discharge, and is 100 meters (over 300 feet) deep and 14 kilometers (almost 9 miles) wide near its mouth at Manaus, Brazil
  • Average rainfall in the entire basin is 7.5 feet, with as much as 19.7 feet in the northwest portion
    Rain make up 1/3 of the water that flows into the Atlantic, _ evaporates before hitting the ground after being captured by the trees
  • The mouth of the Amazon is over 320 km wide (approximately 200 miles), and contains the worlds largest freshwater island, Marajó Island.
  • Water levels vary up to 65 feet during the year.
  • The width of the Amazon at Iquitos, Peru is about 2 km. Ocean-going ships can easily access the Port of Iquitos at high water, as the mean depth of the current-canal of the Amazon is up to 150+ feet deep, and in places, over 300 feet deep. Even hundreds of miles away from the ocean, sections of the bottom of the river channel actually lie below sea level!
  • The Amazon Basin is over 2,500,000 square miles
  • The Amazon basin is home to over 2,400 known species of fish, more species than are found in the entire Atlantic Ocean! Some scientists estimate that there may be as many as 5,000 species! These range from giant air-breathing fish (Arapaima gigas) and river catfish weighing up to 600-700 lbs, to tiny tetras, electric eels, sting-rays, needlefish, fresh-water flying-fish, and knife-fish.
  • Although it now empties into the Atlantic Ocean, the Amazon once flowed into the Pacific! The uplift of the Andes Mountains about 65 million years ago in a geological event called the Laramide Revolution cut the flow to the Pacific, and forced the Amazon River to flow eastward.