The cuisine aboard the MV Aqua was so good, it deserves its own post. The menus were created by one of Peru’s top chefs, Pedro Miguel Schiaffino.
Pedro Miguel Schiaffino, Executive Chef on the M/V Aqua, oversees the M/V Aqua menus and restaurant operations, focusing on fresh, delicious Peruvian fare, paired with fine South American wines. Schiaffino is owner of Lima’s renowned Malabar Restaurant, and previously made his international reputation at La Huaca Pucllana, where his superb nouveau-Andean fare resulted in an invitation to become a featured chef at the James Beard House in New York City. Schiaffino studied at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park New York, and did Master’s level work at the Italian Culinary Institute. While in Italy, he also honed his skills at the Michelin three-star Ristorante dal Pescatore, under renowned chef Nadia Santini and at Piero Bertinotti’s celebrated Ristorante Pinocchio.
Each day, the chefs on the MV Aqua prepared a wonderful continental breakfast, an amazing spread of Peruvian fare for lunch, and a sophisticated 3-course dinner. Needless to say, Jeff and I did not hesitate to eat as much of this delicious food as we could. What follows are some highlights of our MV Aqua dining experience – believe it or not, this is a pared down collection of pictures!
For lunch we were welcomed to the dining room with a beautifully set table.
Each day we entered the dining room for lunch, we admired the beautiful colors of the buffet and enjoyed the delicious food!
Solterito Arequipeno Salad
~Fava beans, corn, tomatoes, red onion and white cheese in a dressing of lemon and olive oil.~
This traditional salad was one of our favorites – we had it a number of times throughout our trip.
Ceviche – another traditional Peruvian dish – this preparation was fantastic!
This is pretty much how my plate looked every day at lunch – filled with a lovely variety of Peruvian food.
And now for some dinner highlights…
Ceviche Appetizer
Chicken with Potatoes
These fried potato slices – like thick french fries – were delicious! These aren’t the same kind of potatoes that we have in the US – Peru has over 3,000 varieties of potatoes.
Scallop Appetizer
Shrimp with Risotto
Vegetarian Empanada
Ok, I’m not exactly sure what was in these appetizers – fried chicken on top of a plantain perhaps – but they were delicious!
Fish with Potato Puree and Shaved Hearts of Palm
Chocolate and Vanilla Dessert
The chocolate in Peru is amazing – I mean, seriously, some of the best chocolate I’ve ever had.
Thank you to all the chefs on the MV Aqua who worked so hard to prepare all these wonderful dishes for us!
On the last day of our Amazon cruise, we visited the Manatee Rescue Center in Iquitos – here biologists and volunteers care for endangered Amazon manatees that conservation authorities have seized from local people and fishermen. Efforts are underway to educate the local people about sustainable alternatives to hunting these friendly creatures. The rescued manatees are rehabilitated with the hope of reintroducing them into their natural habitat.
On the last day of our Amazon cruise, we visited Belen – known as “The Floating City” – and a manatee rescue center (pictures to follow in another post).
Iquitos (population ~370,000) is the largest city in the Peruvian rainforest and is also the world’s largest city reachable only by plane or boat. Belen is an area at the edge of Iquitos inhabited by 65,000 local people, many living in extreme poverty, without electricity, clean water or sanitation. Most of the homes float on the river or are built on stilts such that only the top levels are habitable during the flood season. Pueblo Libre (population 15,000), a section of Belen nearest the river, is the poorest neighborhood in Iquitos. Sadly, overcrowding and inadequate living conditions have lead to problems with disease and other issues associated with severe poverty.
I can honestly say that I’ve never seen anything quite like Belen. In addition to some of the scenes below, we saw a little girl – probably only 5 or 6 years old – walk out the front of her floating house, get into a canoe, and paddle down the “street”…all by herself. While we were amazed to see people so comfortable going about life in a place filled with water – it was also with a heavy heart, knowing that they are living without clean water and sanitation.
There are about 100 villages (42,000 indigenous people) within the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve in Peru. While we encountered some of the local people on many of our excursions, we also had the opportunity to visit one of their villages. The M/V Aqua, our cruise ship, makes a special effort to educate tourists about the lives of “the rainforest people.” Sadly, the Peruvian government has essentially forgotten about these people – they are extremely poor and have very little access to medical care and education. Fortunately, the people are able to harvest food and other abundant natural resources from the rainforest – they are actually very happy people with an amazing sense of community within their villages.
We encountered people from the local villages fishing from these small canoes.
This is a group of local people trading goods with one another.
The people in the village, especially the children, were very excited to see us – this village gets visited by M/V Aqua tourists maybe twice per year.
Since the Peruvian government has essentially forgotten about these rainforest people, they have very little access to medical care and education. Below is a picture of the paramedic from our cruise ship providing free medical care to an injured villager. Our visit is one of the rare opportunities these people have to receive care from trained medical professionals.
This is the kitchen of a typical village house.
None of the houses have walls – this helps people to stay cool in the extreme heat.
Though the rainforest people are extremely poor, they are also very happy.
The school and school teacher are resources that arrived just last year to this village. The school relies on donations to provide the children with pens, paper, and other supplies. In additional school supplies, our group also brought fishing supplies, toothpaste, soap, and small toys for the children – I can’t even really express in words the delight on their faces as these treasures were passed out. I wish we would have brought more.
(That’s our group in the back)
These children and happy, smart, and eager to learn – they just need the opportunity.
While the indigenous people of the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve practice sustainable resource utilization to help preserve the rainforest, sometimes their activities still result in undesirable consequences…
On one of our morning excursions, we spotted a cormorant caught in a fishing net, vigorously struggling to free itself but on the verge of drowning. We made our way over to the bird and our naturalist guides, Juan and Eric, went to work. The cormorant was so exhausted from its struggle that it hardly resisted our guides’ rescue efforts. It was a delicate job to try to untangle the bird without also destroying the fishing net. But…after some time…Eric was able to do just that. Tired from its struggle but unharmed, the cormorant returned to its life in the rainforest.
We spent much of our time in the Amazon exploring the Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve, the largest protected area in Peru spanning more than 5 million acres. This reserve is known for its rich biodiversity – conservation efforts as well as sustainable resource utilization by the indigenous people are helping to protect this important area.
It’s hard to describe the beauty of this reserve which is full of life everywhere you look. Exploring in small river boats, we did not encounter any other tourists and were able to experience and appreciate the wonderful scenery and wildlife. Here are pictures of just some of the wildlife that we saw…
Entering one of many tributaries in a small river boat…
owl monkey
hawk
egret (with lunch)
kingfisher
toucan
brown capuchin monkey
naturalist guide with baby caiman
jabiru stork
grasshopper (just one of MANY)
capibara rodent
(this is the largest living rodent in the world – it’s hard to tell from this picture, but this capibara is probably over 100 lbs)
giant lilies
sloth
another sloth having dinner….slowly
caiman (not fully grown yet)
blue heron
some kind of caterpillar
piranha
sloth
just one spider – but every time I looked down into the foliage, I saw more spiders than I’ve ever seen before
noisy night monkeys (owl monkeys)
blue-and-yellow macaws
