Vacation Review: Luxury Peru Trip, Lima Cuisine & Museum, Amazon Jungle Excursion, Cusco Sacred Valley, Scenery & Beauty

Start taking altitude sickness pills a day or two before we reached Cusco. This was advice we should have been given by the travel medicine experts we saw before we left. Instead we were instructed to take so many precautions against dangerous disease in the Amazon. We saw almost no mosquitos there and I am not sure that it was necessary in this part of the rain forest. 

Travel Company Comments

Thank you for taking the time to send your feedback about your trip. I am glad to hear that you had a great time, you certainly had some great hotels and experiences included in your trip! I just wanted to touch a little on your comments about the altitude and medications for the Amazon Jungle.

It is important for anyone reading this to understand that the altitude in the highlands of Peru affects everyone differently. With more than 11 years of experience welcoming foreign visitors to Peru, we have gained lots of experience in how people react to the altitude. Our figures show that 95% of visitors typically feel only mild symptoms of altitude or none at all. Feeling dizzy, lack of appetite, tiredness or dull headache are typical symptoms. These symptoms usually persist for a couple of days as the body acclimates. For 5% of visitors symptoms of the altitude can be stronger requiring the person to take oxygen. Never have we evacuated anyone or faced anything more serious. Medication is often prescribed by travel doctors, but we think that a carefully planned trip that increments the altitude little by little and includes well thought out days with lots of rest and downtime is the best way to go. You'll see that we take great care in incorporating this into our itineraries.

Regarding the Amazon Jungle and vaccinations. Travel doctors (especially in the US) need to adhere to the guidelines set out by their respective governments (in the US the CDC). If they fail to properly vaccination or medicate a traveler, they risk being sued should something go wrong, so you'll most likely be given absolutely everything. I think that the advice doctors offer should be listened to carefully but also that the traveler takes some responsibility as to what medication and vaccinations they want administered. Of course we are travel agents, not doctors so their advice comes first (we don't want to get sued either).

Once again, thank you for writing a review about your trip, we are pleased to know that you had a great time. Our desire to share the best that Peru offers and creating memorable and truly meaningful experiences is what drives us forward.

Warm Regards,