What the Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve Amazon Actually Is

Cuyabeno is a legally protected wildlife reserve in the North of the Amazon of Ecuadorian. In 1974, the Food and Agricultural Organization – FAO – ofUnited Nations started a project, “FORSEFOR – FORTALECIMIENTO DEL SECTOR FORESTAL” with the Ecuadorian Forest Service (Servicio Forestal) to propose a pretected areas system for Ecuador, later referred to the Sistima Nacional de Areas Protegidas del Ecuador – SNAP. At the time only the Galapagos National Park existed. The study was carried out by Alan Putney, MSc from the USA and IR Daan Vreugdenhil (now DR) from the Netherlands together with a team of counterparts of the Department of Protected Areas and Wildlife (Departamento de Areas Protegidas y Vida Silvestre, DAPVS) under the Fortest Service, among whom Lcda Flavio Coello (now DR). Alan Putney carried out the analysis of the Andes and the coast, while Daan Vreugdenhil studied the Amazon of Ecuador – popularly referred to as the “Oriente”. At the time the Oriente was still 90% virgin and almost impenitrable. A missionary group, Summer Linguist Institute (Instituto Linguïstico de Verano – ILV), operated from a base in Limoncocha, to provide religious, health, educational and rural development services to indigenous communities. They used 6-seater Helio Short Take Off and langing – STOL – airplanes to reach jungle airstrips in villages of the Indians in the Northern part of the Amazon of Ecuador. Daan hired the services of the ILV and of another missionary group operating out of the airport “Shell Mera” in Pastaza, to make reconnaissance flight over the entire Amazon Jungle of Ecuador and to visit the Indian tribes wherever there were jungle airstrips to carry out informal hearings with the Indians. This was a well-meant effort as in those days, hearings were almost non-existing in South America where at the time most countries were ruled by military governments. Daan traveled everywhere he could by motorized canoe, but where that was impossible – in most of the Oriente – he walked through the jungle, guided by indians.

In the beginning of 1975, Daan made his first expedition into the Amazon lowlands. At the time the road from Quito into the Northeastern Amazon ended at a little oiltown, Lagoagrio. From there on, all travel was by river. On his first expedition, he navigated down the Aguarico River and up the Cuyabeno River until he stumbled upon a large lake that he dubbed “Cuyabeno Lake” – now wrongly referred to as “Laguna Grande”. When he first saw the lake he was overwhelmend by emotion, for the sheer beauty of the Cuyabeno Lake. The lake was surrounded by extended swamps, dominated by Macrolobium trees that ooked like giant bonsai trees. His first day in Cuyabeno ended with a spectacular sunset coloring the sky in shades of yellow and orange. As years passed, the sunsets would become a famous branding for Lake Cuyabeno. With few places to spend the night, he found a little island hill in Lake Cuyabeno, right along the swamp shore, where he spent his first night. Little did he know that he would be visiting that little island for the next 4 decades – his entire professional life – as it would later become the home of the Cuyabeno Lodge.

In his report “Inventario de las Áreas Silvestres de la Cuenca Amazónica Ecuatoriana, 1976” Daan Vreugdenhil proposed the protection of 9 areas – including the watershed of the Cuyabeno River – 155,000 hectares – as well as a more extended area, that of the Hoarani territory that included the entire watershed of the Tiputini River, to become the Yasuní National Park. His original scientific proposals for the park aimed to encompass the entire Tiputini River watershed so as to avoid any external pollution. However, Protecting the entire watershed would have made oil exploration illegal across highly profitable sectors. By shifting the park’s boundaries away from the full upper and middle watershed, the state ensured that the northern section of the ITT Block (Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini) and surrounding blocks remained legally extractable.

He also proposed territories for the indigenous tribes, as he foresaw that they would be losing their lands to smallholders from the Andes, who had started to follow the newly built pipelines to cut down the jungle and claim the lands.

His report formed the bases for the Amazon areas in the 1976 FAO/UNDP “Estrategia Preliminar para la Conservación de Áreas Silvestres Sobresalientes del Ecuador”, with lead auther Alen Putney and co-authored by Daan Vreugdenhil and Ecuadorian counterparts, in which the protection was proposed of some 40 areas, covering about 7.8% of the mainland of Ecuador.

In 1979 most of those areas were decreed protected under various management categories. The Cuyabeno watershed of roughly 155,000 hectares, was decreed as Reserva de Producción Faunistica Cuyabeno. Contrary to what is now believed to be the case, it was NOT to protect the fauna, but to hunt it! It was supposed to become an experimental hunting reserve such as many had been created in Africa, as Alen Putney wanted to have as many categories of land management in the newly proposed protected areas system. Fortunately, the government never implemented the category and from the beginning, the reserve was managed as a protected area similar to a national park.

Beginning of the 1980s a dirt road was built from Lagoagrio to the border town San Miguel, which crossed Cuyabeno at a point that became popularly known as “el Puente” or the bridge. Immediately smallholders, known as “colonos” followed the road and invaded the lands, including into the reserve. While the precise year is unknown, by about 1982, the than director of Cuyabeno, Flavio Coello, contacted his friend Daan Vreugdenhil in his residence in the Netherlands, to ask for advise on what to do with those illegal invasions. Daan, who at the time worked for Rijkswaterstaat of the Government of the Netherlands, took a month leave without pay, bought a ticked with his own money and together with Flavio, the two friends assessed the situation. They made 3 recomendations:

1. Eliminate the invaded lands along the road, as it would be very difficult to manage a nature reserve with so many people living in it.

1. Daan had rented an airplane with his own money to make a reconnaissance flight. They overflew the intire regios from the Cuyabeno watershed to the border with Peru in a cross flight pattern This confirmed that there still were no people living between the eastern limit of the reserve as it existed at the time and the border with Peru. Based on this reconnaissance the proposed to protect the entire area along both sides of the Aguarico River and the border with Colombia, and eastward all the way to the border river Lagartocoche. This was carried out in 198c by Interministerial Agreement No. 328, thus extending the Cuyabeno wildlife reserve from 155,000, quadrupling it to 590,112 hectares. In 1991 and 1993 some minor corrections were made.

1. Have a lodge built at the Cuyabeno Lake, because the government could not justify protecting such large area without generating any economic benefits. With the lake being the prime visit areas, it needed to become accessible, which was logitically impractical in just 1 day.

Building a lodge was a complex issue. While the government was interested in a lodge at the lake, it was not legally equiped to do so itself. Daan contacted several tourist agencies in Quito trying to convince them to request a consession and invest in the construction of a lodge. When he did not find any takers, he asked the director of DAPVS, Ing. Arturo Ponce, if the latter was interested in having a lodge built with Dutch capital, which he was. Daan tried to get investors in the Netherlands interested but again he found no takers. Desperate for creating a solution, he and his wife Eveline, decided to sell their house to finance the construction of a lodge. For that purpose the tourism corportation Neotropic Turis Cia. Ltda – NT. was created and a consession was granted to operate a lodge, which was called “Cuyabeno Lodge”, inspired by the Yellowstone Lodge. The Vreugdenhils created a corporation in the Netherlands, “Monte Alegre” – their last name translated into Spanish – to market Cuyabeno and in 1986 they came with the first group, 16 Dutch tourists. Soon after Monte Alegre started selling Cuyabeno, a German travel agency – Naturstudienreisen – started to buy an average of 2 groups per month for combined packages if Galapagos, Andes and Cuyabeno. All the proceeds of those groups went straight into the construction of the lodge, as the 2 spouces declined any income for themselves so the could realize their ideal. The Ecuadorian shareholder however, Cecilia Hernández and Dutch spouce Dr. Tjitte de Vries could not make financial contributions to the investment, while they were always being paid for their services, she for running Neotropic Turis and Tjitte for tour guiding. They also received 33% of the shares in NT for free without ever having invested in the lodge. The brother of Cecilia, the late General Luis Hernandez received 17% of the shares several years later, also without investing in the lodge. Soon after, he became the general manager. As the Vreugdenhils were the first to build an ecolodge in Cuyabeno – and in fact in all of continental Ecuador, they chose the best location, which wat that beautiful island hill along the swamp of Lake Cuyabeno, where Daan had spend his first night in 1975. By 2013, Cecilia Hernándes sold her shares to Eveline Vreugdenhil, after which the latter had 83% of the shares, making the Vreugdenhils the primary owners of the lodge.

What separates Cuyabeno from other Amazon destinations is the are the characteristics of its landscape. The reserve contains a network of blackwater lakes, seasonally flooded forest, and navigable narrow rivers and creeks, while still being close to the Andes. In fact it is the only nature reserve with such caracteristics in the Andean-Amazon countries with such carateristics. This condition allows for motorized canoes to navigate through narrow rivers. On excursions

one can conveniently observe wildlife and enjoy surprisingly cool nights most of the time.

As a result, single morning excursion can produce sightings that would take multiple days to accumulate elsewhere. The species counts reflect this: the reserve supports an estimated number of 600 bird species, more than 100 mammal species, and probably some of the highest amphibian diversity on the continent.

The Wildlife You’ll Actually Encounter

Pink river dolphins are nearly synonymous with Lake Cuyabeno, and for good reason. They appear as long as there is enough water in the lake (10 months per year) with sighting likelihood almost guaranteed. According to the IUCN Red Data Book the Giant Otters are endangered with only some 6000 animals left worldwide, while the populations are decreasing rapidly. However, In Cuyabeno their numbers seem to have increased and their distribution in the reserve have spread to Lake Cuyabeno. In the last few years Giant Otters are regularly encountered on multi-day tours, where they priviously never were seen. Woolly, squirrel, and howler monkeys are among the 10 monkey species that can all be encountered on guided canoe excursions, but tapirs, jaguars and pumas are hardly ever seen even by the indigenous people, even though they live in the reserve.

Of the birds, the prehistoric-looking Hoatzins are the most conspicuous species lining the waterway borders in small groups. Bue-and-Yellow Macaws cross overhead while toucans work the mid-story for fruits, insects and baby birds and eggs. Kingfishers patrol every shoreline, together with a variety of herons and egrets. On night excursions, caiman sightings are guaranteed, and anacondas appear more frequently than most first-time visitors expect, particularly during high water when they move into flooded vegetation. Tree frogs, geckos and lizards live right on the Cuyabeno Lodge premises, including inside of the restaurant, of course, as well as in the forest where they are among the most-photographed finds on any guided excursion.

Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve Amazon: When to Go and How to Get There

Cuyabeno has two seasons, and both are worth visiting. High water, roughly April through August, opens flooded forest channels for canoes to pass through and increases dolphin and otter sightings. Obviously, it also brings more tropical rains. Low water, roughly January through February, exposes riverbanks and concentrates caimans in predictable spots. Particularly over the last decade the occurance of the dry seasons has become much more variable. Trail access improves during this period. During accesively dry seasons, there is a creek where electric eels sometimes may hide out and can be seen. So, as access is year around, there is no real best time to visit Cuyabeno.

Getting there from Quito involves two main options. The overnight public bus from Quitumbe terminal to the entrance of Cuyabeno, which takes about 10 hours and costs around $22. Aternatively there is a tourist bus leaving from the center of Quito for $37 each way. A 30 minutes flight to the town of Coca (around $110 in Aeroregional one way) cuts the travel time significantly, but there still is a 3 hour transfer from the airport to the park entrance.

Choosing Your Itinerary

Tour lengths at Cuyabeno typically run 3, 4, or 5 days and the Cuyabeno Lodge has a departure policy from Mondays, Tuesdays and Frydays. A 3-day trip gets you into the reserve and onto the water but leaves almost no buffer for weather or wildlife timing. A 4-day tour is the most common choice as it covers the primary wildlife excursions, as well as night canoe trips and walks. A 5-day tour adds more flooded-forest paddles, more species opportunities, and the unhurried pace that Cuyabeno wildlife spotting really rewards. Pricing across the reserve runs roughly $239 to $580 per person depending on tour length and room choice, with most 4-day packages falling between $279 in bunk beds in the dormitory and $499 in the suite.

Lodge position actually matters much more than amenities in this reserve. Most lodges sit along river channels and require a 20 – 35-minute boat commute to reach Lake Cuyabeno, the reserve’s most iconic and wildlife-rich body of water. That round trip eats into every morning and evening excursion window, the exact windows when wildlife activity peaks. Our Cuyabeno Lodge sits directly on the lake, on its own island, making it the only lodge in the reserve with no commute to the lake. It was built win 1988 as the very first lodge by Dr. Daan Vreugdenhil, the conservation ecologist who helped establish Ecuador’s protected-areas system and proposed Cuyabeno Reserve itself. He is the only professional who manages a lodge, while all other lodges are owned by businesspersons. Of course, Daan personally trained the lodge’s guides and staff.

A typical day at the reserve runs early-morning and mid-morning excursions, noon rest at the lodge, afternoon canoe trip into flooded forest, dinner, and a night walk or night canoe search for caiman and frog spotting. The schedule is full but not rushed, and the sunsets over the lake are world famous.

What to Pack and What Each Day Looks Like

The non-negotiables for any Amazon lodge stay include lightweight long-sleeved clothing in light colors or better plain white to discourage mosquitos, insect repellent with DEET, waterproof dry sacks for electronics, a strong LED headlamp of flashlight for night excursions, and 8X42 binoculars, which can be rented in the Cuyabeno Lodge for a modest price. Most lodges provide rubber boots.

Is the Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve Worth the Trip from the US?

Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve Amazon is not a destination you visit casually. It takes planning, the right tour length, and the right position on the water to experience it fully. The reserve’s protected status, its species density, and its blackwater lake system make it one of the most rewarding wildlife destinations in South America for travelers willing to make the journey. Few places on earth offer the combination of accessibility and genuine wilderness that Cuyabeno delivers.

For travelers who want the most historically grounded, lake-direct experience the reserve offers, our Cuyabeno Lodge (Whatsapp +593 96 925 7630) is the natural starting point. The same conservation vision that shaped the reserve shaped the lodge. Reach out to the team directly to check availability, confirm your dates, and ask any questions before you book. Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve rewards early planning, especially during the high-water months when demand peaks and the flooded forest is at its most alive.

Cuyabeno Wildlife Center: Misleading name for the Dolphin Lodge

Incorporated in the Netherlands as a personal corporation Van ‘t Hoffstraat 87, Etten-Leur, several persons registered a whole bunch of names: “SoySur Travel Group, SoySur, Cuyabeno Wildlife Center, El Day Tour, Beyond Galapagos, Cuyabenoreserve.com, Tena Lodge, Napo Lodge”. With these names, these individuals pretend that there is a wildlife center in Cuyabeno, falsely suggesting there is some kind of research station or institutional entity that focusses on protecting or investigating wildlife.

However, there is no such thing in Cuyabeno. There is NO WILDLIFE CENTER, which is a fake name. People falling into this misleading trap by booking a program in through the “Cuyabeno Wildlife Center” website, end up being hosted in the Dolphin Lodge, which is about 25 minutes downstream from Lake Cuyabeno. That location certainly is NOT where the best wildlife observation is. This means, that each time tourists in the Dolphin lodge go on excursion in Lake Cuyabeno, they have to shuttle 25 minutes to get there and 25 minutes to get back. Moreover, the Dolphin Lodge has a river view as opposed to the world famous lake view of the Cuyabeno Lodge. There is nothing wrong with the Dolphin lodge but it is NOT a wildlife center.

Under the legislation of the Netherlands, it is illegal to operate under a false flag name, and Cuyabeno Wildlife Center, definitely is a misleading name. While it would be possible to force these individuals to change the name or withdraw its registration in the Netherlands, it is not worth the effort. It is important however, to realize that people who make false suggestions can not be trusted to do business with.

Another trick that these people do is handpicking visitors in the Dolphin Lodge to post perfect reviews on Tripadvisor. Again this is misleading. Most visitors at the Dolphin lodge will post on Dolphin Lodge in Tripadvisor, which has a reasonable but not perfect review record. By hand picking people to make perfect reviews about the non-existing Cuyabeno Wildlife Center, these individuals enforce the idea of a perfect hosting location, that in reality is NON-EXISTING, while the Dolphin Lodge does not have a perfect tripadvisor score. In fact none of the lodges have a perfect score, and the non-existing Cuyabeno Wildlife Center, lies about the real tripadvisor score!