Whoa.
- Wow. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. Whoa. - That wasn't a good landing. - Whoa!
'On our crowded planet,
'there are still beautiful and remote wild places.'
- It is absolutely stunning out here. - Yeah.
'But if you're determined enough...'
It's all in Russian!
'.. there is a way to reach them.'
Buenos dias.
'I'm Arthur Williams. I used to be a Royal Marine,
'but eight years ago, I was paralysed in an accident.
'Then I learned to fly, and regained my spirit of adventure.'
Why would you let a small thing like
not being able to feel two-thirds of your body get in the way?
'Now I'm going to use the aeroplane
'to reach the world's most isolated airstrips
'and meet the people living at the ends of the earth.'
The volcano is our gateway to heaven, almost.
I'm not toasting to Stalin!
'To get there, I'll have to tackle
'some of the world's most dangerous flying...'
Oh, my God! Jesus Christ!
Whoa!
'.. and take my chances in the toughest places on our planet...'
This is a different kind of flying than I'm used to.
'.. to find out how to make a life out here...'
I feel like Del Boy!
'.. and why.'
The people, the community.
This time, I'm in Peru,
a South American country five times the size of Britain.
I'm going to fly where few outsiders go,
travelling deeper and deeper into this amazing country.
Wow.
'I'll start in the deserts of the south
'and then cross into the Andes to a hidden gold mine
'reached by one of the world's riskiest airstrips.'
These mountains are ridiculously close.
This is insane.
Hola.
'Finally, I'll travel deep into the jungle,
'to an isolated floating city...'
This is the only ever time I want to have my arm
inside an alligator's mouth.
'.. and go in search of a tribe
'who until recently had been cut off from the outside world.'
My journey begins in the far south of Peru,
in a small town called Nazca.
Tens of thousands of people come from all over the world
to this little airstrip every year
to understand a mystery found deep in the desert.
The best way to see it is from the air,
in small planes flown by specialist pilots.
But it doesn't come without danger.
Peru hasn't got the best safety record in the world,
and where I am now is actually a blackspot within Peru.
There's a lot of accidents.
And I want to know why so many people want to risk it
to come flying here.
'People flock here because this is the home of
'an ancient and mysterious landmark, the Nazca Lines.
'With so many tourists willing to pay good money to see the lines,
'dozens of operators started flying here.'
Wow. Oh, man.
'And unqualified pilots flying old planes
'is a bad combination.
'18 people have been killed here in the last ten years.'
But it's just a really sharp reminder of
how quickly things can go from really, really lovely,
amazing experience to, boom!
And you are lost control and things turn super-ugly super-quick.
'I want to investigate a new theory about why the Nazca Lines are here,
'so it's time to get airborne, a risk worth taking.'
- Carlos. - Hi, how are you doing? - It's good to meet you, sir.
- How are you? - Fine.
Carlos, have you been flying here for very long?
- I've been flying 15 years. - 15 years. - Over the Nazca Lines, amazing.
Really? Let's go and see them, shall we?
Yes, it's going to be amazing.
Yeah, lovely. Cool.
'From the airstrip, it's a quick hop over Nazca to the desert beyond.'
'Suddenly, I can start to see weird patterns and lines
'emerge in this endless stretch of sand.'
There is a little parrot down there or something.
That one looks like a little bird.
Wow.
There are over 800 lines, 300 figures and 70 animal shapes
across hundreds of square miles.
Still, the lines just go on and on and on for miles and miles.
'One of the most famous sand etchings comes into view.'
- Oh, the spaceman, look there. - Oh, yeah! Yeah, yeah, yeah!
Here there's like a very primitive little...
it looks like an astronaut.
This has been carved into the side of the mountain there.
I remember reading about the Nazca Lines when I was
a very, very young boy, and one of the most vivid memories I have got
is reading this book and looking at these lines in the desert
- and thinking that they were put there by aliens. - Yeah!
'Aliens are just one in a long list of unlikely theories,
'but it's believed the Nazca Lines were actually made
'by the Nazca people over 2,000 years ago.
'It's an astonishing feat.'
'The Nazca Desert is one of the driest places on earth,
'with very little wind, so the lines have stayed
'where they were made for thousands of years.'
It's almost like they're compass points.
It's like they're ancient signposts just pointing the way.
You know, much like Roman roads are straight,
so you'd follow it and you'd come to the next town.
These kind of feel like the same.
They're straight, they're pointing you to something.
'It's time to get back down on the ground
'to find out more about what these lines might mean.'
Very good, very good.
In capable hands today.
In 2010, an American scientist came up with a new theory.
His claim is that some of the geometric patterns are, in fact,
signposts in the sand, visible from nearby mountain tops.
The animals are thought to be ritualistic symbols to summon water
and the lines are there to guide the Nazca people
to this precious resource.'
The ancient Nazca people were farmers.
To make the desert bloom, they built an aqueduct system beneath the sand,
and to prevent the waterways from being forgotten,
or so the new theory goes, they drew the lines above as a map.
The land is still being farmed today.
I've met up with Pablo,
a local farmer whose livelihood depends on the Nazca aqueducts
that are, like the lines, still going after 2,000 years.
'It's almost impossible to believe that we could be near water.
'This is one of the hottest and driest places I've ever been to.'
Pablo, what is this?
Pablo...
That is cool.
Right. I'm going to go and have a look myself, I think.
It's arrow-straight, half submerged, half open
and you can see the light, which comes presumably from the opening
at the other aqueduct.
It's incredible in here.
It's really, really well engineered.
All of these walls, all these massive pebbles,
they're not stuck in with anything, they just resting there.
This is the actually nicest place to be,
without a shadow of a doubt, in this entire desert.
In fact, I'm really relieved to be getting this water,
because it's so hot,
but under here, it's just really lovely.
By tapping into the water table,
the Nazcans created over 40 aqueducts
that still help their descendants achieve the impossible,
to farm in the desert.
Pablo grew up on this soil.
When he was a child, his family survived on food crops
cultivated on this barren land.
Today he has eight acres of cactus plants,
which he makes a living from.
What you harvest them for?
'Pablo's farm is a family business.
'They all help out cultivating the cactus plant
'and harvesting the cochineal, which they sold to local traders.
'It makes a small but liveable wage for his family.'
Do you think often about the people
that thousands of years ago built the Nazca Lines,
or carved the Nazca Lines?
The cactuses also produce an unexpected by-product,
known locally as tuna.
Pablo's wife Alto and their daughter
show me the harvested fruit.
That is amazing!
It tastes like watermelon.
There's a lot of seeds in it,
but Pablo and his missus say
they're all right to swallow.
'It's amazing that Pablo and his family can live in this desert,
'thanks to 2,000-year-old technology.
'But where I'm heading next is even more inhospitable...
'.. the high Andes Mountains.
'And to get there, I'm going to have to fly into
'one of the world's most dangerous airstrips.'
I'm leaving the southern desert lands of Nasca and heading north,
up the coast, travelling 800 miles to the mountain village of Chagual,
over 4,000 feet up in the Andes.
It used to take 24 hours to get there by road from Lima,
but now you can fly there
if you can face one of the world's scariest landings.
But for the people who built it, it's a risk worth taking.
Luckily for me, experienced pilots Jose Gonzalez and Sebas Rodriguez
have let me join them in the cockpit today.
Chagual is actually infamous the world over among pilots
for being one of the most dangerous,
difficult landing strips to get into.
Why? It's actually such a dangerous flight to Chagual
that it takes two very experienced pilots
with thousands of hours between them.
They've trained specifically to land at this airstrip,
so, needless to say, I'm not behind the controls this time.
Sebas, what is it about this canyon landing that makes it so dangerous?
Chagual's landing strip is hidden deep in the Andes.
To get there, the pilots have to corkscrew their way down
through a narrow canyon.
It's exactly the type of risky and potentially dangerous flying
that you'd normally try to avoid.
These mountains are ridiculously close. This is insane.
What would happen to us if we got a strong gust of wind?
Sebas, how close do we get to the cliff-side?
You must be out of your mind to land here.
As if this approach wasn't hard enough already,
the pilots here don't even use radar to help them navigate.
So we're going to... On this landing,
we're going to be looking out for a cactus?
To line up for the landing, the pilots have to make a hair-raising
90-degree turn at the very last minute.
I can understand why that takes them years and years
to practise the landing because that was impressive. That was impressive.
Wow.
Wow. That was a landing.
I can't describe... I have done thousands of landings in my time,
but that is up there with... Well, in such a large aeroplane,
it was handled so nimbly,
in such conditions.
These pilots are brave.
We're brave for getting on in the first place, but we're here now,
so let's find out a little bit about the place.
We head towards the gold mine on winding mountain roads.
The last time we were at this kind of altitude, above the clouds,
was in an aeroplane, not a white van,
winding our way up precarious tracks.
The gold was discovered here over 30 years ago
and a giant mine has been operating here ever since.
The mining company built the airstrips
so the mine managers could fly in.
Winding up these mountain roads, they go on forever,
and it's clear that the mountain really is dominated
by the mining company, from what I can see so far.
But, every now and then, you see these houses and smallholdings
dotted on the mountainside
and it gives you evidence of the people that did live here
before the mining companies were around.
Gold mines are notoriously secretive in Peru...
.. but the mining company have allowed me in to meet Victor,
the mine's chief engineer, who's worked here for 15 years.
- Hi, there. You must be Victor. - Hola. - Victor, hola.
- Bienvenido, bienvenido. - Lovely to meet you. - Welcome, welcome.
Right, shall we have a look around this mine?
- Vamos a la mina. - Good man. Good man. Right.
'Victor's taking me where few outsiders go...
'.. deep inside the mountain.'
It's a good job I'm not claustrophobic because the walls
in here are absolutely tiny, and the ceiling isn't much higher either.
And actually, as a contrast to outside, it's very cold in here.
Peru is one of the largest gold producers in the world,
making the country about ten billion dollars a year.
The miners down here, are they employed from the local area
or are they all flown in?
How much material do you have to mine out of here
to make, say, a wedding ring of gold?
In the past, this area was home to hill farmers living off the land...
but the mine has transformed the place.
Half an hour from the mine entrance is Vijus village.
Once a tiny hamlet, but now home to many of the miners.
It's not something you see on the back of a pick-up every day.
Inside those little crates I was expecting to see chickens,
but they're actually full of quite fat guinea pigs.
Gold mines are controversial in Peru,
but some people here have benefited from their arrival.
I'm on my way to meet one of them.
- Lila! - Hola. - Hola.
Que gusto!
Hola. Hola. Buenos dias.
- Buenos dias. - It's lovely to meet you.
Lila Urdanivia lives in the house
that has been in her family for over 100 years,
little did they know they were sitting on a gold mine.
Lila, when the geologists found the gold, where was it?
If they found gold on your land, they strike any sort of deal?
Is the village as a whole happy with the mine?
Today, Lila still manages the family's farm.
All pigs. So lovely, huh?
Mine aside, what does it feel like to live in such a remote place?
For Lila, this remote life has brought undeniable benefit.
But living close to nature means you're at its mercy.
We've had a phone call from the pilots
saying that the weather's closing in
and, if we don't leave immediately, we're going to be stuck here.
Right.
It would appear that we're not the only ones in a hurry today.
Luckily, we've made it to the plane before the weather changes.
We're on our take-off run. We made it. We're out of here.
And as take-off runs go, this is pretty awesome.
Next, I'm heading north, over the Andes and along the Amazon River,
to get to the world's largest city that cannot be reached by road.
I'm travelling further north,
flying into the vast jungle interior of Peru.
I'm excited to be taking the controls of a Cessna seaplane
with my co-pilot, Coco.
We're following the Amazon River in search of a city that stands utterly
alone in the middle of the jungle.
I'm surrounded by this dense jungle that looks,
from a pilot's point of view,
the most dangerous place to fly
because there's nowhere to land and if you do,
you're in serious trouble, nobody's ever going to find you.
Finally, our destination comes into view.
Iquitos, the only major settlement for hundreds and hundreds of miles.
That's amazing, it's the first built-up area we've seen in ages.
I can see why people rely on this city so much.
I've heard so much about it.
Known as the floating city,
Iquitos grew out of the rubber industry that boomed here
in the early 20th century.
Today, Iquitos is home to nearly half a million people
but is still so isolated, it's only reachable by boat...
.. and, of course, by plane.
I can't wait to get on the ground and find out how a jungle city
survives and lives day to day.
It's the largest city in the world that cannot be reached by road.
I am never going to forget this.
Ever.
Height's good, speed's good, temperatures and pressures,
fuel's fine. Yeah, throttle set.
But first, we've got to land on the Amazon.
It's a chance to watch a master at work,
as Coco puts his 35 years' experience of river landings
into practice.
Coco, all yours.
Gracias muchos.
Or muchos gracias.
His hands are moving very quickly.
Stall warner. A bit of power.
Wow.
Wow. That was very smooth.
Brilliant.
When the rubber industry perished,
Iquitos became the trading port
for the weird and wonderful products coming out of the Amazon jungle.
It's the first time I've ever touched a piranha's teeth
and they really are as sharp as I've heard.
No, I'm OK, thank you.
This is Nanay, a bustling waterfront market
with hundreds of traders selling the sort of thing
you don't often see in your local supermarket.
Adios.
Hola.
A bit of alligator meat with some alligator heads.
- Harpoon? - A-ha.
Oi!
This is the only time I want to have my arm inside an alligator's mouth.
Those teeth are really sharp.
One of the most popular delicacies for sale here is the suri worm.
You don't come to the Amazon jungle and not try the local cuisine.
Best eaten barbecued.
Gracias.
Wow.
They're good.
Actually, they're not so good.
They don't taste so great.
I hope she hasn't told me you're not supposed to eat them.
I'm heading down from the market towards the water's edge.
Iquitos is a water world where life is dominated
by the flow of the Amazon and its tributaries.
Rainfall and meltwater pouring down from the Andes Mountains raises the
river level by over 20 feet for months of the year.
But I've heard the locals have found
their own way to cope with these conditions.
I'm meeting Freddie, who's offered to show me around.
Freddie, it's good to meet you.
- It's good to meet you. - Nice to meet you, too.
Right, are you going to show me around?
Sure, I can show you around.
But I want to show you my Iquitos, my place.
I'd like that very much.
It's like the M25 around London...
.. in rush-hour.
Wow, so literally on the banks of the river?
They all float.
Yeah.
There are around 5,000 floating and stilted homes here.
Few have electricity or running water.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, my God.
Many of the houses are on stilts,
but I have to say, there seems to be a lot of rubbish around.
Why don't people tidy up the rubbish?
Really?
- No way? - Yes.
Does it not make you ill?
No.
Oh, I see.
Our stomachs are considerably weaker than yours
and that would make us very ill.
Like a fifth of all Peruvian children,
Freddie left home at a young age to look for work.
11? Blimey, I thought I did well,
I moved out at 17 and I thought I'd got out quick.
That must be incredibly strong connection and bond.
Yes.
Freddie grew up here in the shanty town of Belen,
one of the poorest districts in Iquitos and home to 75,000 people.
It's one of the areas of the city
most affected by the rise and fall of the Amazon.
65-year-old Luciola has lived in Belen for 50 years.
She still works, selling bananas every day at the local market.
This is my neighbour.
It's lovely to meet you.
Si. Luciola.
Luciola her name.
- Luciola. - Si. - Excellent.
What's it like living here? It looks beautiful.
Does she move away when it starts to flood?
She has to stay because these are floating houses.
- This is a floating house. - This is a floating house, yes. - Wow.
Why is she so happy living here?
Would you choose to live anywhere other than here?
She'd like to stay here.
Because...
Because her work, I like it.
Luciola, it's lovely to meet you.
But if Iquitos seems remote,
it's nothing compared to the place I'm heading next,
to meet an Amazonian tribe
that was totally cut off from the outside world.
For the final part of my journey,
I'm heading even deeper into the Amazon.
I've been given special permission to visit the Matses people,
an indigenous community who only started to come into regular
contact with the outside world in the 1960s.
I'm flying deeper into the jungle, to the border with Brazil.
I'll finish the final leg by boat,
travelling up the Amazon river.
Full power, starting the take-off run on water.
It was once an eight-day boat trip to reach the Matses,
but it's now just half an hour by seaplane.
I'm hitching a ride with the Peruvian military.
Travelling with me is army doctor Juan.
He's been flying for years and today,
he's taking supplies to another doctor in the jungle.
Juan, how often do you do these civilian missions and
how much do the people rely on them?
All you can see is just a sea of trees.
I've never seen so many trees in my life.
Juan, what's different about landing on the Amazon
to landing anywhere else on water?
The Amazon river is really beautiful.
It just seems to sort of snake and wind and actually seeing it,
with all of its bends that go miles out,
kind of understand why it takes eight days on a boat
and relatively short time as the crow flies.
We've started getting lower and lower now.
The seaplane has taken me to its last stop along the Amazon.
I'm here to meet up with the doctor who lives in Colonia Angamos.
The only way to reach the tribe from here is by boat.
Dr Jessica Tunjar does regular checks on tribe members for malaria.
She's picking up some important supplies.
Hola, Jessica.
Hola.
- Lovely to meet you. - Nice to meet you, Arthur.
Contact with the tribe is limited to a few outsiders,
but they have agreed to let us come with Dr Jessica today.
How long have you worked out here for, Jessica?
Even though many of the community have started wearing Western clothes
and grown used to Dr Jessica, they're still wary of strangers.
Just big smiles and all will be fine.
The Matses have a troubled past.
When rubber traders tried to take their land 100 years ago,
they fled deeper into the jungle.
After years of attacks and counterattacks,
in the late 1960s,
the Matses finally let Westerners in.
Missionaries helped the tribe reach a peace deal with the government,
leading to limited contact with the outside world.
Lovely to meet you.
So, this lady, Cecilia, she's the leader.
Jessica was quite insistent that we needed her permission
to come and land in their village, which I completely understand,
because we're coming from a different world
as far as these people are concerned.
Good.
OK.
This is not the easiest.
Cor.
We have the whole village cheering us on.
Eh?
Cor.
Over the last 30 years, the Matses have changed
their nomadic lifestyle and settled into more permanent communities.
The government has given them money for projects like building
concrete paths in their village,
but they still rely on the rainforest around them
for most of their food and resources.
Wow!
This place is amazing. And the people are really, really lovely.
We've come to the middle of nowhere,
they've never seen probably anything like the likes of me before
and within 30 seconds, we're high-fiving,
shaking hands, big smiles and everybody's happy.
Dr Jessica is here to test for malaria.
When the doctors first arrived,
the Matses people were suspicious of the needles
and thought they were full of government-supplied poison.
Nobody likes having their jabs.
In just a few years,
the doctors have got the malaria epidemic firmly under control
and have saved dozens of lives.
Daniel used to be the community leader and
has lived through the changes brought by the doctors.
Most people around the world would probably be incredibly envious
of living this remotely.
Have you ever had the opportunity to travel outside of the village,
like, go to Iquitos or the larger cities?
When you were there, what did you think of it?
Would you ever consider moving away from anywhere than here?
We are really in the back of beyond here.
We're about as remote as remote can be.
You come further into the jungle here
and it's like the most stunning.
It's so peaceful.
The place is so clean and meticulously well-kept.
And just look at that.
You know, the sun's just setting, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else.
I've only been allowed to stay for one day with the Matses
and my time is up.
They protect their independence fiercely, but with good reason.
Peru's incredible landscapes bring isolation for many,
but with that comes a real sense of community and pride.