Like its northern neighbor Ecuador, and its southern neighbor Bolivia, Peru has a diverse topography ranging from high Andean mountains to primary Amazonian rainforest. It is home to almost fifty different indigenous groups. Most of these are found in the upper and lower Amazon areas, although some also live in the mountains. They number around twelve million - almost half of the country's population. A few Amazonian groups still prefer to have little or no contact with the outside world.

In the four hundred years before the Spanish arrived Peru was the center of the most advanced civilization in the Americas - the Inca Empire. Since then Peru's indigenous population has been on the decline and that trend continues today. First it was the diseases brought by the Spanish that wiped out the indigenous peoples in huge numbers. Today it is a combination of economic, social and political factors. People are beginning to migrate away from their ancestral lands into towns and cities; the capital, Lima, is home to almost a fifth of the country's population.

In the sparsely populated Amazon region the biggest challenge to its indigenous inhabitants' survival is the threat of oil and gas exploration and exploitation. The Camisea Gas Project has been criticized by almost every environmental and indigenous peoples protection organization as a disaster. The recent increase in crude oil price has only furthered the Peruvian government's sellout of the country's indigenous lands to foreign oil companies.

Visiting Peru's indigenous peoples is at best difficult and at worst dangerous. Much of Peru's border with Colombia is an area of FARC activity and at the present time should be avoided, although the area around Leticia, Colombia is relatively safe. Other areas have little infrastructure and the visitor should be prepared for up to many days of hard travel to reach their destination.