Lately, every day people are hearing about fires in the Amazon, which is quite alarming. Naturally, since we send lots of people to the Amazon, we get people asking if the fires are going to affect their trip.

Two weeks ago, me and a group of agents and marketing reps from the U.S. and Canada toured Guyana, as guests of the Guyana Tourism Authority. I had talked with one of the tour operators about Guyana for years and finally got to experience first-hand what he had been telling me about.

To me, it seemed like such an exciting mix for those looking for something different. The country promotes it's amazing wildlife and Kaieteur Falls (the highest single drop waterfall in the world), but it offers much more than that. When you visit the interior, it's like visiting a frontier territory - a vast land, largely untouched, except for the natives and a few foreigners who came to carve out a life, as you can see from the video below.

You may or may not know it, but there are probably about 13 ships that sail in the Peruvian Amazon. What makes cruises on the Aria special - what sets them apart from other ships?

Are you planning to travel to South America and are looking for an agent to help you with your plans? If so, you might consider some things that were revealed in a recent survey of travel agents:

• almost 66% of agents said that they sell mostly cruises and all-inclusive resorts
• almost 79% said that the Caribbean and Europe were their best selling destinations
• only 1.54% said that South America was their best selling destination
• only 5.14% said they belong to the Adventure Travel Trade Association and only 18.51% said they specialize in adventure travel

Many people seem to think that travel to South America is dangerous. The U.S. Department of State recently came out with a new system of grading the safety of countries and it shows some interesting things

I know that some people have the idea that a trip to the Amazon is a life-threatening experience for anybody, so they definitely would not want to bring their kids there. Well it could be dangerous if you went on your own and didn't know what you were doing. But if you go with a company that has good guides and a good program, it can be a safe and very entertaining and educational experience for kids. And kids seem to leave with a sense of pride because they leave the natural jungle feeling more connected to nature than they ever did back home in their concrete jungle.

Federal health officials have issued a travel alert about the spread of yellow fever in Brazil and say travelers need to be vaccinated before heading to affected areas. People may have to plan ahead because there is a shortage of yellow fever vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted in its alert.

I am re-reading a book I had read years ago (Tales of a Shaman's Apprentice) and it got me to remembering when I was researching my first trip to the Amazon over 20 years ago. I had been reading trip reports at an office in Quito and read things like:

• "our guide knew the jungle like an animal, but he did not know how to communicate"
• "during the day, our guide was great, but then he would start drinking and pass out and leave us to ourselves to cook"
• "he would get drunk and start flirting with the females in our group"
• "the guy at the airport that we bought a trip from promised us a great trip, but that wasn't what we got"

It was reported that the percentage of foreigners travelling to Brazil because of the country’s natural attractions and adventure tourism activities increased from 12.8% in 2014 to 15.7% in 2015.

"Brazil is lucky to have treasures such as the Amazon Rainforest, the Pantanal, the Cerrado, the Atlantic Forest and over 8,000 kilometers of coastline, as well as the largest river basin in the world. With professional management and a partnership between the public and private sectors, these products can be exploited in a sustainable manner and to the benefit of local communities," says interim Tourism Minister Alberto Alves.