A speedboat departs the Iquitos slums, which hover over the water on stilts and rafts to accommodate mercurial high-water marks that vary 15 meters with the Andes snowmelt. Devouring Peru's Amazon for several hours, the boat slows as it enters the tributary Yanayacu that snakes through the jungle like an anaconda.

I am a hiker. But at home, no one uses a machete to blaze the trail prior to walking on it as Souza, our Amazon guide, did, creating a path in the overgrown rainforest step by step. Slicing, swatting, swooping, chopping, no branch, bush, vine or twig was safe.

Are we really what we eat? Not sure about that. But judging by the comments of our esteemed travel writers at Traveling Boy, we seem willing to try just about anything from reptiles, bugs  and even some tasty surprises from the far corners of the globe. Please Note: Read at your own risk. Piranha I Caught in Peru’s Amazon. Eat …