PERU


ITINERARY TWO HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NORTH Start point: Huaraz • End point: Utcubamba Valley • Distance travelled: 700 miles • Average length: 14 days


Witnessing little international attention, northern Peru receives just a fraction of the visitors of the better-known south. Yet it’s home to some of the country’s richest archaeological sites, as well as natural wonders you’re likely to have to yourself. Start in the Cordillera Blanca, an Andean


sub-range of sky-reaching peaks, before making your way to the coast. Pre-Columbian artefacts abound outside the metropolises of Chiclayo and Trujillo, where museums are stacked to the rafters with gold, and adobe pyramids built between 100 and 800 CE still stand proud. Then, from the city of Cajamarca — where you can soak in thermal waters once frequented by Inca emperors — a road traces through the mountains to the green Amazonas region for the last stops on this itinerary. Tourism is nascent in the north and the


infrastructure reflects this. Domestic flights are either non-existent or require a stopover in Lima, so bus journeys often offer the most direct transit between destinations. They can be long, slow and occasionally hair-raising — but as you whizz past adobe villages tucked into mountain passes and career alongside yawning valleys, you’ll feel like you’re travelling through time, too.


128 NATIONALGEOGRAPHIC.COM/TRAVEL


HIGHLIGHTS HUARAZ


From Lima, buses take around nine hours to reach this high-altitude city. Give yourself two days to acclimatise with short hikes around the surrounding Cordillera Blanca, then join Turismo Andino on a two-day trek to Lake 69 in Huascarán National Park, a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage Site. You’ll clamber high into glacier-sheathed mountains and through valleys splashed with crystalline lakes — and stay overnight in a rustic lodge with pisco sours on tap. turismoandino.com.pe


TRUJILLO


It’s a seven-hour bus ride to the dusty, 16th- century city of Trujillo. A local highlight is Huaca de la Luna, an adobe pyramid built by the pre-Incan Moche civilisation, whose use of human sacrifices is recorded in grisly friezes. Next, catch some waves at the nearby beach town of Huanchaco aboard a caballito de totora, reed boats first used by fishermen 3,000 years ago and considered by some to be the predecessors of modern surfoards. huacasdemoche.pe trebolviajesperu.com


CHICLAYO


There’s more history on display a four-hour bus journey away, inside Chiclayo’s under- the-radar Museo de Tumbas Reales del Senor de Sipán. A 20-minute taxi ride from the city centre, it has a staggering, three- floor collection showcasing gold artefacts discovered in the tombs of a nearby Moche site. Afterwards, get lost in Mercado de Brujos (Witch Doctors’ Market), where you can find folk remedies said to help mend a broken heart, charms to attract wealth and everything in between. facebook.com/ museotumbasrealesdesipanoficial


CAJAMARCA


Second only to Cusco for its elegant architecture and a six-hour bus journey inland, Cajamarca is where the fate of the Inca was sealed. To secure his release after having been imprisoned by the Spanish, final Inca leader Atahualpa supposedly called for his subjects across the empire to send enough gold and silver to fill a room, but was executed regardless in 1533. Los Baños del Inca, said to have been his favourite thermal waters, are just a few miles away and still open to visitors. ctbi.pe


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