Trip to Peru: Main Destinations

Cuzco offers visitors plenty to do. The city is dominated by one of the most impressive Inca constructions: Sacsayhuaman, an enormous fortress of gigantic, perfectly fitted stones, some over 3 meters high and weighing nearly 20 tons — a must-see. A few kilometers further, other Inca sites are also worth a visit: Kenko, Puka Pukara, and Tambomachay.

Beyond a half-day guided tour of these Inca sites, we recommend setting aside at least one free day to enjoy Cuzco's charm.

Enjoy the generally sunny climate to stroll through the historic center, its flower-filled squares, or the San Blas neighborhood, with streets so narrow the sidewalks sometimes can't fit two people, and so steep some turn into staircases. Discover an extraordinary heritage: numerous Inca and colonial-era museums, the richly decorated cathedral, or the Koricancha, or Temple of the Sun, the political and spiritual center of the Inca empire, on which the Spanish built the church of Santo Domingo.

This is also a cacao-producing region: visit the ChocoMuseo and make your own chocolate bar in a workshop.

Cuzco is also a city where you can breathe in Andean culture, that blend of Indigenous and Spanish lifestyles and customs — best felt at the Saint-Pierre market, Cuzco's main market, in the city center.

A half-day guided tour is recommended to discover the city's most beautiful corners: the Yanahuara district with its square, church, and sillar houses; a lookout point with a panoramic view of the city and its 3 volcanoes; and the colonial center, including the Santa Catalina Monastery.

Santa Catalina is the largest monastery in Peru and one of Arequipa's finest colonial buildings. Built in the 16th century, it has housed a community of nuns for over 4 centuries, and its streets and courtyards evoke Andalusia. The visit takes about an hour and a half.

A free half-day to enjoy the charm of Arequipa's colonial center is well worth it — you could use it to visit the museum of the mummy Juanita, a young girl sacrificed in Inca times whose body was found in the glacier of the Sabancaya volcano.

Other museums and religious monuments worth a visit include the monasteries of Santa Teresa and La Recoleta (the latter with a library of 17th-century books), the Church of San Agustín, the Church of the Society of Jesus (whose cloisters are freely accessible), and the Casa del Moral colonial museum.

The San Camilo Market, a few streets from the Plaza de Armas, is also worth a wander for the lively atmosphere and variety of local food: potatoes, fish, vegetables and, above all, fruit.

If you're interested in cooking, we offer a Peruvian cooking class in Arequipa, where you'll learn to prepare ceviche and lomo saltado, two of Peru's most iconic dishes.

From Puno, several excursions let you sail on the lake. The most classic reaches Taquile Island on a one-day round trip, with a splendid view over the lake from the top of the island — though the 6-hour round-trip crossing on traditional boats is a downside.

You can also opt for a 2-day excursion with an overnight stay on Amantani Island, close to Taquile. The night with a local family gives you a closer look at their life and the rare tranquility of this island of silence, with no cars or dogs. Taquile Island is visited the next day.

If discomfort puts you off, the private island of Suasi offers a pricier but fully comfortable alternative with its hotel from the Casa Andina chain.

All these excursions pass the Uros floating islands, 20 minutes from Puno. Tourism has multiplied these islands to a population of over 1,000, and the traditional hunter-fisher lifestyle has disappeared — but even very touristy, they remain astonishing. Reach them on a 2-3 hour excursion, or by kayak from Puno for the sporty.

Nazca is world-famous for its geoglyphs, the Nazca Lines, the region's main tourist attraction — a set of figures mostly depicting animals (spider, monkey, hummingbird, condor…), straight lines, and geometric shapes such as zigzags and trapezoids. Animal figures reach up to a hundred meters across; straight lines extend up to 10 kilometers.

The lines were traced on a flat, arid surface covering several hundred square kilometers by removing the surface layer of oxidized stones, leaving pale lines by contrast. They are believed to date from the first millennium AD, and the near-total absence of rain in the Nazca desert has let them survive for more than a thousand years.

The geoglyphs almost certainly had a ritual purpose, but the exact meaning of each figure and how the Nazca civilization used them remains unknown — numerous theories, from the serious to the far-fetched, keep an aura of mystery around them.

Two figures (the tree and the hand) can be seen from a roughly 15-meter-high metal tower 25 kilometers from Nazca, and a nearby hill offers views of several lines a few kilometers long. But the lines are best observed from the air: flights depart from the Nazca aerodrome, last about half an hour, and cost around 100 USD.

The Ballestas Islands are an archipelago of rocky islets with spectacular relief — cliffs, arches, and caverns — home to several thousand sea lions and tens of thousands of birds. Visitors can observe several species of cormorants, pelicans, various boobies, Inca terns, Humboldt penguins, and dozens of other species.

The large bird population has built up a thick layer of guano over the centuries, exploited in the 19th century as fertilizer and once one of Peru's most important exports — today only a minor economic resource.

The richness of bird life is linked to the abundance of fish off the coast of Peru, itself due to the Humboldt current, whose cold waters flow up along South America from Antarctica.

The excursion departs in the morning from the fishing port of Paracas and lasts about two hours; besides the sea lions and seabirds, dolphins can occasionally be observed.

The Cordillera Blanca is arguably one of Peru's most beautiful ranges, with numerous "nevados" (snow-capped peaks), including Huascarán, the country's highest summit at 6,768 meters. Many peaks carry glaciers and draw mountaineers (known here as "andinistas") from around the world.

The Cordillera Blanca is also a paradise for hikers and trekkers, with treks from 1 to 10 days through sumptuous mountain scenery. The best known, the Llanganuco-Santa Cruz trek, usually takes 4 days and passes the turquoise Llanganuco lagoon. These hikes run at an average altitude of nearly 4,000 meters and cross passes near 5,000 meters, so excellent physical fitness is recommended.

Another favorite for big mountain treks is the Cordillera Huayhuash. Farther from Huaraz and less easily accessible, it offers pristine scenery, explored on a great 10-day trek that circles it.

For those not drawn to long hikes, day excursions reveal the magnificent Cordillera Blanca scenery without the effort. A one-day trip lets you admire the splendid Llanganuco lagoon in the heart of Huascarán National Park, passing through the villages of the Callejón de Huaylas, Caraz, Carhuaz, and finally the Yungay cemetery, where 25,000 people died when the town was buried by a mudslide in 1970.

A day excursion also allows you to get close to the glacier of the Nevado Pastoruri, at 4900 meters of altitude. Another excursion lets you visit the archaeological site of Chavin de Huantar, one of the oldest in Peru, which includes underground passages.

Finally, the Callejon de Huaylas valley ends in a narrow, deep canyon called the "cañón del pato", which can be reached from the village of Caraz.

The city of Trujillo itself deserves a half-day visit. Its central square, with colonial façades and distinctive windows, is one of the most beautiful in Peru. The historic center has several well-preserved colonial buildings open to visitors, including the Palacio Iturregui with its Italian marble statues, the Casa Bracamonte, the Casa del Mayorazgo de Facalá with its Mudéjar-style corner balcony, the Casa del Mariscal de Orbegoso, the Casa de la Emancipación, the Casa Ganoza Chopitea with its colorful baroque portal, and the Casa Calonge, which houses a museum of fine Chimu gold ornaments.

The city also has notable religious buildings: the cathedral (built 1666), the churches of San Francisco (18th century), Belén (1680-1708), San Agustín (17th century), and La Merced (rebuilt 17th century), plus the Carmen monastery, one of Trujillo's most interesting architectural complexes, with two cloisters and an art gallery of 150 paintings from the 17th and 18th centuries.

Trujillo also has interesting museums, including the Museo de Arqueología José Cassinelli, with fine objects from the Chimu and Mochica cultures, and the archaeology, anthropology, and history museum of the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, displaying pieces from the region's various pre-Hispanic cultures.

A few kilometers north of the city lies the archaeological site of Chan Chan, a large adobe-brick city that was the most important center of the Chimu civilization, which developed in this region from the 10th to the 15th century before being annexed by the Inca empire. The Chimu were skilled goldsmiths who left behind some of Peru's most beautiful gold jewelry, and some of Chan Chan's walls still show bas-reliefs.

The Huaca del Sol and Huaca de la Luna, a few kilometers south of Trujillo, belong to the Mochica culture of the first millennium AD; these pyramidal complexes are famous for their beautiful polychrome friezes.

Other archaeological sites in the region include El Brujo, 60 kilometers toward Chiclayo, made up of several Huacas, the largest standing 30 meters high; the figure of the head-cutter, typical of this civilization, appears on one of its polychrome friezes.

Huanchaco beach, 10 kilometers from Trujillo, is still bathed by the cold waters of the Humboldt current at this latitude, so swimming is only good in summer, from December to March. For water that's swimmable year-round, head further north to the beaches of Mancora and Punta Sal, near the Ecuadorian border.

Chachapoyas is a small town, or rather a large village, at an altitude of 2,300 meters, with a temperate, generally sunny climate around 18ºC year-round and a pleasant town center around the main square.

Less than 10 kilometers from Chachapoyas lies the village of Huancas, known for ceramic craftsmanship practiced exclusively by women, and a viewpoint with a spectacular view over the canyon of the Sonche River, 800 meters deep at this point.

But the Chachapoyas region is mainly visited for the citadel of Kuelap. Perched on a promontory at 3,000 meters altitude, this site towers more than 1,000 meters above the Utcubamba River, with a magnificent view stretching for dozens of kilometers in every direction. It was clearly a strategic point of the highest importance for the Chachapoyas people, and the fortress they built there is one of the most impressive pre-Columbian structures in Peru.

The entire site is built on a platform surrounded by walls more than 10 meters high, a colossal undertaking given the site's topography. With the scale of its construction, its semi-tropical vegetation, and its splendid views, Kuelap is reminiscent of Machu Picchu — lacking only its fame!

Another not-to-be-missed excursion is to Gocta Falls. In a cirque with knife-cut cliffs, this small river drops 770 meters in two stages, making it one of the tallest waterfalls in the world. A marked trail leads to its foot from the village of Gocta through dense vegetation; the round trip takes about 5 hours.

The Karajia sarcophagi are another site well worth an excursion. Belonging to the Chachapoyas culture, they appear to hang suspended in the cliff face, like many constructions in the region.

Other points of interest include the Leymebamba museum and its mummy collection, and the chullpas, or funerary houses, of Revash. The region's landscapes also suit multi-day treks for adventurers, far from the classic tourist routes.

Although Peru lies between the equator and the Tropic of Capricorn, outside the Amazon its climate is not exactly tropical — partly due to the high altitude of the Andes, and along the coast to the Humboldt Current flowing up from the Antarctic. As a result, the entire Peruvian coast is bathed by this current's cold waters. The entire coast? No, one small region in the far north still holds out against the invader... ;-)

A warmer water current in the Tumbes region turns the climate tropical, and the desert that occupies 2,500 kilometers of the Peruvian coast finally gives way here to vegetation, though the area is still fairly arid.

It is a bit like Peru's Mediterranean, a holiday and second-home destination for the upper classes of Lima, with many hotels of all categories.

The most renowned beaches are Mancora and Punta Sal. Mancora is livelier, particularly for surfers, while Punta Sal is a bit more exclusive; Punta Sal lies 80 kilometers south of Tumbes, and Mancora another 20 kilometers further.

The main activity in Mancora and Punta Sal is, of course, relaxing: the beaches are beautiful, the water pleasant, and many hotels have a pool. You can also enjoy an excursion to the Puerto Pizarro mangroves, surfing and kite-surfing, sea kayaking, and even boat trips to spot humpback whales from August to October.