Peru Vacation Spotlight

The Cathedral

built 1666, destroyed by an earthquake in 1759 and reconstructed in 1781, is an important repository of Cusco colonial paintings and sculptures and altarpieces of Baroque and Rococo styles.

Chan Chan

is the 28-square-mile (75km2) capital of the Chimu Empire, which dominated the region from about 1000 A.D. until about 1470 A.D. It is the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas, and the largest mud city in the world. Built around 1300 A.D., Chan Chan at its height had an estimated population of 60,000 people.

The “Huaca del Sol” (Sun) and “Huaca de la Luna” (Moon)

are huge pyramids built by the Moche culture some 700 years before the Chimu. The Huaca de la Luna contains chambers that were filled with ceramics, precious metals and polychrome friezes. The Huaca del Sol, originally built from more than 140 million adobe bricks, is the largest pre-Columbian structure in Peru.

El Brujo

is a sprawling archaeological complex with some of the most impressive friezes in the area, including multicolored depictions of life-sized priests, warriors, prisoners and human sacrifices. In 2005, archaeologists discovered the tomb of the mummy Señora del Cao, believed to be the first known female ruler of pre-Columbian Peru — likened to a South American Cleopatra.

    

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