Nearing the end of our travel in Peru, we still wanted to see more of Peru's historic and cultural greats, so we headed to Trujillo, the cultural capital of Peru. To get there, we flew from our previous destination of Iquitos on the Amazon in Peru's north-eastern corner to Trujillo, on the coast in Peru's north-western corner.
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| Colonial architecture in Trujillo, Peru |
We'd heard that Trujillo is home to amazing colonial architecture, and unique UNESCO protected ancient ruins that we were itching to visit.
Arriving at Trujillo airport we caught a taxi to our accommodation, Hotel Saint Germain, in the historic city centre. The Hotel is a family run business and while we found the room to be a little tired, the family were lovely, friendly people.
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| Marg in the Plaza de Armas, Trujillo, Peru |
Trujillo was founded
in 1535, making it one of the first Spanish settlements in Peru. Then in 1820,
after centuries of Spanish rule, it became the first city to become independent of Spain, hence the statue.
Now-days, with a population of around 900-thousand, Trujillo is the third largest city in Peru (after Lima and Arequipa).
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| Spanish influenced decorated windows, Trujillo, Peru |
One aspect of the Spanish legacy in Trujillo is its architecture. There is an abundance of interesting colourful colonial buildings, with many of them sporting stunningly beautiful iron lattice windows and ornate plaster portals.
Many of these are clustered around the Plaza de Armas, but can also be found in the surrounding streets of the historic centre.
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| Cathedral and other ornate buildings, Trujillo, Peru |
We wandered around the Plaza and nearby streets for ages, admiring the stunning yellow cathedral, and colourful government buildings, historic houses, and museums. All were ornate, beautifully maintained, and very attractive.
That night, we were in a small restaurant that was full of
locals. It offered simple but tasty food prepared by an
enthusiastic group of chatty women in the kitchen. We got to talking with them and our neighbouring diners, and it was such a pleasure to hear about their life in Trujillo. They seemed just as interested in us, the only 'gringos' in the place.
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| Pedestrian street in the historic centre of Trujillo, Peru |
The next day, we wandered around the historic centre again, visiting some of the narrow streets and pedestrian walkways. They also had ornate buildings full of quaint shops and restaurants, where we spent some time.
One of our reasons for visiting Trujillo, was to see some of the ancient pre-Incan ruins that dot the desert in this northern part of Peru. There are several notable ruins, so instead of trying to get a taxi to each one, we booked into a tour.
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| Some of the adobe ruins at Chan Chan (UNESCO), Trujillo, Peru |
Our first stop on this tour was to the amazing Chan
Chan ruins, a complex of royal palaces and homes that was once the capital city of the Chimú
civilization, housing over 60,000 people. It's made of adobe, and covers around 20 square kilometres, making it the largest adobe complex in the Americas and the second largest in the world (the largest is in Iran).
The Chimú ruled here from around AD 900 until conquered by the Incas in around 1470. The Incas abandoned Chan Chan, then the Spanish arrived in 1534 and looted its riches, letting the structure fall into to ruin. Chan Chan is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, rich in cultural history.
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| Intricately decorated walls in the rooms of Chan Chan (UNESCO), Trujillo, Peru |
What can be seen
today, is a large series of walled enclosures with carvings
that depict the life of the inhabitants of the time. The intricacy of the enclosure walls, and the detail of its decorations are still visible after all these years, and a cover has been erected over the main site to protect it from the harsh climate of northern Peru. It's size and history are amazing.
We wandered around and enjoyed Chan Chan for ages, and once we managed to have our guide stop poking us on the arm to get our attention, we enjoyed it even more.
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| Carvings at Huaca del Arco Iris, Trujillo, Peru |
Our tour also took us to see other
archaeological sites near Trujillo. One was Huaca del Arco Iris – the Rainbow Pyramid or Dragon
Pyramid. The name comes from the rainbow-like semicircles in the huge carvings that adorn its walls.
The Chimú built this temple pyramid around 1100 years ago. The outer wall is adobe and it contains a brick-built pyramid inside it. To the side of that are some pits that it is believed, were used for offerings, and that were discovered to contain the bones of infants.
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| Example of the many murals excavated at Huaca de la Luna, Trujillo, Peru |
We also visited the Huaca de la Luna, Temple of the Moon. This site is known for its colourful murals painted between 300 and 800 AD, that became the largest group of symbolic images excavated in South America.
The Huaca de la Luna and the neighbouring Huaca del Sol (see below), are the remains of the Huacas de Moche, the ancient capital city of the Moche people. They are situated in the Moche Valley just outside Trujillo.
The Moche people ruled here from 100 AD to 800 AD, preceding both the Chimú and the Inca civilizations.
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| Millions of adobe bricks and friezes at the Huaca de la Luna, Trujillo, Peru |
The Huaca de la Luna is a stepped pyramid structure made of millions
adobe bricks that, over 600 years or so, were added to or built over by new Moche
rulers. This eventually resulted in a large structure that had a series of decorated plazas and patios, linked by similarly decorated corridors and ramps.
From the outside, you can see the shape of the pyramid and the millions of adobe bricks slowly being uncovered by the archaeologists.
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| Wall of stunning friezes in Huaca de la Luna, Trujillo, Peru |
Both of the Moche sites were incredible, and we came away absolutely amazed at the skills and sophistication of these ancient people, to build such massive and intricate structures.
While we were visiting the Huaca de la Luna, a bunch of school children standing behind us, seemed fascinated with Leigh’s blonde hair and gave it a little tug. We turned around and giggled with them and we all spoke together in mixed English and Spanish. It was a lovely moment.
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| The pyramid and sacrificial pits at Huaca del Sol, Trujillo, Peru |
From Huaca de la Luna, we saw Huaca del Sol - the Temple of the Sun. This is an adobe brick pyramid built around AD 450, also by the Moche people.
The pyramid was about four main levels high, and expanded and built on by successive rulers over time. It's estimated that over 130 million adobe bricks were used. This Huaca was used as a royal residence, ceremonial hall, and burial chamber. There were also sacrificial pits nearby.
The open desert between the Huaca del Sol and Huaca de la Luna is thought to have once contained structures of the common citizens of the time.
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| Cultural concert, Trujillo, Peru |
Our organized tour included lunch at a local
restaurant accompanied by a cultural concert. It was all a bit touristy but interesting.
The last part of our trip was a visit to
Huanchaco beach. The beach is famous for its seafood and surf, as well as its ancient hand-made boats called caballitos de totora, used by Peruvian fishermen for the last 3000 years.
The boats are made of bound totora reeds that the fishermen straddle like a horse. The totora reeds are the same reeds we'd seen used for the floating islands on Lake Titicaca at the southern end of Peru.
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| Leigh and row of caballitos de totora racked up behind, Huanchaco Beach, Peru |
We had been led to believe that we
would see fishermen still using these boats. Sadly, this was not the case, and they seemed to be there only for
tourists to ride in or take photos!
A few days later and it was time to move on again. Because we were going to Ecuador, we decided to take an overnight (18 hours) bus
as the cost of flying across a border is hugely expensive. So, we booked VIP seats with Cruz del Sur bus line the day before we needed to leave.
Our seats were on the bottom tier of a double-decker bus, and we had wide soft seats that reclined so that we could sleep. The only downside was that the bus didn't leave until midnight. However, our lovely hotel owners let us stay in their lobby and use their wifi, toilets etc until we left.
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| Old city gate-Portada de la Sierra, Trujillo, Peru |
As we drove out of Trujillo, we said our fond goodbyes to this old city and to Peru, where we'd spent the last month of our South America tour.
We'd come into Peru in the south at Puno on Lake Titicaca, been to the Inca capita of Cuzco and walked the Inca trail to Machu Picchu, marvelled at the condors and rural villages of the Colca Canyon, loved the architecture of Arequipa, enjoyed the ambiance and history of Lima, sailed along the Amazon River, and admired the capital of culture - Trujillo. What a fabulous country.
Now on the bus, we managed to sleep until served a basic breakfast
just before Peru's border with Ecuador. At the border, we all got out of the bus, lined up, and were stamped out of Peru. We then walked
to the other side of the room and lined up, and were stamped in to Ecuador.
Soon, we were
back on the bus and headed to Guayaquil, our jumping off point to visit the Galapagos Islands, our next destination.
This
is part of a blog series about our travels through the north-eastern countries
of South America. The first blog in this series is called “In and around Santiago”.