Chinchero: an Inca and colonial village, and its weavers

A plateau village, between Cusco and the Sacred Valley

Chinchero is about 30 km from Cusco on the paved Urubamba road; open from 7:00 to 18:00; entry with the Boleto Turístico. The village spreads across a farming plateau, above the Urubamba Valley. Its place in a route is simple: on the road that goes down from Cusco to Urubamba, before the Maras salt pans and the circular terraces of Moray, further along the same plateau. Distances: Cusco–Pisac 32 km; Pisac–Urubamba 39 km; Urubamba–Ollantaytambo 19 km; Cusco–Chinchero 27 km; Chinchero–Maras 22 km; Maras–Moray 8 km; Moray–Maras salt pans 17 km; salt pans–Urubamba 19 km; Cusco–Tipón 24 km.

Altitude first. Chinchero is at about 3,750 m, higher than Cusco (about 3,400 m). It is not a low stop for acclimatising: walk slowly, especially on the stairs of the terraces, and place the visit after a few days in the region. See altitude.

The Inca site and the colonial church

According to historical accounts, the Inca Túpac Yupanqui chose Chinchero for his residence and had palaces built there for himself and his lineage. Today you can see its walls of large stones, enclosures, shrines and agricultural terraces. The Cusco Directorate of Culture manages this archaeological park; excavations by a Spanish archaeological mission, between 1968 and 1970, uncovered and restored part of it.

In 1536, during the uprising of Manco Inca, the village was burned. In colonial times, Viceroy Toledo gathered the population together there and had the church built, on the Inca halls: it is the most telling image of the place, a colonial façade set on Inca walls. A mural in the village commemorates another episode: the victory of the cacique of Chinchero, Mateo García Pumacahua, over the rebellion of Túpac Amaru II, in the form of a puma bringing down a snake. The park’s rules prohibit drones, camping and climbing on the walls.

Textiles: a living craft

Chinchero is one of the centres of Andean weaving, studied by anthropologists since the 1970s. In 1996, weavers from Chinchero founded, with international support, the Centro de Textiles Tradicionales del Cusco, which now works with ten communities in the region; since the 1990s, weavers’ associations have revived natural dyes, using cochineal and local plants.

In the village’s textile centres, you generally watch hand spinning, a dyeing demonstration and weaving on a loom, before moving on to the shop. It is often the most instructive part of the visit. Two nuances, with no suspicion towards anyone:

• A demonstration is not a guarantee. It shows a skill; it does not prove that every piece on display was woven on the spot, or with the fibre or the dye shown. Ask who wove the piece, how long it took, with which fibre and which dye.
• Nothing obliges you to buy. A demonstration often ends in the shop: look, compare, and leave with nothing if nothing suits you.

The Sunday fair, and the rest of the week

On Sundays, a traditional fair is held next to the tourist coach car park: local textiles and crafts, produce from the region and, according to the MINCETUR inventory, a form of barter still practised by the elders, the “chalay”. It is the liveliest day, and the busiest. This record dates from 2022: confirm the day and the location on the spot.

On other days, the village is quieter: the site, the church and the textile centres, which welcome visitors outside the fair. Do not confuse the two: a textile centre is a house or an association that demonstrates and sells; the fair is a market.

The ticket, and what it does not cover

The archaeological park is visited with the Boleto Turístico del Cusco: S/ 70, valid for 2 days, for Pisac, Ollantaytambo, Chinchero and Moray, or the full ticket for 16 sites (S/ 130 for 16 sites, valid for 10 days). Unless the ticket office says otherwise, this ticket covers neither the church, about which the sales page says nothing, nor the textile centres, which are private or community initiatives.

How long, and what to combine it with

Allow about an hour for the site and its terraces at a slow pace, half an hour for the church, an hour for a textile centre, more on Sundays with the fair. Three ways to fit it in:

1. On the way to the valley: Cusco early in the morning, Chinchero, then down to Urubamba for the night, lower down.
2. The plateau day: Chinchero in the morning, Maras and Moray in the afternoon, the salt pans at the end of the day. See Chinchero, Maras and Moray.
3. On a Sunday: the fair in the morning, the site afterwards, once the groups have left.

The guide’s itineraries that go through Chinchero: a first trip to Peru in 15 days, Peru for food lovers, Cusco and the southern Amazon, the southern classic and a month.