Northern Peru: culture and beaches

Why this order

The route follows the coast north, as history does: the Moche around Trujillo (around 100 to 800), then the Lambayeque around Chiclayo (around 750 to 1375), and the Chimú of Chan Chan, conquered by the Incas around 1470. You visit the sites in the morning, before the heat, and keep the afternoons for the sea, the town or rest. Everything takes place at sea level: no altitude constraints.

You enter through Trujillo and leave through Talara, Piura or Tumbes, without retracing your steps: Trujillo, Chiclayo, Piura, Talara and Tumbes, served from Lima by one to three airlines (JetSmart, LATAM, Sky depending on the airport). The night of day 13 in Lima protects the international flight from a delay.

Three bases, three transfer days

Total: thirteen nights. The three transfer days are the Trujillo–Chiclayo bus (day 5), the Chiclayo–Máncora bus (day 9) and the return flight to Lima (day 13). Take the morning buses: the FDFA advises avoiding intercity journeys at night.

Day by day

Days 1 to 4: the Moche and the Chimú

• Day 1. The flight arrives in Trujillo; Huanchaco is 17 km away. In the evening, the fishermen come back on their caballitos de totora, reed boats that are ridden astride to get through the waves.
• Day 2. The Huaca de la Luna, a temple rebuilt on top of itself over six centuries, whose successive layers have preserved polychrome friezes of the feline-faced deity; the site museum presents the excavations (Tuesday to Sunday from 9:00 to 16:00 (last group for the Huaca de la Luna at 15:30); adults S/ 10 for the huaca and S/ 5 for the museum, cash only). In the afternoon, the colonial centre of Trujillo. The FDFA recommends great caution in Trujillo: get around by booked taxi and be back before nightfall.
• Day 3. Chan Chan, the Chimú capital built of earth: the site museum (Tuesday to Sunday from 9:00 to 16:00; S/ 10 for an adult), then the Tschudi palace and its walls carved with fish and seabirds. In the morning, as there is no shade. The afternoon in Huanchaco.
• Day 4. El Brujo, 46 km away in the Chicama Valley: the Huaca Cao Viejo and its reliefs of prisoners, and the museum where the Lady of Cao rests, a tattooed woman buried around 450 with weapons and ornaments (every day from 9:00 to 16:00, except 25 December and 1 January; S/ 10 for an adult, Peruvian or foreign, huaca and museum included). A day of its own, not to be combined with another visit.

Days 5 to 8: Lambayeque, the tombs and the pyramids

• Day 5. The bus to Chiclayo, then a first northern lunch: arroz con pato, green rice with coriander and duck.
• Day 6. In Lambayeque, 12 km away, the Royal Tombs of Sipán museum presents the Lord of Sipán and his gold, found intact in 1987; the Brüning museum, in the same town, gives an overview of the region’s cultures.
• Day 7. Túcume, the valley of adobe pyramids, with a viewpoint over the whole site; then the Sicán National Museum, in Ferreñafe, devoted to the Lambayeque culture and its goldwork.
• Day 8. Huaca Rajada, the site of the Sipán excavations, 30 km away, and its site museum: not to be confused with the museum in Lambayeque. A free afternoon.

Opening hours and entry fees for the Lambayeque museums: Tuesday to Sunday from 9:00 to 17:00, closed on Mondays; Tumbas Reales de Sipán S/ 10; Brüning, Sicán (Ferreñafe) and Huaca Rajada S/ 8 each; Túcume S/ 8 (routes A and B) or S/ 12 (full route).

Days 9 to 12: the warm sea

The morning bus arrives in Máncora in the afternoon. Choose your base according to what you are looking for:

The water there is warm, especially from December to May. The days fill themselves: swimming, depending on the day’s swell, the green turtles at the El Ñuro pier, which you do not touch or feed, and, from July to the end of October, humpback whales offshore. See the north coast.

Days 13 and 14: return

The road to the nearest airport (Talara for Máncora and Los Órganos, Tumbes for Punta Sal), the flight to Lima, a night near the airport, then the buffer before the international flight.

Budget: the items to add up

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Variant in 12 days

Variant in 15 days

Add a night in Huanchaco, between days 3 and 4: a day at the sea, a surfing lesson, or the Arco Iris and Esmeralda huacas on the outskirts of Trujillo. The rest of the schedule shifts by one day: fourteen nights.