Does toiling under the hot desert sun heaving bricks up a ladder to rebuild collapsing walls interest you? What if the walls were many hundreds and hundreds of years old and part of the world’s largest adobe city, one of the largest cities of any kind in the ancient world? A city home to the rulers of the Peruvian desert coast, the Chimú imperial heart of Chan Chan. Does a couple of days of hands-on archaeology at one of the world’s most important archaeological sites interest YOU?
January 12, 2010 | Archaeology, Culture & History, La Libertad & Trujillo Guide, News
So, what’s the difference between the ceviche of Peru and the international dishes that share its name? To Javier Wong, perhaps Peru’s biggest ceviche expert and internationally renowned ceviche chef, the answer is simple: There is no other ceviche in the world.
December 4, 2009 | Peruvian Food
The discovery of 17 wooden statues at Chan Chan are enough to change our understanding of the Chan Chan urban centre. Embedded in the walls of the later Ñain An complex, also known as Bandelier, the figures are thought to have bid farewell to the deceased leaders.
October 20, 2009 | Archaeology, News
The ancient capital of the Chimor Kingdom, the grand city of Chan Chan, has been in the news recently for all the wrong reasons. After 500 years of abandonment in the desert outside Trujillo, it has been damaged by 500 yearly rains that have washed away large parts of the walls of the adobe city. Restoration has been under way for years, but with limited resources it is a slow process. The site needs all the help it can get to avoid deteriorating more – that’s where the housewives come in.
September 3, 2009 | Archaeology, News
Though they disappeared millions of years ago, the vestiges of their existence are evident today in the form of fossils. These remains are the objects of study for palaeontologists who recognise, clean and classify them like pieces of a puzzle, giving us an idea of how the prehistoric would would have looked like.
August 28, 2008 | Culture & History
Huanchaco is a friendly beach town popular during the summer months with the people of Trujillo and known as a excellent surf spot. It is also a popular spot to eat ceviche.
December 13, 2007 | La Libertad & Trujillo Guide
What do you do if you own a successful gas station on the road out of town? Build your own collection of ancient artefacts, of course! For over 40 years Señor José Cassinelli (sometimes incorrectly written as Casinelli) has been buying ceramics and other items from the illicit black market of huaqueros or tomb robbers.
December 12, 2007 | La Libertad & Trujillo Guide
In the heart of their world, the Moche constructed two truncated pyramids, the gigantic pyramid of the Sun (sol) and the smaller pyramid of the Moon (luna). These pyramids, and the city that spanned between them functioned as their capital.
The Huaca del Sol is by far the largest of the two and is one of two pyramids in Peru thought to possibly be the largest adobe mud-brick construction in the Americas.
December 11, 2007 | Archaeology, La Libertad & Trujillo Guide
The Moche (or Mochica) were a civilisation who occupied the northern Peruvian coast between modern-day Lambayeque and Virú and influenced an area that ranged from Huarmey to Piura in the north. They were a collection of peoples with a similar culture and had no central political authority on a grand scale, i.e. they never formed an empire. Primarily farmers and fishers they built irrigation systems to create fertile areas in the desert and created rafts known as the Caballitos de Totora to fish from. But by far their most important legacy was one of art.
December 8, 2007 | Archaeology, Culture & History, La Libertad & Trujillo Guide
Theologic Soup is the name for a soup created in the 1600s by Dominican monks in Northern Peru, particularly Trujillo. It is made of white bread, potato, tomato, sliced cheese and milk. It can have chicken or turkey meat, sometimes both. The seasoning is the blending of garlic, leek, celery, oregan, pepper, salt, oregan, white onion, laurel and yellow chilli pepper.
December 7, 2007 | La Libertad & Trujillo Guide, Peruvian Food
We saw a show in Trujillo put on by the INC of La Libertad to celebrate 49 years of them not doing very much other than receiving a salary.
The show was good, but I particularly enjoyed this act. Play the video…
December 6, 2007 | Culture & History
Trujillo is the capital of the region of La Libertad on the northern coast, and is the third largest city in Peru after Lima and Arequipa. This is where the Moche and Chimú civilizations developed between 200B.C. and 700A.D. Its year-round pleasant climate has earned it the title of “Capital of the Eternal Spring”. It has wonderful beaches, including the famous Huanchaco, which are sometimes venues for international surfing competitions. Fishermen still use reed canoes called “Caballitos de Tortora”, made the same way for thousands of years.
December 6, 2007 | Culture & History, La Libertad & Trujillo Guide
