Olleros - Chavin - Huanuco Pampa Trek

This trek across the Southern section of the Huascarán Biosphere Reserve provide great opportunities to admire, among many others, the impressive iced-summits of Huantzán Grande (6395m), the highest peak of that section of the Cordillera Blanca and major Sacred Apu in pre-Hispanic times. We also admire the Cashan (5723m).

The trail leads us to Chavín de Huántar, South America oldest and most advanced Pre-Inca civilization, one of the six centers of independent cultural evolution in world prehistory, and also a World Cultural Heritage Site. Chavín’s monumental granite pyramids and ceremonial plazas are linked by stone-carved staircases and platforms. Subterranean chamber complexes, known as galleries, are the most unusual elements of Pre-hispanic architectural style in the New World. Visit the Lanzón Gallery with its supreme deity of Chavín, a large stone idol called Lanzón that is finely carved with human, Jaguar, Anaconda, and Harpy Eagle iconography. Sophisticated stone-carved friezes, columns, giant heads, and astronomic representations are a puzzle for Andean archaeo-astronomers.

We continue our journey by an Inca trail linking this sacred Pre-Inca site to the great Inca city of Huanucopampa, the Capital of Chinchaysuyo, one of the four states of the Inca Empire. Here, in a high Andean plateau overlooking the extensive lowland valleys, we visit the remains of a very well planned city with food storage facilities and a sophisticated system of water canals and reservoirs. We also explore the military quarters, plazas, gates and streets. On the horizon we could see a portion of the great Royal Highway that linked the extensive Inca Empire. The Inca’s Palace, its purification fountain, the house of the chosen women and other urban remains of this great Andean civilization