Saturday, October 8th, 2022
This morning we began our day walking to the Huaca Pucllana. Today we took a tour of the area with our guide Percy.
The tour lasted about an hour and a half. Our guide was very knowledgeable. This temple was built before the Incas. It was a Lima civilization temple, dating from around 500 AD. The clay/mud blocks were placed vertically with space in between because of earthquakes. It was made up of million of these adobe bricks. It once served as an administrative center and a pre-Inca ceremonial site.
We were amazed at the advanced engineering techniques used so long ago! Peru sits on the “Ring of Fire”, an area where many volcanic eruptions and earthquakes happen, so tremors occur constantly but many you don’t even notice.
This area was mainly forgotten. You could still see the dirt hill that covered the site before excavation began.
The beginning of restration, investigation, and preservation began in 1981 by Dr. Isabel Flores Espinoza and her team and in 1984 it became a cultural heritage site. The Peruvian government has made the necessary preservation efforts to keep the Huaca intact for years to come! It was now a third of its original size, only 15 acres. Due to the rapid expansion and urbanization of the area in the 1900’s that is why it was much smaller.
Archeologists were still working! Our visit on day 2 showed them busy working. You can look at that post to see the excavations still being uncovered!
Its pyramid shape was solid not hollow like the pyramids built in Egypt. The Wari culture took over this site around 700 AD and for them it held significance primarily as a burial site for its nobility. Archeologists found an intact tomb in 2008 that held three people, 2 adults wearing masks and a sacrificed child. Below was a replica of the tombs that were found.
In the museum on the grounds we saw some original pottery that was found in the area.
We walked over to the Ricardo Palma house museum. He lived in this home for a long time. He was a famous writer who was noted for creating the genre called tradición which is a combination of history and fiction anecdotes. Unfortunately when we arrived the museum was closed for remodeling. We were disappointed but we did find a statue of him.
We walked over to Kennedy Park and looked at all of the art displays by local artists and nearby there were many stalls of various products. We also noticed there were many shoe shine stations. It was popular!
After lunch we walked down by the ocean to Larcomar which was a shopping area for locals and tourists. It was quite busy.
For dinner we walked to a local restaurant called Veda. It was great because the restaurant was a dedicated gluten free establishment.
After our excellent dinner we walked back to our hotel and we read our Road Scholar information sheet because we join the tour tomorrow morning!
