"PERU and Open Museum!" a Peru Travel Page by LuisVasquez

The Andes, the Amazon Jungle and the Coast of Peru witnessed the presence of the most amazing civilizations. We now enjoy their art via beautiful ceramics and textiles, engeneering works and a very good idea of their social, political and religious systems.
In northern Peru a visit to Chiclayo and Trujillo must include Sipan Sican, Chan Chan, El Brujo sites among the most important ones.
Southern Peru includes the famous Nazca and Palpa Lines, the Paracas textiles and ceramics. In the Cental Andes the Culture of Chavin dates over three thousand years! There are many pre inca settlements who arrived from the higher lands of today's Bolivia. All deserve the highest cultural admiration.

The INCA was a socio political group. They conquered all the other groups, united them and created a wonderful social system: its structue has the fingerprints of people who had intense knowledge of human beahvour and interaction.
The Inca Empire started sometime in the 1100's and when the Spanish arrived in 1535, the system was in the middle of serious internal wars and divisions. The greatests architectural monuments were erected: Machu Picchu being the leader and most visited in Cuzco everyday of the year! Time for 1% of Inca architecture? The visit the various sites in Cuzco!

The Spanish occupation lasted 400 years. The Inquisition was establsihed along with a very srong presence of the catholic religion. The Spanish brought slaves. In the late 1800s the British built the highest train in the world. But they neeed labor. A huge number of chinese came to work. Later, pre, during and after the 2nd World War a significant group of japanese arrived. Today the beautiful mixture of Andean natives, europeans, africans, chinese and japanese have contributed to the best and reknown cuisine in the Americas. Lima, the capital is at sea level. It has excellent museums, art galleries and artisan shopping centers.