Maras Moray & Sacred Valley Tour

Two of the most important tourist centers of the city of Cusco are Maras and Moray. In these places you can see part of our millenary culture in its different stages such as pre-Inca, Inca, colonial and republican. We invite you to learn a little more about these tourist attractions and also to start planning your next vacation with visits to these places. Maras and Moray are waiting for you!. We will start with Moray, agricultural terraces built in gigantic natural depressions or holes. These terraces are superimposed concentrically, taking the form of a gigantic amphitheater. The biggest hole has a depth of 150 m and the average height of the platforms is 1.80 m. According to historians, these constructions constituted an important agricultural laboratory of the Inca Empire. Since their platforms are built with their respective irrigation channels and each of them constitute a microclimate. What is striking is the great difference in annual average temperature between the top and the bottom of the depressions, a difference that reaches up to 15 ° C. Maras was an important town during the viceroyalty (it was the main supplier of salt from the southern ), as shown by the church and the houses that still preserve the shields of indigenous nobility in their facades. The houses are made of adobe, white walls with roofs and blue windows, the streets are made of stone and mud. In the lintels you can read inscribed in stone the date they were built, their owner or a shield or ornament.

Quick Itinerary:

• 08:30 We pick you up from Hotel
• 09:00 Starting to the Maras, Moray & Salineras (Salt mines)Tour
• 10:20 Guided tour of Moray
• 10:50 Driving to Maras
• 11:00 Guided tour of the Maras Colinial small town
• 11:20 Driving to Salt Mines
• 11:50 Salt Mines guided tour
• 12:30 Return to Cusco
• 14:30 Cusco 

Maras 

• Salt Mines Maras: Maras our second visit point belongs to the village Maras, which was of great importance during the Viceroyalty, was the main supplier of salt in the southern highlands, as demonstrated by the church and mansions that still have the shields of nobility indigenous in their facades. The Salt Mines of Maras surprise the visitor by the more than three thousand wells that it presents and that at present are still being worked by more than 360 families, who have inherited this custom and extractive craft work; salt marketing is under the responsibility of the Maras Salt association, which is in charge of looking after the interests of the community since the ends of 1980s. 

Moray 

Our visit ends by visiting the circular terraces of Moray, which are a sample of how the Andean man challenged nature and took advantage of its geographical environment to use it to their benefit, these circular platforms served as agricultural laboratory that allowed to obtain a wide variety of species of potatoes, corn, among other products.The platforms were built on retaining walls filled with fertile soil. It was irrigated by complex irrigation systems. At the bottom of the platforms, there is a system that stores the water coming from the rains. Following this practice, more than 250 plant species were cultivated. Other studies indicate that the place was used for astronomical observation and monitor climatic changes that could occur, by tracking sunlight and shadows generated by the high mountains of the area.

• Location: Moray is located 57 km northwest of the city of Cusco. 
• Average Temperature: Average temperatures range between 4.2 ° C and 19.6 ° C. 
• Season: Cusco has two well-marked seasons: a rainy season, between November and March, and a dry one (the most recommended for your visit) between April and October.

Interesting Info:

• Sacred Valley Peru
• City Tour in Cusco
• Southern Valley Tour
• Cheap Rainbow Mountain Cusco
• Inca Trail Hike