The great walls
Up to twenty metres.
Elemaki — CC BY-SA 2.5 · Zadircito — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Martin St-Amant (S23678) — CC BY 3.0 · Ceciluqp — CC BY-SA 4.0
A huge walled city on a limestone ridge about 3,000 metres up above the Utcubamba valley, built by the Chachapoyas people, nicknamed the «Warriors of the Clouds», from the sixth century AD, some thousand years before Machu Picchu. Green cloud forest draped in orchids surrounds it. The fortress runs about 600 metres long, ringed by massive stone walls up to twenty metres high in places, with narrow entrances just wide enough for one person. Inside are the remains of more than 400 round houses, their walls decorated with stone friezes of rhombuses and zigzags. Its best-known building is an inverted-cone tower called «El Tintero», the inkwell, thought to have been a solar observatory. Visitors now arrive by a cable car opened in 2017, which crosses the valley above the forest in about twenty minutes, followed by a walk of about half an hour. Part of the outer wall collapsed in April 2022 after heavy rain, and since then the site has reopened gradually along set circuits, so some parts are still closed for restoration. The site is closed on Mondays, so check which circuits are open before you go.
Up to twenty metres.
Zigzag friezes.
Over the cloud forest.
Ridge above the Utcubamba valley near Tingo, about 40 km south of Chachapoyas; by cable car from Nuevo Tingo station
Partly: since the collapse the site has reopened gradually along set circuits, with some parts closed for restoration. It is closed on Mondays, so check before you go.