Less visited than southern Peru, the north of the country has been called the Egypt of the Americas for its wealth of archaeological sites.
                        
Peru’s north coast was the cradle of several pre-Inca cultures. The Chimú, the builders of the massive fortified adobe city of Chan Chan, established an empire which by the 15th century stretched as far south as modern Lima. These renowned goldsmiths resisted the rise of the Incas until their capital fell to the armies of the Inca Tupac Yupanqui in 1470.

The warlike Moche, who thrived about 1,500 years ago, left behind an extraordinary artistic legacy, portraying every aspect of their lives in the pictorial designs of their pottery and metalwork and the colourful friezes of the pyramidal temples they built. These consummate artists recorded what they ate, what they looked like and how they made both love and war in stylised illustrations dedicated to the worship of their pantheon of fearsome deities, and the fabulous wealth of their royal tombs is displayed today in the region’s excellent museums.

Today, the elegant colonial city of Trujillo stands as a testament to the European empire which superseded those of pre-Columbian Peru. Founded in 1535 and named after the birthplace of the conquistador Francisco Pizarro, its wooden-balconied colonial mansions are well-preserved and its people revel in their Spanish traditions of horsemanship, music and dance.

The climate of northern Peru is mild, and the region is nationally famous for its fine seafood, surfer’s beaches and the excellent sport fishing that brought men like Ernest Hemingway to Peru some fifty years ago.

Beyond the desert coast, the slopes of the northern highlands descend into the Amazon basin and offer the traveller a glimpse into a mysterious world of cloud-wreathed lost cities and spectacular walled hilltop fortresses like Kuelap. 

The now-peaceful colonial city of Cajamarca saw the end of Inca dominion with the capture of the Inca Atahualpa by the Spanish, and is the venue today for Peru’s most lavish annual carnival celebration.

Recent research indicates that the city of Caral (near Lima) predates the Chavin culture by some 2,000 years, but whether or not Chavín was Peru’s first sedentary “mother” culture, what is certain is that its artistic and religious influence was felt throughout Peru long after its demise. Five hours from Huaraz, in a region of highland lakes and breathtaking mountain scenery, the 2,800 year-old subterranean temples and zoomorphic motifs of Chavín de Huantar display the remarkable skills of these early stonemasons.