Ayacucho's Historic Centre

Ayacucho is a stone town in the central Andes, built around a Plaza Mayor enclosed on all four sides by two-storey arcades. The city is traditionally said to have thirty-three churches, and while the count is loose, the density is real: baroque facades in pink and white stone turn up on ordinary residential corners, several with carved portals far grander than the buildings behind them. The cathedral, Santo Domingo and La Compañía are the ones most often open. The city is also Peru's craft capital, with retablo makers, weavers and stone carvers concentrated in the Santa Ana district, and it holds the country's largest Holy Week, ten days of processions that fill every street.

What you actually see

• The Plaza Mayor - two storeys of stone arcades on all four sides.
• The carved church portals - baroque facades in pink and white volcanic stone.
• Barrio Santa Ana - the craft district of weavers, carvers and retablo workshops.
• Semana Santa - ten days of processions, the largest Holy Week in the country.

When to go

Holy Week is the reason many people come and it is genuinely extraordinary, but it books out months ahead and prices climb steeply. Outside it, May to September is dry and clear. Church opening hours are erratic all year and many open only for early mass or late afternoon, so build the day around whatever is unlocked.

Honest expectations

Most of the thirty-three churches are shut when you walk past, and there is no reliable schedule. The city sits at 2,760 metres, high enough to slow you down on the first day. Flights from Lima are short but weather cancellations happen and the alternative road journey is very long. Outside Holy Week the centre is quiet in the evenings and the restaurant scene is thin.

Nearby

The Wari ruins and the ceramics village of Quinua lie on the same road north.