Cahuachi

Cahuachi covers around twenty-four square kilometres of desert west of Nazca: forty or so mounds built up over natural hills with adobe walls and terraces, the largest around thirty metres high, together with plazas and enclosures. Italian-led excavations under Giuseppe Orefici since the 1980s have argued that it was not a city in the ordinary sense - there is little evidence of a large resident population - but a pilgrimage and ceremonial centre used periodically over centuries, from around 100 BC to 500 AD, with textiles, ceramics and trophy heads deposited in quantity. The geoglyphs on the pampa are connected to it, several lines running towards the site. It appears to have been abandoned after flooding and earthquake damage, then sealed with fill. Restoration has raised parts of the Great Pyramid, and what visitors see is partly reconstructed adobe on a bare, extremely hot plain.

History

Frabee was the first to excavate the site, in 1922, followed by Kroeber in 1926, Tello in 1927 and William Duncan Strong in 1952-1953. In the early 1980s Helaine Silverman and Giuseppe Orefici began long campaigns of excavation that found little sign of a permanent population, and scholars now see Cahuachi, with its 40 or so adobe-topped mounds, as a pilgrimage centre rather than the capital of a Nazca state (Wikipedia, Cahuachi).

What to look for

• The mounds - around forty adobe-built pyramids, the largest about thirty metres.
• The interpretation - a pilgrimage centre rather than a populated city.
• The link to the lines - geoglyphs on the pampa oriented towards the site.
• The restoration - reconstructed adobe on the Great Pyramid.

When to go

Year-round, but this is one of the hottest and driest places in Peru - go early. Two to three hours including the drive from Nazca on unpaved road.

Practical notes

Extreme heat, no shade and blowing dust. Much of the site is unexcavated mounds that read as hills. Some of what you see is modern reconstruction. Access is by rough track and needs a suitable vehicle or a tour.

Nearby

The Nazca lines are on the pampa north; Nazca town is east.

Key facts