Chavín de Huántar

Chavín was a ceremonial centre built and rebuilt between roughly 1200 and 500 BC, a thousand years before the Inca, and it gave its name to the artistic style that spread across much of early Peru. Above ground there is a sunken circular plaza, terraced platforms and the remains of the black and white portal. Below ground the platforms are honeycombed with narrow stone galleries, ventilated by shafts and almost unlit, and in one of them stands the Lanzón: a granite shaft over four metres tall, carved with a fanged figure, set in a cruciform chamber where it has stood since it was put there. The carved tenon heads that once studded the walls are now mostly in the museum.

What you actually see

• The Lanzón - the carved granite shaft still standing in its underground chamber.
• The galleries - narrow ventilated stone passages running inside the platforms.
• The sunken circular plaza - the ceremonial court in front of the main platform.
• The national museum - the tenon heads and stelae, in the village nearby.

When to go

May to September for the dry season, when the pass is reliable and the road less prone to landslides. Day tours from Huaraz leave very early and get back after dark. Staying in Chavín village overnight gives you the site early, before the buses, and time for the museum, which most tours cut short or skip altogether.

Honest expectations

The day trip is mostly road, over a pass above 4,500 metres, and people who are not acclimatised feel it. The galleries are low, cramped and dark, which is a problem if you dislike enclosed spaces. Above ground much of the site is foundations and reconstructed terracing rather than standing architecture. Skipping the museum halves the visit, since almost all the carving is there.

Nearby

Huaraz and the Cordillera Blanca lie back over the pass to the west.