CHACHAPOYAS ADVENTURE

5d/4n
All year

7/22 - 7/26, 2008

 

Legends say the Chachapoyans were tall fair skin warriors, and they built their fortified cities on top mountains all over the mysterious Dept. of Amazonas.  This trip (segment) offers Americas’ largest & most mysterious fortress, with soaring stonewalls inside of walls, built to stop the advance of an empire.  You will also see the 2nd largest fortress and the Inca Military Garrison guarding the empire’s major crossroads. Walk downhill on perhaps the Inca’s best un-restored highway. This trip offers the world’s driest desert and thousands of mini-ecological zones with natives, plants and animals adapted to each extreme. No other zone offers Americas’ greatest varieties and most advanced ancient Indian culture. --- Optional extra day, leave by Tarapoto with trekking and boating in the Amazon rainforest.

July 22 Chiclayo-Chachapoyas
Airport pick up service in Chiclayo, see beautiful panoramas on trip to Chachapoyas.  Night in colonial mansion, 3 star hostel.  (BL)

July 23 Chachapoyas – Huancas-Levanto
Visit Sonche Canon, an Inca Mitima village, (the residents were transplants from Huanuco in the Inca heartland to pacify the rebellious Cloud People.)  Huancas main business is making pottery since ancient times, providing for the entire zone.  After lunch we will visit Levanto (one hour from Chachapoyas).  Levanto was the most significant city of the zone at the time of the Inca invasion and also in the Spanish colonial era. We will see a colonial church as old as Lima with its high-carved altar. We will go to the fortified ruins of Yalape overlooking the city.  Nearby is Colla Cruz, this was a major crossroads of the empire's roads with over 2000 miles of major roads going north to Ecuador & Colombia, south to Huanuco and Cuzco, and west to Cajamarca (where the Inca was captured), and east to the Amazon. We will see the Inca Military Garrison guarding this intersection. This is the zone's first restoration, which revealed a major defeat of the Incas by the Cloud people in the revolution against the Spanish.  Night in Levanto Lodge high in the mountains.  (B, L,D)

July 24  Inca Trail Levanto – Choctamal
Inca Trail to Chachapoyas (3 hours downhill), lunch in Chachapoyas and night in our Choctamal Marvelous Spatuletail Lodge located in the road to Kuelap, where you can observe hummingbirds and variety of orchids. (B, L, D)

July 25  Fortress Kuelap
We will spend the day at Fortress Kuelap known as "the Machu Picchu of the North". Kuelap has over 400 buildings inside 3 levels of walls, and is the largest stone structure in the Americas.  Orchids and bromeliads cover the walls and trees inside this fortress. On the way to Chachapoyas we will observe the platforms of Macro located on a cliff overlooking the Utcubamba River.    Overnight in restored Colonial Mansion, 3 star hostel.  (B, L)

July 26  Chachapoyas/Chiclayo
Early departure to Chiclayo and transfer to airport for your evening flight to Lima.  (B, BL)

Rates: US $ 882 p.p.

Single supplement:  US$ 130

 THE TOUR INCLUDES:                                                  

All entrance fees
Transfers to airport or bus station
Meals where noted in the program
All transportation specified in the program
Transfer between cities
Hotels specified in the program
Bilingual guide 

NOT INCLUDED:

Alcoholic beverages
Airport taxes
Internal flights (we can provide upon request)
Gratuities