Most travelers who haven’t been to Peru don’t realize how much there is to see and do there until they start the early stages of their research and are quickly overwhelmed. Even just doing the standard Lima-Cusco-Sacred Valley-Machu Picchu route is hard to pull off in less than a week and it leaves most people feeling rushed. Planning it can involve a lot of moving parts though, so it’s a whole lot easier to check into Peru vacation packages so you can let an expert sweat the details.
If you just look at that standard route, for instance, you’ve got two internal flights, at least two train rides, hotels in three or four locations, tours, tickets, and lots of ground transfers to plan. The rules for visiting Machu Picchu have gotten a lot more complicated in recent years too and advance reservations are required.
Figuring it all out on your own can be a pain unless you really love project management and logistics. Booking one of the available Machu Picchu travel packages, even for just that part, can save a lot of hassles.
If you want to be assured it’ll all run smoothly though, it can make a lot of sense to let a tour company work it all out, either as a private tour booking or on a scheduled group trip. That way you’ve got the meal stops sorted, the tickets bought, and all the transportation worked out for you. You just show up and enjoy.
What about the rest of Peru though? The famous citadel is just one attraction out of 100 and Peru’s diversity in geography goes from snowy Andes peaks and high-altitude Lake Titicaca to the dry Colca Canyon and the humid Amazon River jungle area.
Here are a few other tours and vacation packages we’ve covered that would significantly enhance your Peru trip and take you beyond the well-worn path that every other first-time visitor seems to be on.
The Slow Routes to Machu Picchu
Even if your main goal is to get to the wonder of the world everyone else is coming to see, you can take a more meandering way to get there and see more of the majestic Andes Mountains. The best-known way is via the Inca Trail, the route the original inhabitants took for everything from trading goods to relaying messages. You camp along the way but the porters carry the gear, set up camp, and cook for you.
Or you can go in more style with a lodge-to-lodge trek through the mountains on the alternative Salkantay Trail and end up in the same place. This way you get heated buildings, hot showers, and a bar each night.
You can explore the Sacred Valley with hikes on the Lares Route, also known as the Weavers’ Trail, to visit villages where women are making the traditional clothing and other handicrafts. Or just spend more time in the valley exploring towns like Chinchero, Pisac, and Ollantaytambo after the day-trippers have all left.
Puno and Lake Titicaca
You can actually ride a luxury train from Cusco to Lake Titicaca on the Andean Explorer, then stay at a high-end lodge like Titilaka and take excursions out on the lake to see the floating reed villages built by the Uru people. This is the highest navigable lake in the world, at 3,812 meters (12,507 feet) and on the other side is Bolivia. It’s also the second-largest lake on the whole continent.
Then you could continue on the Andean Explorer train to Arequipa for the next round or fly on to Lima from the Puno airport. Or if you’re on an organized tour, you may head to Arequipa by bus.
Arequipa and the Colca Canyon
The first time I visited Peru we went to Arequipa before we moved on to Cusco because we were coming from close to sea level in the USA. We wanted to give our bodies some time to adjust before we hit the 11,000 feet of altitude in Cusco.
That turned out to be a smart move because it’s a lovely city, easy to navigate on foot, and prices are quite reasonable at the high end since it only gets a fraction of the visitors of Cusco. It’s got one of the prettiest main squares in Latin America and quite a varied list of things to see and do.
It’s also the gateway to the Colca Canyon, a gorgeous place to watch the light change, see some condors so big they look like small planes coming in, and hike along the villages hugging the mountainsides.
Exploring the Amazon River and Jungle
While the first images that come to mind for people when they hear Peru will probably be llamas, Inca ruins, and misty mountains, but plenty of visitors also head to the jungle areas in the lowlands to explore wildlife. The Amazon River is getting mighty already in this area, so one option is to go on an Amazon River cruise and explore from there, eating well when you’re back on the ship.
Otherwise, there are plenty of jungle lodge options in the area, from the community-based science approach of Rainforest Expeditions’ three lodges to the award-winning Inkaterra Reserva Amazonica luxury lodge.
This is not a region to rush through, however, so don’t think you can just tack on two days for the jungle and that will be enough. Just getting to where you’re sleeping can take hours since by nature these are remote places to stay.
Nazca Lines and Ballestas Islands
One of the most interesting areas of Peru is off the radar of most tourists, even though it’s just a few hours south of Lima. That would be the region around Ica where most pisco comes from and the Ballestas Islands teeming with wildlife, near Paracas.
A short flight distance from the coast are the mysterious Nazca Lines, ancient etchings in the desert that can only be deciphered from above—with their origins and meaning still a mystery today. This area is where most of Peru’s pisco comes from and it’s also the epicenter of the awakening Peruvian wine industry.
The Northern Amazonas Region of Peru
Have you ever heard of Kuelap, Gocta Falls or the Chachapoya people? Don’t feel bad if not because I’d never heard of them either before I got invited on a tour and explored the area with a group. It doesn’t help that it’s confusingly called the Amazonas Region even though it’s not on the Amazon…
Still, these days you can take a gondola up to Kuelap instead of what used to be a grueling journey and you can ride a horse to the waterfalls if you’re not up for the hike. The Chachapoya people built interesting tombs and mausoleums in the narrow river valley and their civilization pre-dates the Incas. The main town in the area has some surprisingly lively nightlife and good restaurants.
This is just a small sampling of what else you can do when you travel in Peru and I haven’t even touched on the highest hiking trail areas, the ancient cities that are more than 5,000 years old, or the coastal beach resorts. You’ll have to make more than one trip to do this country justice, but for your first one, branch out a little and leave ample time to soak in the experience.
See these and other Peru travel packages that will show you the best of this fascinating country at that link. The options range from standard routes that tick off the most famous sites to a 15-day “Challenge of the Incas” tour that will get you into less-visited spots and have you working up a sweat.
