Maras, Moray, Salt Mines Cusco Tour (economical Opcion – Group Tour)

We’ll pick up you from your hotel at 08:15 hrs on our bus to start the tour. We’ll visit the first point, the town of MARAS, located west of Cusco at 3300 m.a.s.l. from where it’ll possible to appreciate the mountain range of Urubamba and the snowy peaks of "Veronica" (5682 m.a.s.l) and "chikon" (5530 m.a.s.l). Maras’s history dates back to the colony when the nobles from the Inca Empire were stripped of their palaces in Cuzco or Qosqo and began to settle in other small towns like Maras. The church of Maras made of clay is a typical religious architecture of the colony, it save paintings of what was the Escuela Cusqueña (Cusco School).

We continue with a visit to Moray, about 7 km southwest of Maras; it is the only archaeological site of this kind in the entire region. It consists of depressions or natural gigantic holes that were used by the Incas to build terraces in the contours, agricultural terraces with their respective irrigation canals, they were used as a prototype of greenhouse or experimental biological station advanced for that time, and it helped to the antiquity American men to inherit to the humanity 60% of vegetable products consumed today. For example they obtained more five thousand varieties of potatoes, one hundred and fifty of maize, varieties of quinoa and many other products.

We’ll continue with a visit to Salineras or salt mines that are exploited since the Inca period to the present day, Salineras is located northwest of the town of Maras, is constituted by about 3000 small wells of salt with an average area of about 5 m² each one, during the dry season these well are filled every 3 days with salt water emanating from a natural spring located at the top of the wells, the water evaporates and the salt contained in it, gradually solidifies , then this salt is granulated to be bagged in sacks and plastics, which are then shipped to markets of the region for sale.

Finally we will return to Cusco at approximately 15:00 hrs.