DAY 3 WEDNESDAY JUST UP THE ROAD, THE SECOND OLDEST CIVILISATION IN THE WORL

If you want to see the second earliest civilisation in the world you have to endure a little pain - ‘the traffic’ in the five-hour drive to Caral. We traveled through Lima, northwards past various industrial wastelands, sometimes along the Pacific coast and broad plains

Remarkable pyramidal buildings

Caral was a large settlement in the Supe Valley, some 200 kilometres north of Lima. Caral is the most ancient city of the Americas and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2009. Source: Wikipedia

THE CITY OF CARAL

This civilisation was established 3000 years back. What remains still nestles in a valley of the River Supe and protected by the lower Andes Mountains.  Caral now contains six pyramids and attendant buildings and pathways. The sun was high as we arrived.

Not a soul about apart from us and the archaeologists 

Caral is extraordinary and there was not a soul about, aside from us and several small groups of archaeologists. These were busy discovering things or preparing to discover more things. One was busy mapping a part of the site making marks on a large drawing board. 

Hey, that’s my job sunshine! I thought.

Peaceful, peaceful and at one end of this sixty-eight hectare miracle was a small shelter from the sun. Here we looked westwards out across the valley. We could see in the distance several other smaller archeological sites; there are over twenty sites close by all of the same period. This was construction on a big scale; these pyramids were built for administration, entertainment rather than for entombment. Sacrifices were made of vegetables honoring the Gods for the plenteousness of the Supe valley.  

All the time, high sun, breezes, bird song and the occasion tap tap of an archeologist’s trowel made Caral so very special.