7 Fun Facts about Peru

Most people think of Peru as Machu Picchu and maybe the Amazon if they’re feeling a bit adventurous, which is a bit like thinking Thailand is just beaches and temples. The truth is more interesting than that. Peru is a country where ancient ways of living are still alive in villages and farms and floating islands, where what you eat connects you to thousands of years of history, where languages that were almost lost are being kept alive by people who still speak them every day. This is what happens when you dig beyond the obvious. Keep reading to find out seven things about Peru that may surprise you!

 

 

You know what a potato is. There’s white ones, brown ones, the odd purple one if you’re at a farmer’s market. Peru however, has 4,000 varieties of them as potatoes were domesticated there thousands of years ago, being bred to survive at different altitudes and in different conditions over centuries . Some are tiny, some are massive, some are so purple they’re almost black. The diversity sounds pointless until you visit a market in the highlands and eat potatoes that actually taste like something. When you come to Peru with us, you’ll cook with them, eat them at tables where people have been preparing them the same way for generations, and understand why this humble crop was so important that the Incas built an entire administrative system partly around potato storage. It will change how you think about food.

 

 

The Incas domesticated alpacas thousands of years ago because their wool is genuinely luxurious and they survive at altitude where other livestock would just give up, which tells you something about alpacas as a species. Today there are 87% of the world’s alpacas living in Peru, which means if you’re wearing alpaca wool anywhere on the planet, there’s a decent chance it came from a Peruvian farm. The wool comes in 22 natural colours without any dyeing needed and selling alpaca products is the main source of income for thousands of families, which means these adorable and fluffy animals are essential to Peru’s rural economy. You’ll see them everywhere in the highlands, sometimes just wandering around looking vaguely unimpressed, and you’ll be able to buy jumpers and hats made from their wool that will be the warmest things you own. When you’re sitting in a cold Andean village wrapped in alpaca wool that some farmer has been raising and shearing for years, you’ll understand that this isn’t just a cute animal. It’s a cornerstone of how these communities survive and thrive.

 

Peruvian food is one of those cuisines that sounds simple until you actually understand what is in it and where each element came from, at which point it becomes genuinely fascinating as a window into the country’s complicated past. The foundational ingredients are indigenous and come from thousands of years of Andean agriculture, which means potatoes and quinoa and corn and chillies that have been grown here since before the Incas. When Spanish colonisers arrived they brought their cooking techniques and their olive oil and their pork and their garlic, and over centuries these two culinary traditions merged and created something entirely new. Then in the 19th and 20th centuries Chinese and Japanese and African immigrants came to Peru and added their own techniques and flavours and ingredients, which means that Peruvian cuisine became a genuine reflection of the country’s history of conquest and immigration and cultural exchange.

Ceviche is the perfect example of this fusion because it is raw fish marinated in citrus juice and chillies, which sounds simple but actually brings together indigenous chillies and techniques with Spanish and African culinary traditions in a single dish. We arrange cooking classes in local homes and markets where you will learn to prepare traditional dishes and understand the ingredients and the cultural significance of what you are making.

 

 

You may have seen the Rainbow Mountain on Instagram once or twice! High up in the Andes at 16,000 feet sits a mountain called Vinicunca with stripes of crimson and gold and turquoise and lavender running across it in bands that look almost artificial when you see them. It was hidden under snow for centuries until climate change melted the glaciers and revealed what was always underneath.

The colours come from 14 different mineral deposits mixed with water from the ice melt, which creates a geological painting that nature took thousands of years to compose. The mountain is genuinely stunning and yes, most photographs online are heavily enhanced to bring out the colours because the real thing is actually slightly more subtle than Instagram might suggest, but seeing it in person is still extraordinary and moving in a way that photographs cannot quite capture. It is a humbling and slightly disturbing thing to stand there and understand that there are still discoveries to be made on our planet, and that the landscape itself is changing in real time in ways we can only partially understand or control. When you trek to Rainbow Mountain with our guides they will explain the geology and the history and the climate story all at once, which transforms it from a beautiful place into a place that makes you think very carefully about our relationship with the natural world.

 

 

Spanish may be the official language, but Peru is also home to Quechua and Aymara as official languages, with over 45 indigenous languages still spoken across the country. Eight million people speak Quechua in their daily lives, which is remarkable given that the language faced centuries of devaluation and deliberate suppression. When Spanish colonisers arrived they created systems that associated Spanish with power and progress whilst Quechua speakers experienced discrimination that made many families reluctant to pass the language on to their children. Geography helped preserve it, particularly in isolated mountain communities where Spanish never fully penetrated and everyone around you spoke Quechua naturally. But survival also depended on something else entirely: communities deciding that maintaining the language mattered despite the social cost. The oral tradition helped too, allowing knowledge to pass directly from grandparent to grandchild in ways that didn’t depend on schools or institutions working against it. What is genuinely interesting now is that young Quechua speakers are reclaiming the language through hip-hop and music, speaking it publicly in ways their parents’ generation might have been too ashamed to do. That matters because it shows the language isn’t preserved in museums or classrooms alone, but alive in how young people are choosing to use it today. You can read more about it here.

 

 

Taquile Island sits in Lake Titicaca on the Peru-Bolivia border, home to people who have produced textiles for centuries without modern machinery. The textiles are so skillfully made that UNESCO recognised them as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. What makes this genuinely interesting is that despite both men and women producing textiles here, men are particularly judged by their knitting ability and skill with traditional patterns. When you visit Taquile on one of our trips you can meet the weavers and buy textiles directly from them, which means your money goes straight to the people who made it, and you will understand why this craft matters so much to the island’s identity and the dignity of its people.

 

 

High above the Colca Canyon and the peaks of the Andes soars the Andean condor, the largest flying bird in the world with a wingspan of up to 10 feet and weighing around 15 kilograms, which is enormous! These birds can live for 50 years or more and mate for life, showing their endurance in such a harsh landscape. The condor has been sacred to Andean cultures for thousands of years, revered as a symbol of power and freedom and spiritual connection to the mountains. In Quechua cosmology the condor represents the upper world and the divine, and that spiritual significance remains alive in Peruvian culture today, not as something historical but as something that still matters. When you trek through the Andes or visit Colca Canyon (where condors are regularly spotted) you will understand why these birds captured the imagination of indigenous peoples and why they continue to hold such strong meaning for communities whose ancestors lived alongside them.