2 Best Sights in Elsewhere Around Lima, Lima

It’s the oldest city in the Western Hemisphere—rpredating the pyramids at Giza by some 400 years. Archaeologists say it’s revolutionized their ideas about the very nature of Homo sapiens. Yet this vast pyramid complex in Peru's Supe valley remains virtually unknown, to tourists and locals alike. Discovered by archaeologist Ruth Shady Solis in 1994, Caral is one of the most astonishing sites in the Americas, since it marks one of only six spots on earth where humans crossed what scholars call "the great divide"—i.e., where civilization itself began. When you go, you'll find excellent signage in Spanish and English, as well as informed docents to guide you through this UNESCO World Heritage Site. Walking amidst its crumbling pyramids and sunken plazas, it's impossible not to imagine a priest in his headdress and tunic, arms hieratically outstretched over the fire pit before him. The site is some 220 km (120 miles) north of Lima and not easy to find, so your best bet for visiting is to take an all-day tour.

Sacred to the god of earthquakes, this sprawling adobe temple was for 1,300 years the chief pilgrimage destination on Peru's Pacific coast. What those votaries came to see was Pachacamac—"he who moves the earth"—a scowling lord carved into a wooden staff wielded by the sanctuary's fearsome priests (elsewhere, he appears on ceramic vessels as a strange, griffin-like creature, with a bird's beak and feline claws). Pachacamac's cult began with the Lima culture around 200 AD, but it grew when the Huari took over the complex some four centuries later. It exploded when the Incas came in 1470, elevating the earth-shaker to the rank of their own creator-god and erecting a sun temple in his honor on the bluff's apex. Today, visitors can meander through the pre-Inca Painted Temple, with its traces of red brick, as well as the hilltop Temple of the Sun that looks out on the Pacific. An on-site museum offers informative displays.

The best way to visit Pachacamac is by taking a half-day guided tour with an agency like Mirabus, since the site is 32 km (20 miles) south of downtown, and getting a taxi back can be tricky.