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A
country located at the west central South America and bounded by Ecuador
and Colombia to the North, and by Brazil and Bolivia on the East. Official
language is Spanish in the entire country. Quechua is spoken by natives
on the Andes Mountains. The
population of Peru as of 2003 estimate is 28,409,897 inhabitants.
About 45% of them
are Native South Americans, some of whom are descendent from the Inca
civilization, a great civilization in the region in the 15th century. The
indigenous people are descendants from the Inca, son of the Sun as per Peruvian mythology,
their empire was centered in the Peruvian highlands.
The Spaniards conquered the Inca Empire in the 16th century. Gold
and silver mines attracted Spaniards and converted Peru, for four
centuries, into the seat of their wealth and power in South America. Lima,
Iquitos, and Cuzco are
the main cities in Peru and central to our tour program. The Amazon
River and Machu Picchu are among the most precious touring places in the
country. Lima
is Peru’s capital, the greatest city, with a population in 1996 estimate,
6,884,000. Lima is the second oldest capital city in South America. The
Spaniard Francisco Pizarro founded the city on Jan. 18, 1535 as the
center of the viceroyalty of Peru and the capital of Spain's New World
Empire in the 17th and 18th century. Jose de San Martin (Argentinian) in
July 28, 1821 and Simon Bolivar (Venezuelan) in 1824, liberated
Peru from the Spanish colonization. Today,
Lima is a prosperous urban area, Peru's economic center, and the site of
oil-refining and diversified manufacturing industries.
Iquitos,
city north-eastern Peru, capital of Loreto Department. It is a port on
the Amazon River and located in the middle of the jungle, on the banks
of the Amazon. Iquitos has a population of 400,000 and is connected to
the outside world only by air and river boats. Iquitos was benefited
greatly from the economic boom caused by exploitation of natural rubber
at the end of the 19th century. Today is the starting point for many
tourists who want to explore the surrounding Amazon jungle. The
Amazon River is the greatest river on Earth. Vicente
Yanez Pinzon in command of a Spanish expedition became the first
European to explore the river and ascended the Amazon to a point about
50 meters from the sea. The Amazon main river is navigable for ocean
steamers as far as Iquitos. Cuzco,
in southern Peru, capital of Cuzco Department, in the valley of the
Huatanay River, 3,360 m (11,024 ft) above sea level. The city of Cuzco
was the center of the Inca Empire. · In 1933
the 25th Congress of Americanists performed in Ciudad de la Plata,
Argentina, declared Cuzco City as the “Archaeological
Capital of South America". ·
In 1978
the 7th Convention of Mayors of the World Great Cities, performed in
Milan, Italy, declared Cuzco as “Cultural Heritage of the World". · In Paris,
on December 9, 1983, the UNESCO declared Cuzco as “Cultural
Patrimony of Humanity". · On
December 22, 1983, by means of Law Nº 23765 the Peruvian government
declared the city as “Tourist
Capital of Peru" as well as "Cultural Patrimony of the Nation". · The 1993
Peruvian Constitution declares Cuzco as the Historic
Capital of the country. Machu
Picchu
(the Inca City) This South-America's most famous Archaeological Group is
located on kilometres 112 (70 miles) of the Cuzco-Quillabamba at an
altitude of 2000 m. (6560 ft.). It is known that Hiram Bingham was the
man who on July 23, 1911 found Machu Picchu for the contemporary world
and modern science. He was a North-American historian born in Honolulu,
Hawaii; who in 1907 taught South-American History and Geography at Yale University. |
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