Information for the Peru Traveller

PERU FACTS AND TRAVEL TIPS
Population 23 million, approximately 7 million live in the greater Lima Peru area.

Education Three-level, eleven-year education system based on reforms made after the 1968 revolution. First preprimary level for children up to six years of age. Free, six-year primary education at second level (compulsory) for children between six and fifteen years of age. Five-year secondary education begins at age twelve. In 1990, only 58.6 percent of school-age children attended school. At this time, Peru had twenty-seven national and nineteen private universities, all government-regulated and recipients of public funding. The estimated literacy rate in Peru is 85%.

Religion Peru is predominantly (92.5%) Roman Catholic, Protestantism, including Mormonism is growing rapidly among urban poor and some tribes, although accounting for only about 4.5% of Peruvians in 1990. Other denominations include the Anglican Communion, the Methodist Church, and the Bahai Faith.

Climate/ Seasons Peru is located on the west coast of South America just south of the Equator. On the coast, February is usually warmest, with an average temperature of 26°C, and temperatures rarely fall below 10°C. Winter (July, August) has an average temperature of 5°C in the highlands and 15°C on the coast.

In the highlands and the Amazon basin, February and March comprise the rainiest season. Mean annual precipitation is approximately 884mm (recorded at 3,980m), falling mainly between October and May.

Health/ Immunizations Depending on your itinerary, your personal risk factors, and the length of your visit, your health care provider may offer you vaccination against hepatitis A, typhoid, hepatitis B, rabies, or influenza. Routine immunizations, such as those that prevent tetanus/diphtheria or "childhood" diseases, should be reviewed and updated as needed. An official yellow fever vaccination certificate may be required depending on your itinerary. Quite a few diseases, including hepatitis A and typhoid fever, are transmitted by unsanitary food handling procedures and contaminated water. Food and beverage precautions are essential in order to reduce chance of illness. Anti-diarrheal drugs may be prescribed by your provider. The dusty, dry climate in non-jungle areas may affect persons with allergies, bronchitis, or sinusitis.  Ask your physician during your pre-trip physical check-up.

Insurance We highly reccomend that all travellers are adequately covered byMedical, Accident, Travel, and Rescue Insurance. 

American Alpine Club is well known for their world-wide rescue insurance program.  World Travel Center offers great travel/health coverage for adventure traveller.

PERU'S ECOLOGY
Flora & Fauna The wide topographic range supports an equally wide range of vegetation types with humid montane forest in the valleys and alpine fluvial tundra, and very wet sub-alpine paramo formations at higher levels. Studies have identified 104 families, 340 genera and 799 plant species. Puya raimondii (I), a distinctive alpine bromeliad, is abundant together with other Bromeliaceae species, mountain orchids (Orchis spp., Masdevallia spp.) and relict forests of Polylepis spp. and Gynoxys spp.
Ten mammal species have been recorded, including spectacled bear Tremarctos ornatus (V), puma Felis concolor incarum, mountain cat F. pajeros, white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus and the vicuna Vicugna vicugna (V) are important indigenous species, but all have been heavily hunted in the past. The North Andean huemul Hippocamelus antisensis (V), is also noteworthy. Some of the most notable bird species of the 112 that have been recorded include Gurney's buzzard Buteo poecilochrous, Andean condor Vultur gryphus, giant hummingbird Patagona gigas peruviana, giant coot Fulica gigantea, and ornate tinamou Nothoprocta ornata.

Geology The Cordillera Blanca is in a constant state of geologic activity. The tectonic plaques movement to the east and the movement of the South American continent to the west caused the Cordillera Blanca to rise from the earth. Even now some seismic movement produces avalanches. The glaciers have formed large lakes and the rivers, in finding a way toward the ocean have opened valleys known as quebradas.

The base rock consists principally of sediments from the Upper Jurassic seas and of Cretaceous and Tertiary volcanic deposits which make up the Andean batholiths.

Agriculture/ Mining From ancestral times, most of the valleys have been used as shepherding areas, many bushes are picked up to be used to make fires. The use of the Ichu (grass) to make roofs for the houses is widespread. The production of metallic and non-metallic minerals has placed this region in a class of excellence among mining areas around the world. The reserve is considerable.

Together, these practices have caused deforestation, erosion problems, and the impoverishment of the natural areas.
In the last years, people who visit the mountains and local residents have put strong emphasis and care in the fact that our world and this environment are extremely fragile and we must not alter the conditions of nature so that it can be visited, admired and enjoyed by future generations.

In spite of efforts by mostly private institutions, there has been little government support and certainly not enough to carry out an effective plan in handling our natural resources. As a step in the right direction, there are some private programs aimed at the reforestization of the Cordillera Blanca and the local governments are demanding that the mining companies act responsibly and with care for the environment.

Modern Disasters This region has suffered several strange disasters. In 1941 a flood originated in Palcacocha lake in the Cojup valley. It destroyed a huge portion of the city of Huaraz, since then the government has emphasized control of the water level in those lakes that pose a threat.

In 1962 The city of Ranrahirca was almost completely washed away by a wall of water caused by an enormous block of ice that separated off of Huascaran. The mass of water and mud almost completely destroyed an entire city.

One of the most tragic earthquakes in history happened on may 31 of 1970. At 7.8 on the Richter scale, this earthquake completely destroyed the whole city of Huaraz. Other cities of the Callejon de Huaylas and the Callejon de Conchucos where affected as well. It reports 70,000 deaths.

The same day in the city of Yungay not only suffered from the earthquake but was completely wiped out by a huge avalanche of mud and stones resulting from a block of ice that was dislodged by the earthquake off of North Huascaran. An earthquake-induced rock and snow avalanche on Mt. Huascaran, Peru, buried the towns of Yungay and Ranrahirca. The death toll from the Debris Avalanche was 18,000 (total fatalities from the earthquake and the debris flow was 66,000). The avalanche started as a sliding mass of glacial ice and rock about 3,000 feet wide and one mile long. The avalanche swept about 11 miles to the village of Yungay at an average speed of more that 100 miles an hour. The fast-moving mass picked up glacial deposits and by the time it reached Yungay, it is estimated to have consisted of about 80 million cubic yards of water, mud, and rocks. The city practically disappeared and the only survivors were those that fled to the highest part of the cemetery.

PERU'S HISTORY
Peru encompasses a past of over 10,000 years of the most harsh and inhospitable, if spectacular, environments in the world - the high Andes of South America. Civilization in the Andes has long been equated with the Incas. The architectural achievements of the Incas are inevitably compared to the feats of the Romans.

In contrast, the invasion of the Spaniards in 1532 between the Andeans was one of the first clashes between Western and non-Western civilizations. The Spanish conquest and colonialism has characterized Peru down through the centuries. Peru, like its geography, became divided economically, socially and politically between a semifeudal, largely native coast. The persistence of this "dualism" and the inability of the Peruvian state in more recent times to overcome it have prevented not only the development but also the effective integration of the Peruvian nation to this day.

Another unique feature of Peru is the role that foreigners have played in its history. Peru's independence from Spain in 1824 was largely the accomplishments of "outsiders" such as the Venezuelan Simón Bolívar Palacios and the Argentine José de San Martín. Many foreigners have exploited Peru's natural resources. In 1879 Chile invaded Peru and destroyed and carried off many possessions. This exploitation, led advocates to argue that Peru's export-dependent economy was created and manipulated by foreign interests.

Internal demographic changes since the middle of the twentieth century have shaped contemporary Peru. For example, the total population grew almost threefold from over 7 million in 1950 to nearly 20 million in 1985, despite slowing down in the 1970s. In 1980, over 60 percent of its work force was located in towns and cities, principally the capital, Lima. In 1985 half of Lima's nearly 7 million inhabitants lived in informal housing, and at least half of the country's population was employed or underemployed in the informal sector.

Along with the demographic changes, Peru experienced an increasing leadership crisis. This occurred when the longstanding power of the government (oligarchy) came to an abrupt end in the 1968 military "revolution." The reform of 1969 destroyed the economic base of both the export elite and the gamonales (rural bosses) in the Sierra. After more than a decade, the military, in public disfavor, returned to the barracks, opening the way, once again, to the democratic process.

The resumption of elections was reaffirmed in 1985 and again in 1990. "Redemocratization" confronted many problems. The end of military rule left an enormous political gap that the parties, absent for twelve years and historically weak, were hard-pressed to fill. Peru's long history of authoritarian and oligarchical rule, made effective democratic government difficult to accomplish. More serious, redomocratization faced an increasingly grave threat from a deepening economic crisis that began in the mid-1960s. In 1985 wages approached mid-1960 levels.

Finally, redomocratization was also threatened in 1980 by the Shining Path guerilla movement, Latin America's most violent and ongoing insurgency. By 1985, the so-called "people's war" had claimed over 6,000 victims, most of them innocent civilians. Violence was a thread that ran throughout Andean history, from Inca expansion, the Spanish conquest and colonialism, and countless native American insurrections and their suppression to the struggle for independence.

Culture and Language
At first sight, Peruvian culture may seem brutally divided between indigenous and colonial societies - the mountains and the city. Elite white creoles trace their bloodlines back to the Spanish Conquest in 1536. Like generations before them, most live in Lima, where a European visitor will feel a comfortable familiarity in the cafes and supermarkets.

On the other side, rural communities now also aspire to ownership of televisions and blue jeans but this comes into conflict with their traditional cultural values. The people of the Andes are maintaining the traditional practices of their ancestors in a rapidly changing world. Their livelihood continues to be based on family-owned fields or charkas which are farmed by hand or with the assistance of draft animals.

The social organization of communities in the Andes differs greatly from that of Europeanized creole culture. Work, marriage and land-ownership are centered around a complex extended family organization called the ayllu in Quechua which dates back to at least Inca times. One of the main functions of ayllus is to organize reciprocal work exchange.

The Andes have two large ethnoliguistic groups: the larger of the two speaks Quechua; the smaller group speaks Aymara and is settled around Lake Titicaca and also in neighboring Bolivia. Beyond these global distinctions, other complexities arise. There are "white" ethnic groups called the Morochucos of Pampa Cangallo who have light-colored eyes and hair and speak Quechua.
The misti, the dominant social class in the Andes, may speak Quechua and share other cultural traits but enjoy access to education and the luxuries of the modernization. Meanwhile in the Amazon jungle, there are at least 53 ethnolinguistic groups, although only around 5 percent of Peru's population live in the Selva (the tropical region east of the Andes in the jungle).
Due to its New World history, Peru also enjoys a rich cultural diversity. Up to the 19th Century, landowners brought in African blacks to serve as slaves on their haciendas and frequently used them to repress the local Indians. Between 1850 and 1920, Chinese and Japanese laborers provided the hands and backs to build railways over the Andes and farm the land where there was a scarcity of labor.

A large majority of highland people live a marginal and impoverished existence and are removed from the modern benefits of the national economy. While retaining an unchanged loyalty to their ancestral heritage, so well identified to the outside world through their bright homemade costumes, the poor of the Andes are nevertheless equally eager to share in the luxuries of a "modern" lifestyle which includes education, electricity, sewage and running potable water. But rather than improving, the economic condition of these communities is deteriorating, leading to massive urban migration.

A striking feature of contemporary Peruvian society is the massive scale of the informal economy. The decay of the national economy has led to an abundance of traditional market street trade and bartering at market stalls as an integral part of daily life. Ambulantes (street vendors) can be found on every corner selling a huge variety of goods.