Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Museo de Oro del Perú
(Gold Museum of Peru; 345-1292;
www.museoroperu.com.pe
; Alonso de Molina
1100, Monterrico; adult/child under 11 S33/16; 10:30am-6pm)
The now notorious
Museo de Oro del Perú, a private museum, was a Lima must-see until 2001, when a study
revealed that 85% of the museum's metallurgical pieces were fakes. It reopened with an
assurance that works on display are bona fide, though descriptions classify certain pieces
as 'reproductions.' The cluttered, poorly signed exhibits still leave something to be de-
sired.
Of greater interest (and, in all likelihood, of greater authenticity) are the thousands of
weapons presented in the
Arms Museum
, on the museum's ground floor. Here, in vari-
ous jumbled rooms, you'll find rifles, swords and guns from every century imaginable, in-
cluding a firearm that once belonged to Fidel Castro.
Go via taxi or
combi Museum of the Nation
heading northeast on Angamos toward
Monterrico and get off at the Puente Primavera. From there, it's a 15-minute stroll north to
the museum.
MUSEUM
MUSEUM
Asociación Museo del Automóvil
(Automobile Museum; 368-0373;
www.museodelautomovilnicolini.com
; Av La Mo-
lina, cuadra 37, cnr Totoritas, La Molina; adult S20; 9:30am-7pm)
The Asociación
Museo del Automóvil has an impressive array of classic cars dating back to 1901, from a
Ford Model T to a Cadillac Fleetwood used by four Peruvian presidents.
SAN ISIDRO & POINTS WEST
A combination of middle- and upper-class residential neighborhoods offer some important
sights of note.
Museo Larco
( 461-1312;
http://museolarco.org
; Bolívar 1515, Pueblo Libre; adult/child under 15
S30/15; 9am-10pm)
An 18th-century viceroy's mansion houses this museum, which
has one of the largest, best-presented displays of ceramics in Lima. Founded by Rafael
Larco Hoyle in 1926, a dedicated collector and cataloguer of all things pre-Columbian, the
collection is said to include more than 50,000 pots (thousands are housed in glass store-
rooms, which visitors can also see). The museum showcases ceramic works from the
Cupisnique, Chimú, Chancay, Nazca and Inca cultures, but the highlight is the sublime
Moche portrait vessels, presented in simple, dramatically lit cases. Equally astonishing is
a Wari weaving in one of the rear galleries that contains 398 threads to the linear inch - a
MUSEUM
