Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
REVASH
Near the town of Santo Tomás, Revash is an excellent site of several brightly colored fu-
nerary buildings tucked into limestone cliff ledges. Looking a bit like attractive-yet-inac-
cessible summer cottages, these
chullpas
are made of small, mud-set stones that were
plastered over and embellished with red and cream paints. This bright taste in decor is still
clearly visible today. While much of the site was looted long ago, the skeletons of 11
adults and one child, along with a wealth of artifacts such as musical instruments and
tools made from bones, were found inside by archaeologists. A number of pictographs
decorate the walls of the cliff behind the tombs, and a now empty funerary cave, origin-
ally containing more than 200 funerary bundles, lies 1km from the main set of tombs.
The shortest route to the site is to take a Leimebamba-bound
combi
and get off in Yerb-
abuena, from where you have a 1½-hour hike or can take a taxi (S40 return). If you're up
for the hunt, ask around in Revash for a man who can set you up with horses. A day tour
from Chachapoyas is about S90.
CATARATA DE GOCTA
This 771m
waterfall
(adult/child S5/1; 6am-4pm)
somehow escaped the notice of the Peruvian government, in-
ternational explorers and prying satellite images until 2005, when German Stefan Ziemendorff and a group of locals
put together an expedition to map the falls and record their height. Various claims ranging from the third-loftiest wa-
terfall on earth to the 15th resulted in an international firestorm in the always-exciting contest to rank the world's
highest cascades. Gocta's current measurement is probably correct, give or take a few meters, putting it solidly fifth
after Norway's 773m Mongefossen Falls. Whether you're hung up on numbers or not, the falls are impressive and
accessible. It's easier to go with a tour company from Chachapoyas for about S90 - it will provide transportation
and a local guide for the two-hour hike to the falls - but it's feasible to catch a
combi
from Chachapoyas to Pedro
Ruíz (S5, 45 minutes) and then a
mototaxi
to Cocachimba (S15, 45 minutes) or walk the final 6km from Pedro. The
Communal Tourism Association arranges guides for S30.
The falls are dripping in lore about a mermaid who guards a lost treasure (who knew there were mermaids so far
inland?). With luck you might see the bizarre, orange bird called the Andean cock-of-the-rock or, if miracles tend to
befall you, the rare and endemic yellow-tailed woolly monkey. In the rainy season, some seven additional drips
sprout over the ridge.
The newish
Gocta Andes Lodge
( 041-63-0552;
www.goctalodge.com
; s/d S169/209; )
, in the village
of
Cocachimba
, is one of the special spots in the Northern Highlands, sitting on a severely idyllic setting with un-
impeded views to the falls, both from the rooms and the small infinity pool. Spacious but simple rooms feature
lovely kaleidoscopic textiles, cozy down comforters, vaulted ceilings and balconies which frame the falls like a
