Segment Taparaku - Tambo de Llata and Segment Taulli - Tambillo
Plan this ride
Recorded distance
309 km
Riding-time estimate
7 h 01
Journey
Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Puños it runs 309 km to Puños; allow about 7 h 01 of riding. The stops in between: Segment Ayash - Taulli, Chavin, Segment Taulli - Tambillo and back through Chavin. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 4,400 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Segment Taparaku - Tambo de Llata
The Qhapaq Ñan, the great road network of the Inca Empire, ran for thousands of kilometres along the Andes, linking the capital Cusco with the far corners of an empire that stretched from Colombia to Chile. In the department of Huánuco, in central Peru, one of its best preserved sections crosses the high puna between the administrative centre of Huánuco Pampa and the valleys to the north, and the segment between Taparaku and the Tambo de Llata is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site inscribed in 2014.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Segment Taparaku - Tambo de Llata is where the day begins. Next is Segment Ayash - Taulli.
2. Segment Ayash - Taulli
East of the Cordillera Blanca, the Andes break into a jumble of high plateaus and deep valleys draining toward the Marañón and the Amazon, and the Inca road ran through this country on its way from Cusco to Quito. The Ayash to Taulli segment is a stretch of the Qhapaq Ñan in the highlands of Huánuco, near the town of Llata, part of the UNESCO-listed Andean road system. It runs through the puna, the high grassland above the tree line, where the wind blows cold and the views stretch for miles over ridges and valleys. In places, the original road survives, with stone paving, retaining walls, steps and drainage channels, and walking a section of it is the best way to understand how the Incas moved people and goods across this vertical landscape.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Segment Ayash - Taulli comes up about 22 km into the recorded legs. Next is Chavin.
3. Chavín
Three thousand years ago, priests at Chavín de Huántar led pilgrims into a labyrinth of dark stone galleries beneath a temple, where at the heart of the maze stood a carved granite pillar, the Lanzón, depicting a fanged deity. The Chavín culture, flourishing between roughly 1200 and 500 BC, spread its art and religious ideas across much of the Andes, and its temple complex in the Mosna valley is one of the most important archaeological sites in South America, inscribed by UNESCO in 1985. Look out for the cabezas clavas, carved stone heads that once projected from the temple walls, showing a transformation from human to jaguar or bird.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 94 km into the recorded legs you reach Chavin. Next is Segment Taulli - Tambillo.
4. Segment Taulli - Tambillo
In the high valleys of Huánuco, north of Lima and east of the great white wall of the Cordillera Blanca, an Inca road crosses a landscape of stone-walled fields and thatched farms. The Qhapaq Ñan ran north from Cusco to Quito by way of an inland route, and one of its major administrative centres was Huánuco Pampa, a vast planned town on a plateau at about 3,700 metres, with a great plaza, storehouses and barracks, where the emperor's officials gathered tribute and fed travelling armies. Segments of the road around Llata, in the Huamalíes province, connect with that old network.