Yes, there is an Iris Temple (Arco Iris, the rainbow temple) with dogs around, hot dogs, naked hot dogs!
First, the Iris Temple….
Chimu Culture built several temples around Trujillo – one of the best preserved is the Arco Iris, the rainbow temple. So we had a look at it…
… and saw the naked hot dogs!!
The Peruvian hairless dog is a very old breed, already a domestic animal in ancient times. It has a genetic, inheritable disposition for hairlessness. Their body temperature is higher than for normal dogs, it’s about 40 degree. Used in former times to cure asthma etc, i.e. used as a warming bottle. As this breed is in danger of extinction, it was declared as “national monuments” and are treated accordingly, i.e. they get feed at the archaeological sites (and sometimes, have their own house!).
Thereafter, we went to the world largest adobe city of Chan Chan, an UNESCO World Heritage Site. It was the capital of the Chimu Culture, started in 850 AD and lasted until the conquest of the Inca around 1470. Estimated 30 000 people lived there – the biggest pre-Columbian city in Southern America. It is really HUGE!!! You can only visit a small part of it – a restored temple.
As the city is build of adobe, it does not resist heavy rain very good. The El Nino phenomenon, which occurs every 10-20 years or so, causes floods in this area and destroys this structure bit by bit. Therefore, most of the frescos on display are restored / rebuild, but gives a good idea of how it once looked like. Of course, water is an essential source for life, therefore it is a frequent motive at the frescos, together with the common animals…
They also had a lake in the temple complex…
As said, El Nino causes huge problems, those parts which are not covered, now look like this…
Btw, we are thinking of buying a car in order to really explore also the small villages… This one is quite cheap, but I try to get an even better deal… Let’s see.
In the evening, we went to the beach of Huanchaco…
… with the very special fisher boats…
… and Thorsten discovered a feature at his camera mine hasn’t!
The next day, we visited the Temple of the Sun and the moon with the remains of the city in between, an even older complex from the Moche culture (the one from Sipan!). We visited the temple of the moon, where the Moche people did human scarifies… Excavation started only in 1991, a lot more work is to to as they want to dig the whole city…
The huge advantage is, that the frescos remained as they were covered with sand for hundreds of years….
After those cultural highlights, we went to the bus terminal to catch the night bus to Lima…