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<< Our Photo Pages >> Las Salinas - Ancient Mine, Quarry or other Industry in Peru

Submitted by pab on Wednesday, 13 November 2013  Page Views: 3989

Multi-periodSite Name: Las Salinas
Country: Peru
NOTE: This site is 71.997 km away from the location you searched for.

Type: Ancient Mine, Quarry or other Industry
Nearest Town: Urubamba  Nearest Village: Maras
Latitude: 13.300185S  Longitude: 72.155311W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
4 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
4 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
2 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
4

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jdeblois83 would like to visit

bat400 visited on 13th Sep 2018 Our guide told us that although salt had been collected hear long before the Spanish conquest, the number and extent of the salt pans seen today are a modern feature. Even in his own lifetime the area of the "works" were dramatically smaller. Having said that, the methodology appears to not have changed for many hundreds of years.

PAB have visited here

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Ancient salt pans, Peru. (Vote or comment on this photo)
Salt terraces in Peru.
About half an hour drive from the Sacred Valley of the Incas in the town of Urubamba are the interesting salt terraces of Maras, called Las Salinas.

We visited these on our way back from the Moray Terraces, and hadn’t really expected them to be anything special – we had certainly not realised they would be contenders for a posting on the Portal!

These ‘salt pans’ have been in use since Inca times or earlier, and the salt extraction process has remained unchanged up to the present day. The Inca empire had very robust arrangements in place to ensure that they had 2 years food in storage to cope with poor harvests and failures in rainfall, as well as to enable them to deal with any periods of siege. Salt would have been an important part of this strategy.

The 2000+ salt pans are run and allocated through a system of family and community rights to the individual salt pans, and this has also operated over the centuries and currently the salt terraces are owned and maintained by a cooperative union involving about 200 local families.

As for how they came to be there - underground springs pass through subterranean salt layers (once, no doubt sea bed layers uplifted by land movement) higher up on the plateau and collect high concentrations of salt minerals en route. In fact, the dissolving of the salts and minerals by these streams is believed to be the initial cause of subsidence in the Moray Terraces due to the amount of material dissolved and carried away by the streams running underneath the Terraces towards the Sacred Valley. The depressions caused by this erosion were then extenuated into the terraced craters found today.

These streams, laden with salt minerals, spill over the top of a hill and are directed along ditches to an amazing number of terraces where the briny water collects, settles, and evaporates leaving salt deposits and crystals. The salt comes in two grades, the white premium grade and the salmon coloured "roseadas" which contain traces of clay. The salt is sold both for cooking (sometimes mixed with other spices) and for use in some therapies. During the time of the Spanish conquest and early occupation, they also used vast quantities – apparently large amounts of salt were needed as part of the process to extract silver from ore.

The overall effect of the different colours reflecting the sunlight is fantastic – especially when combined with the knowledge that you are actually seeing how salt was mined during Inca rule - the overall scene is really spectacular and it's amazing to see them still in use today. Many people find this a close second to Machu Picchu itself in terms of special memories of trips to Peru.
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Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Family working their plot - another generation learning the ancient skills. Photo, Sept 2013 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : The product of the ancient salt pans, Peru. This is the heap of salt drying out after being dredged from the pan. It is then bagged up for sale. Photo, Sept 2013 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Ancient salt pans. Part of the system of conduits taking the mineral-laden water around the hillside. Although it looks as if it should be slippery, the surface is actually rough. Photo, Sept 2013 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Ancient Salt Pans, Peru Working their family's pans as has been done for 1700 years or more, these workers give an idea of the scale of the site - there are over 2000 of these individual pans. Photo, Sept 2013 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Site in Peru View of some of the family-run salt pans. Photo, Sept 2013 (Vote or comment on this photo)

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Ancient salt pans, Peru Using every possible square foot - including the space created by building artificial sides on the hillside! The white streaks down the hillside are the run-off from centuries of use. Photo, Sept 2013

Las Salinas
Las Salinas submitted by pab : Modern methods of transport - until the Spanish conquest, the early workers did not have donkeys or horses to use as beasts of burden, so this image could only have been anytime since 1530s...before that, just lama and alpaca available! Photo, Sept 2013

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Nearby sites listing. In the following links * = Image available
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