Traditional villagers in Huilloc, Peru 19 Aug 2016
About this photo
Traditional hospitality and hard work remain the norm in Andean villages, where the traditions of life - from marriage and community work to cooking and clothing - still defy globalisation. Communities often consist of farmhouses scattered about the mountainside, with the landscape stitched with precarious stone walls, built for removing rocks from the soil rather than for setting boundaries.
The essence of rural life is the ruling fact of altitude and the necessity of having access to lands from the high puna, where animals graze, through lower slopes where beans and potatoes are grown, on down to warmer valleys where maize and vegetables thrive, and often even lower to the tropical regions of avocado, fruits, and coca.
Here, villages are dressed in traditional clothing in the high-altitude village of Huilloc, located in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, a key area for hiking tours.
Want to explore Peru's tribal villages for yourself? Discover trips with Insight Guides to the Inca Trail and Peru online here or submit a trip enquiry and we'll plan a trip from start-to-finish for you.
