Major Tourist Attractions In Lima

Plaza Mayor and Plaza San Martin

 
A long pedestrian street crowded with shoppers, vendors and sightseers connects Lima's two main plazas to each other. The heart of the old town is centred on the striking Plaza Mayor, or Plaza de Armas, gracefully colonial with its bronze fountain and old street lamps. It was once the central marketplace, where bullfights were held during Spanish rule. Surrounding the square are several notable buildings, including the grand Spanish Baroque Cathedral, occupying the site of an ancient Inca temple and housing the Museum of Religious Art and Treasures; the impressive Government Palace where the changing of the guard takes place; the Town Hall; and the Archbishop’s Palace sporting a beautiful wooden balcony. The Plaza San Martin is an impressive square with a hive of activity surrounding its central fountains; a busy area of shoe-shiners, soapbox speakers, street artists and the site for political rallies and rioting workers.

Museo de la Nación (National Museum)

The superb anthropological and archaeological National Museum contains excellent exhibits tracing the history of Peru’s ancient civilisations and provides an outstanding overview of the archaeological richness of the country. It is the city’s largest and the country’s most important museum and the chronological layout guides visitors easily through the complicated ancient history, highlighting the many conquering cultures and their achievements, from the art and history of the original inhabitants to the Inca Empire.

Museo de Oro del Peru (Gold Museum)

Housed in a fortress-like building are the safe-rooms crammed with treasures from the Inca civilisation and their predecessors. The massive collection of gleaming gold, ceremonial objects and jewellery compete for attention, and the famous golden Tumi, the symbol of Peru, has been exhibited around the world. The rest of the museum is just as interesting with thousands of exquisite tapestries, pre-Incan weapons and wooden staffs, masks, mummies, and clothing. There is also a vast display of antique weapons and uniforms, a reminder of Peru's violent past.

Museo Rafael Larco Herrera

The 18th century colonial-style museum houses the largest and most impressive ceramic collection in the world, with about 55,000 pre-Colombian clay pots on display. The collection concentrates on the refined ceramics of the Moche Dynasty, the people who lived along the northern coast of Peru between 200 and 700 AD. The Moche culture is recognized as accomplishing one of the greatest imaginative languages of ancient Peru through the use of creative pottery, providing clues to all aspects of their civilization without the use of the written word. One can learn about their religion, agriculture, transport, dance and music through their ceramic designs and shapes. The Moche are also renowned for their fascinating erotic pottery and the famous collection is on display in the separate ‘Erotic Hall’, depicting sexual practices of several Peruvian cultures in a lifelike, explicit and often humorous way.

Church of San Francisco

The most spectacular of Lima's colonial churches, San Francisco is a striking white and yellow building with twin towers and a stone façade. It was one of the few buildings to survive the devastation of the 1746 earthquake and is famous for its underground catacombs that contain the bones and skulls of an estimated 70,000 people. The interior of the church has arches and columns decorated with beautiful mosaic tiles and an exquisitely carved Moorish-style wooden ceiling above the staircase leading to the cloisters. The church also contains a superb 17th century library with thousands of antique texts and a room containing painted masterpieces by Reubens, Van Dyck and Jordaens.