Salineras

Salineras de Maras seems a typical Peruvian village but for the fact that almost everyone works in the salt terraces nearby harvesting salt using the ancient pre-Incan methods of producing salt.  We hiked down a canyon through mountain valleys off the beaten track to Salineras village where people still wear traditional clothes. Qoripujio  has been feeding the many salt ponds for thousands of years through a series of small channels that must be opened and blocked for each pond. When the salt crystalises it is drained, dried and then bagged.  We saw little old women hauling the bagged salt up the hills to a centre point where it goes to market. This income will mean the survival of a whole family.