Taste of Peru

IMPORTANT: AS THIS IS ONE OF OUR MOST IMPORTANT PROGRAMS, WE OFFER A HUGE ARRAY OF OPTIONS. PLEASE CHECK ALL IN OUR DEDICATED CULINARY SITE: WWW.TASTE-OF-PERU.COM

Day-by-Day Itinerary

Day 1: Arrival to Lima

Upon your arrival to Lima, one of our representatives will meet you at the airport and accompany you and take you to your hotel in Lima. *An extra day in Lima can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 2: Market Visit with Fruit Festival, Mission with Ceviche Festival, Afternoon Lima City Tour & Peruvian Fusion Dinner at Astrid & Gaston (B, L, D)

After breakfast at your hotel in Lima, one of our representatives will meet you in the lobby and escort you on your market visit and fruit festival. You will begin your culinary adventure in Lima by visiting the Main market. This market is informal and a great way to experience a little bit of the Peruvian culture in its daily life. In the Main Market you can find the best variety of vegetables and fruits in the country, including exotic products from the “Andes” and the “Jungle”. In all Peruvian markets, “el regateo” is a common practice “asking for a discount and negotiating the price for the product with each vendor” people even ask for a “Yapa” something for free with your purchase, one extra lime or one extra potato. We will also have the chance to taste many of the exotic fruits that Peru has to offer. On this market visit, you will also have the added chance to participate in a very special Ceviche Mission. More than an activity, this is your secret mission, which starts at the market; we will give you the recipe, ingredient list and money, which you will use to buy all your supplies to make your Ceviche (don’t worry if you don’t speak Spanish, this is part of the fun).

Immediately following, one of our chefs will lead you on this journey into the famous Peruvian dish, Ceviche. This class will give you the experience and knowledge needed to prepare the best Ceviche and all related dishes such as Tiradito and other classic fresh seafood combinations. After lunch, you will be picked up at the restaurant, and taken on your City tour of the city of Lima. On the City Tour, you will see the Spanish city Square, get a snapshot of the most important city sites, and visit the popular and mysterious catacombs, where you will learn about pre-Inca cultures. Sites to be visited: Main Square, The Cathedral, Government Palace, City Hall, San Francisco Monastery (including catacombs), old streets with colonial houses, and a great driving tour through beautiful San Isidro and Miraflores. At the conclusion of your city tour, you will be taken back to your hotel in order for you to relax and enjoy some down-time before dinner.

In the evening, you will once again be met at your hotel, and taken to Astrid y Gaston for a special, exclusive “Tasting Menu” at Astrid & Gaston- a 12-courses tasting menu dinner specially prepared by Gaston Acurio, arguably Peru’s most famous chef and restaurateur, at the best restaurant in Lima. This dinner will present the Peruvian Food in another dimension. You will taste traditional dishes presented into a creative and new form. Gaston’s dishes are prepared to perfection, which allows you to taste every ingredient. At the conclusion of dinner, you will be taken back to your hotel for the remainder of the evening. *An extra day in Lima can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 3: Introduction to the Peruvian Cuisine Class, Afternoon Museum Tour & Author’s Fusion Dinner at Rafael (B, L, D)

After breakfast at your hotel, you will be picked up for your Introduction to the Peruvian Cuisine Class at one of the best restaurants of Criolla Cuisine: The Senorio de Sulco, here his head Chef and owner Flavio Solorzano will teach you the quintessential basics of Peruvian Cuisine. You will learn how to prepare Peru’s staple dishes, and afterwards you will enjoy a full tasting of these traditional Peruvian dishes. This specially-catered demonstration class and lunch will offer an opportunity to taste the many dishes you learned to prepare during this class, along with enjoying the very best of Peruvian ingredients. After lunch, you will be picked up and taken on your museum tour. On this tour, you will appreciate a splendid private collection of ceramics, singularly from the Mochica culture. The Treasure Room keeps gold work pieces like the unique pure gold chest decoration of a Chimu chief. We will be able to find pieces from the pre-ceramic age (8000 – 2000 B.C.) till the imperial and conquest age (1532 A.D.). At the conclusion of your tour, you will be taken back to your hotel in order to freshen up before dinner.

For dinner tonight, you will be picked up and taken on a special Author’s Fusion Dinner at Rafael Restaurant. Executive chef and owner Rafael Osterling creates each and every dish as if he is creating a piece of art.  His cuisine is not defined by any style and is only influenced by the quality of the product he finds in each place he has a restaurant. His dishes are incredibly creative but always respecting the ingredients as he always points out. The result is a mind- blowing taste and presentation that will make you experience new and creative ways to eat popular ingredients. At the conclusion of this delicious dinner, you will be taken back to your hotel to rest for the evening. *An extra day in Lima can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 4: Trip to Cusco, Afternoon City Tour & Novandina Tasting Dinner at Map Café (B, D)

After breakfast at your hotel in Lima, you will be met by one of our representatives and taken directly to the airport in Lima, in order to catch your short, one-hour flight to the capital city of the Incas: Cusco. You will be met upon arrival and transferred to your hotel of choice. You will have the remainder of the morning to rest and freshen up. It’s best to take it easy this morning to let your body adjust to the altitude. Some find enjoying a cup of hot coca tea a real help in adjusting to the high elevation and that is what the locals traditionally use coca for. * Depending on which domestic flight you choose you will have more or less time to rest.

Once you have had a chance to settle to the altitude, you will be met at your hotel and taken on a grand tour of the city of Cusco, the former capital of the once vast Incan Empire. The city’s Spanish Colonial architecture both overlays and is interlaced with the earlier Incan architecture. We walk Cusco’s impressive Plaza de Armas and visit both the Spanish cathedral and Incan temple of the sun, Qoricancha. The Spanish conquistadores destroyed significant portions of the Inca civilization while leaving their mark on Cusco. Ornate cathedrals, adobe walls, carved balconies, hidden courtyards and cobblestone streets add to the historic richness of the ancient Incan capital. Next we set out to visit the ruins above the city that were considered an essential part of the ancient capital. We start with one of the most impressive of them all, Sacsayhuaman. This is where Inti Raymi, the Festival of the Sun, is held during the Summer Solstice. Some of the stones used to build the site weigh up to 70 tons yet are fitted so precisely–without the use of mortar–that one cannot slide even the thinnest object between them. Some believe that the site forms the head of puma or jaguar and that the huge triangulated walls form its teeth, or symbolize lightening. Tambomachay, the Temple of the Sacred Waters, is another site we will visit and is a marvel of hydraulic engineering. Its waters still flow today. At Q´enqo we’ll see the remains of a ceremonial site used for fertility rites and for celebrations of the solstice and equinox. At the conclusion of your tour, you will be taken back to your hotel in order to freshen up before dinner.

In the evening, you will be picked up at your hotel and taken on your Novoandina dinner at MAP Café. The MAP Café is located at the Museo de Arte Precolombino (Museum of Pre-Inca art) in Cuzco. Specializing in Novoandino cuisine and presenting the use of native ingredients and rescued recipes with innovative dishes, this 7-course tasting-menu dinner will be sure to introduce your palete to tastes rarely experienced before. At the conclusion of dinner, you will be taken back to your hotel in Cusco for the remainder of the evening. * An extra day in Cusco can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 5: Sacred Valley Private Tour & Home style cooking demonstration (B, L)

After breakfast at your hotel in Cusco, you will set out into the Urubamba Valley, also known as the Sacred Valley of the Incas, for a private tour. Our first stop will be a visit to the the Pisac market. The Pisac market has a wide variety of artisan arts & crafts and you will have the chance to see the many different products that the sacred valley produces. This is a great opportunity to for you to do some unique shopping, and to purchase souvenirs for your family and friends. After the market, we head deeper into the Sacred Valley and visit the Inca town of Ollantaytambo, still inhabited by the locals in much the same way as it was during the time of the Incas. The lodging area is formed by complex structures known as “canchas” or apartments. The Inca built a temple on a terraced site above the town. The impressive, standing stones they erected, conjure up images of Atlantis. This is the site where Manco Inca and his warriors staged a temporary victory over the Spanish Conquistadors, led by Francisco Pizarro. During this victory, the Inca warriors flooded the fields, while raining down spears and arrows from above, making it difficult for the Spanish horses to maneuver, ultimately forcing a rare retreat on the part of the Conquistadors.

At the conclusion of your tour, you will take part in a unique, once-in-a-lifetime experience in the sacred valley, specially catered for you at the Huayoccari Hacienda. You will take part in a Demonstration of Local Vegetables & Home Style Cooking. Owned by Jose Ignacio Lambarri, who will share with us his family art collection or colonial art gathered over half a century, you will have the opportunity to take part in a special lunch at the hacienda, which will be made from fresh produce from the actual plantation. The current inhabitant of the house, the Lambarri-Oriehuela family will be your host on this very special occasion. In this visit you will learn, touch and taste some of the main vegetables farmed in this area. You will then learn about the unique ways that the Chefs are using the great variety of special natural products including an endless variety of potatoes and other delicious vegetables.

After lunch, we head out to the bustling market-town of Chinchero, our final visit today. The town of Chinchero is the the Birthplace of the Rainbow, situated at over 11,500 feet. Its extensive agricultural terraces made it, in Incan times, the breadbasket of Cusco city. The main sight to see at this location is a catholic church, with fine paintings from the Cusquenian School. Modern Chinchero has a very active community of women weavers who create textiles on backstrap looms using only natural dyes. The weavers make fine, high quality mantas, table runners, pillows, bags, belts, and scarves in soft natural colors. At the end of the day you will go back to Cusco. All of our suggested hotels are well situated, so that you can relax and enjoy more of both ancient and contemporary life this evening. * An overnight at the sacred valley can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 6: Machu Picchu Tour (B, S)

The day you have been waiting for! After breakfast at your hotel, we catch the train to the town of Aquas Calientes at the base of Machu Picchu. You will then continue by bus for the short ride up switch backs to the Machu Picchu citadel overhead. We enter the ruins for a breathtaking view of the city in the sky. You will enjoy a full tour of the lost city and have lunch on your own after the tour. In the afternoon we say farewell to Machu Picchu as we set out by train heading to the station at Poroy and then back to your Cusco Hotel by car arriving at night. * An overnight in Machu Picchu can be added upon request. Also, we can add bus and entrance tickets for a second day at the citadel. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 7: Flight Back to Lima, Sushi Lunch, Free afternoon & Pisco Tasting with Amazon Fusion Dinner (B, L, D)

After breakfast at your hotel in Cusco, you will be picked up at your hotel and taken directly to the airport in order to catch your short, one-hour flight back to the capital city of Lima. Once you arrive in Lima, you will be met at the airport and taken to your hotel. Once you have had a chance to check-in, you will then be met in the lobby, in order to be taken on your Japanese fusion lunch at one of Lima’s best Japanese-Peruvian restaurants. After lunch, you will be taken back to your hotel in order to rest and enjoy the remainder of the afternoon, free at your leisure.

In the evening, you will once again be met at your hotel and taken on your Pisco Tasting and dinner at Malabar. Pisco is Peru’s national drink and liquor so versatile that it can be enjoyed alone or mixed with fruits from which we make amazing “Pisco Martinis”. You will learn to prepare these new, trendy pisco-based drinks with exotic fruits in addition to the traditional Pisco Sour at one of Lima’s hottest spots: Malabar restaurant. Tasting good Pisco is like tasting wine, you will be able to learn about the different grapes and grape combinations that are used in the preparation of Pisco through a guided tasting by an expert sommelier. Chef Pedro Miguel Schiaffino will present his new cuisine using jungle ingredients after tasting the most important varieties of Pisco. You will also learn how to make both the traditional Pisco Sour and a Pisco Sour made with Exotic fruits. After your pisco experience, you will enjoy a delicious, yet exotic Amazon fusion dinner, made by the pioneer chef in this culinary field. At the conclusion of dinner, you will be taken back to your hotel for the remainder of the evening. *An extra day in Lima can be added upon request. Please let us know if you like us to add additional activities and meals.

Day 8: Culinary Shopping, Lunch at closed doors & Farewell Nikkei Dinner (B, L, D)

After your final breakfast in Lima, you will be met at your hotel lobby and taken on your culinary shopping tour through the city of Lima. We will take you to shop for recipe books and ingredients for you to prepare at home the Peruvian dishes you learned to make during your trip. At the conclusion of your shopping tour, you will be taken on your “closed-door” lunch at Sankuay Restaurant. This is the non-traditional stop at a “Puerta Cerrada” (Close door) restaurant so don’t bother to look for a sign outside. We will just say the chef’s name when the door cracks open. Here Chef Javier Wong will personally prepare you lunch at his 8-table Sankuay restaurant, located is his three-story home steps away from a wide avenue lined with tire and rim vendors in Lima’s industrial La Victoria district. Behind a spotless white counter, wearing his signature woven golf cap, Wong will start chopping with his $900-Victorinox knife and mixing fragrant ingredients with the freshest fish. There are no menus at Sankuay. Wong, who was born of Chinese ancestry, will determine your first and second courses with a quick glance at your party. At the conclusion of lunch, you will be taken back to your hotel in order for you to enjoy the remainder of the afternoon, free at your leisure.

Seeing how this is your last day in Peru, this free-time will allow you to prepare for your flight back home, or tie up any lose ends that have yet to be done. In the evening, you will be picked up at your hotel, and after a quick check-out, be taken on your farewell Nikkei at Costanera 700 Restaurant, one of the premier restaurants in all of Peru. You will have an eye opening dinner at the restaurant of the chef who was the first to merge these two amazing food cultures in Peru. You will experience the Japanese and Asian influence in the Peruvian Cuisine. Japanese taught Peruvian how to eat fresh fish and the use of seafood and the next generation of Japanese adopted Peruvian ingredients and fusion them with their techniques. The result was a wonderful Cuisine that takes the best of both worlds. At the conclusion of dinner, your trip to Peru winds to a close as we transport you back to Jorge Chavez airport, in order for you to catch your flight back home. * Please let us know if you like to add extra activities or an extra day hotel if your flight is the next morning.

NOTE: Some people prefer to go directly to the Sacred Valley upon arrival to the Cusco Airport. Please let us know if you prefer that to send you an updated itinerary

Not exactly what you want?

Remember that Magical focuses on providing the best available options and can work with you on customizing your tour to better fit your interests and budget, without compromising the quality of your tour. Just contact us with your questions and preferences and we can modify this tour based on your expectations and requests.

Important Notes:

About MachuPicchu Entrance Tickets

As the popularity of MachuPicchu has increased in the last few years, and in order to preserve the ancient paths of MachuPicchu, the Peruvian Cultural Institute (INC) has restricted the number of people that could enter MachuPicchu to 2,500 people per day. This means that, once the 2,500 tickets are sold out, no further entrance tickets will available. Also, please note that to avoid a secondary market for these tickets, all tickets are issued with the name of the passenger, his/her passport number, nationality and date of birth. Therefore, tickets are non refundable and non transferable.

About Huaynapichu Tickets

Entrance tickets to Huaynapichu are not longer free, entrance tickets are now US$12.00 per person. There are two scheduled visits per day, with a limit of 200 people per visit (Total of 400 per day). If you are interested in hiking the Huaynapichu, we will need you to let us know at the same time you book your trip since the Huaynapichu tickets need to be purchased in conjunction to the MachuPicchu tickets.

Price

This tour (*) is available from:

USD$1684.90 per person – Culinary activities are in Private, cultural tours are in group. All Private Transfers

For single supplement and prices in a private service, please contact us!

* Based on double occupancy, 4 people, Budget Accommodations

IMPORTANT: As price depends on each passenger choices, please contact us to send you an updated price based on your specific request. Please send us the following information and we will respond within 24 hours with your updated price.

• Number of people in your party
• Level of accommodation (3, 4, 5*). Please see options
• Choosing a Private or Group Tour?
• Train choice. Please see options
• Adding options: if you like to add day tours, extra days, meals, etc
• Need domestic or international flights?
• Have a special request (e.g.: special diet, wheelchair, children, senior, etc)

What’s Included?

• Expedition train Roundtrip. Upgrade to other trains: Vistadome or Hiram Bingham upon request
• Bus to MachuPicchu roundtrip.
• Expert leadership / guides & support personnel for all listed tours.
• Cooking Set and recipes.
• Accommodations: 4 nights in Lima and 3 nights in Cusco.
• Meals as noted (B = Breakfast, L = Lunch, D = Dinner, S = Snack). We can add any meals upon request
• Land excursions as noted including entrance fees (Lima Cathedral, San Francisco Catacombs, Lima Museum, BTG, Cusco Cathedral, Qoricancha and MachuPicchu)
• Private transportation: Lima Airport/Lima Hotel, Lima Hotel/Lima Market, Lima Market/Lima Restaurant, Lima Restaurant/Lima Hotel, Lima Hotel/Lima Restaurant, Lima Hotel/Lima Airport, Cusco Airport/Cusco Hotel, Cusco Hotel/Train Station, Train Station/Cusco Hotel, Cusco Hotel/Cusco Airport, Lima Airport/Lima Restaurant, Lima Restaurant/Lima Hotel, Lima Hotel/Lima Airport.

What’s Not Included?

• Airport taxes: Local ($5-6) and International ($31) departure tax of payable in local currency by each passenger at Lima International Airport upon departure (if applicable)
• International and domestic airfares, usually quoted separately
• Insurance of any kind: mandatory evacuation insurance; suggested cancellation insurance, interruption, baggage loss, damage and delay
• Visas. Please be advised that some citizens other than Canadians and US may need visa to travel to Peru. Please advise us of your nationality to help you or check with the Peruvian Consulate.
• Tipping & Gratuities (Guides $4 per person per day / Drivers $1 per person per day)
• Excess baggage charges
• Medical immunizations
• Items of a personal nature (clothing, sodas, liquor, snacks, laundry, etc.)

Domestic Tickets

Lima/Cusco/Lima: From US $190 per person. This is an example price. Prices depend on date and time of booking