Maras Salt Flats (Urabamba Province, Peru)

 

My guide and I are on our way from Cusco to the Sacred Valley of the Inca. Along the way, we will make a couple of stops. The first is the Maras Salt Flats. This very impressive site sites at an elevation of 10,500 feet above sea level. While a fresh water creek passes beside and below the salt flats, a salt water spring feeds the saline rich liquid through a complex canal system and allows the indigenous peoples to mine thousands of tons of salt each year. 

Researchers have discovered relics dating back as far as 700 B.C.E. in this area, indicating that these pools have been a source of salt for thousands of years. And, they are used until this very day. The saline waters flow through an ingeniously engineered system of canals and pools. The pools are flooded and then over the course of a couple of weeks, the high Andean sun evaporates all of the water, leaving a thick layer of crystalized salt to be harvested. There are a few thousand pools in the system and it is quite site to behold.