The Moray Maras Salt Mines Horseback Riding Tour with Wonders of Peru Expeditions is a full-day Sacred Valley adventure combining horseback riding through the Andean highlands with guided visits to two of Peru’s most remarkable sites — the circular Inca terraces at Moray and the ancient salt-harvesting pools at Maras. Over eight hours, you ride Peruvian Paso horses through high-altitude farmland with views of the snow-capped Veronica and Chicon peaks.
Most visitors see Moray and Maras from a tour bus window. On horseback, you ride through the same highland terrain the Incas once traveled — past traditional Andean villages, potato and quinoa fields, and high-altitude grasslands at over 3,400 meters. The ride between sites takes approximately 2.5 to 3 hours and passes through landscapes that vehicle tours miss entirely. This is the Sacred Valley the way the Incas experienced it.
Moray features concentric circular terraces that plunge approximately 150 meters deep. The Incas used this site as an agricultural laboratory — the temperature difference between the top and bottom terraces reaches up to 15°C, creating distinct microclimates that allowed them to test which crops could grow at different altitudes.
Maras Salt Mines contains more than 3,000 salt pools carved into the mountainside, fed by a natural saltwater spring. Salt has been harvested here since before the Inca Empire, and local families still use the same ancestral techniques today. The cascading white terraces against the brown mountain create one of Peru’s most photographed landscapes.
Your guide picks you up from your hotel in Cusco or the Sacred Valley and drives to the starting point. After a safety briefing and horse assignment, you ride uphill through small villages and farmland with views of the snow-capped peaks. After approximately three hours of riding, you arrive at Moray for a guided tour. From there, you continue to the town of Maras for lunch before transferring by vehicle to the salt mines for a guided visit. You return to your hotel by approximately 5:00 PM.
8 Days
8
English, Spanish
A full-day experience combining horseback riding with visits to two of the Sacred Valley’s top sites. No riding experience needed. Maximum weight: 90 kg (200 lbs). Departure at 8:30 AM.
