Peruvian site welcomes aspiring cavemen – and cavewomen
Not all that glitters in the northern Peruvian cavern system of Quicota is true gold.
But that doesn’t mean the remarkably long underground attraction didn’t at one time attract people eager for some instant wealth.
The system, found near the city of Chachapoyas, is 545 meters long, 500 of those meters walkable, with lighting and a walkway awaiting those eager to see a subterranean world.
Area tour guide Henry Valiente notes that Quicota — one of many caverns in the area — hosted people long ago, with human bones and ceramics dating back centuries having been found inside an underground system located in a part of Peru home to many pre-Columbian archeological sites.
Valiente speculates that the caverns may have long ago served as a refuge or a holy spot.
And he adds that it once attracted part of the get-rich-quick crowd, with area residents once incorrectly believing that some Quicota stone that had a golden hue was in fact gold, and worked to extract it.
“It’s not gold. It’s similar. It has no value,” he said of that stone, which some visitors have suggested might be iron pyrites, often dubbed “fool’s gold.”
Valiente said exploring Quicota won’t make you rich but will be enriching, with visitors encountering a world of stalactites, stalagmites and unusually shaped rock formations that have been eons in the making.
Localized lighting can be turned off, enabling visitors to temporarily stand in darkness, perhaps only hear water dripping from the ceiling. (“Some visitors are uneasy about the dark,” he conceded, adding he’ll then keep the lights on throughout his tour.)
Quicota has been turned into a tourist attraction – thanks in part to Japanese funding – welcome news to tourism officials, whose region has struggled to make the inroads among international visitors in the same way that some other areas of Peru – such as the one home to the Inca retreats as Cusco and Machu Picchu – have.
Among recent Quicota visitors was Anas Rawa of Kitchener, Ont.’s, Off the Map Adventures, who acknowledged he can be claustrophobic in some situations.
“I had no issues,” he said of his Quicota visit. “Because the space was so big I didn’t feel nervous.”
Meanwhile, Valiente said Quicota rock formations often form recognizable shapes for visitors and so are given names by guides.
But he acknowledged that not all may come to the same identifying conclusion when it comes to those formations.
“You have to use your imagination,” he stated.
