Located 48km northeast of Cusco city, Maras was an important town during the Spanish colonization, evidenced by the church and large homes still bearing shields of indigenous nobility on their facades. These days, the local economy is centered around agriculture.
10 km from the town of Maras. Also called Salinas de Maras. They are salt mines whose exploitation is as old as the Tahuantinsuyo. The villagers channel the saline water that emanates from the ground into pools where, due to the effects of the sun, it evaporates, leaving the salt on the surface, which is then treated to be sold in the local market. The view of the group of approximately three thousand pools is spectacular. Villagers show visitors their ancestral techniques and allow them to intervene in the collection.
About 7 kms. to the southwest of Maras is Moray; unique archaeological group of its kind in the region. These are depressions or gigantic natural holes, which were used to build terraces or agricultural platforms with their respective irrigation channels; What is striking is the difference in mean annual temperature between the top and bottom of the depressions, this difference reaches up to 15 ° C.
The largest hole has a depth of 150 meters and the average height of the platforms is 1.80 meters, between them.
The structures found here are typically Inka, however, some suggest that they are earlier structures, at least on the lower terraces. It is also estimated that the bottom is on a very porous natural rock formation that facilitates the filtration towards the interior of the earth, at the bottom of the depressions there are no floods in the rainy season.
