Provoking many visitors to make the trip all the way down from Lima, this former slave plantation with its stately hacienda offers a window into race and class in the Peruvian historical context. While the buildings and grounds are indeed magnificent, the museum could be orientated less to the opulence of the gentry and more to the horrors endured by their slaves. One-hour tours of the hacienda and its famous catacombs include strolls through the original building, with its fine baroque chapel.
Surviving artifacts include frescoes, agricultural equipment, and brutal remnants of a system once used to subjugate the slaves including an extensive web of catacombs and underground tunnels. A spectacularly ruined cotton factory, dating from 1913, sits next door.
