San Pedro de Casta

Marcahuasi and the Plateau of Stone Faces

A plateau at four thousand metres in the Peruvian Andes, strewn with weathered rocks in which faces and animal figures appear under the right light. The Peruvian researcher Daniel Ruzo announced in the 1950s that they were the work of an ancient civilisation; geologists hold the shapes to be erosion and the resemblance to be the work of human eyesight. From the 1970s the plateau became a place for esoteric groups to camp, and reports of lights arrived with them. They have been described here for decades, and Marcahuasi is a fixture on Peruvian lists of sighting sites. It can only be reached on foot or on horseback, the nights are cold, and most of the observations were made by people who came for them.