The Maras salt pans sit about an hour north of Cusco, carved into the slope above the Urubamba valley at around 3,200 metres. There are roughly 4,500 shallow pools fed by a single salt spring that has been running since before the Inca.
Local families own individual pools — a few square metres each — and the ownership is hereditary within the community of Maras. The spring water evaporates in the sun, salt is scraped out by hand roughly every month, and the operation has worked the same way for about 1,000 years. Pink, white and brown salt grades sell locally and online.
Visitors used to walk down between the pools; since 2019 that’s been restricted to a viewing platform at the top of the complex, which still gives the full staircase of pools. Combine it with the circular agricultural terraces at Moray, 15 minutes further on, for a half-day trip from Cusco or the Sacred Valley.
Book the Maras-Moray day trip with transport and a guide through Peruways. Entry to Maras is 10 soles; Moray is on the Boleto Turístico.
