Oscar was our official English-speaking guide and driver for this one-day excursion. But he brought along Rene, his friend, to help with the long drive to Toro Muerto and to share some history of the Majes River valley. Rene only spoke Spanish so Oscar translated. 

Our first destination, three hours west of Arequipa, was Toro Muerto to see drawings and carvings on volcanic rocks. Toro Muerto means dead bull and the name for the area was chosen because many herds of livestock died there from dehydration as the animals were led from the mountains of Peru to the coast. 

Historians believe that the petroglyphs date back to 1,000 to 1,500 BC and are remains from the Huari and Chuquibamba cultures. Toro Muerto is the largest archeological depository of petroglyphs in the world and few visitors travel to the sight each year. 

We hiked around on the hillsides in the warm sun with Oscar and Rene to find some of the 2,000+ registered, intact petroglyphs of people, animals (elk, snakes, deer, llamas, fish, and birds), plants, and geometric shapes on the white volcanic boulders. One rock includes over 150 drawings.  Interpretations of the artwork vary widely and both Oscar and Rene shared plausible meanings of the petroglyphs we found.

After our visit to Toro Muerto  we watched a giant egret catch fish while we ate lunch at a restaurant along the Majes River. Then we traveled about 15 minutes to Querulpa Jurassic Park to see dinosaur footprints, fossils, and life-size models of the large creatures.

The footprints vary in size with some 75 cm long (30 inches), 54 cm deep (21 inches), and 25 cm wide (10 inches) and others as wide as 60 cm (24 inches), and 10 cm deep (4 inches). The footprints, discovered about 40 years ago by the son of the land owner, are presumed to belong to the Plintosaurus, a giant animal that weighed between 8 and 10 tons. Owners of the private park believe that even more footprints remain undiscovered.