Machu Picchu often is the highlight of a tourist’s visit to Peru resting almost 8,000 feet above sea level on a spectacular mountain ridge and evoking life of the Incas in the 15th century.
The Cuban-American singer Gloria Estefan was so taken that she completed a romantic video at the site that is interspersed with references to a love story possibly involving Pachacuti, the Inca emperor who is thought to have developed the community.
Tourism is booming in Peru, reportedly growing faster there than in any other South American country. Historically important — tourism is Peru’s third most important industry after fishing and mining — it takes many forms including archeological and gastronomic, not to mention the tourists who go for hiking or to enjoy its historic cities and towns and its natural beauty.
In recent years as the country’s economy has experienced a positive lift and the cruise lines stop at its ports frequently with their thousands of passengers, tourism is more important than ever.
Although Global Atlanta didn’t have the time to go to Machu Picchu during a visit to the country this September organized by the Consulate General of Peru in Atlanta, it did visit to the Hacienda Mamacona located near the capital Lima just off the Pan-American Highway.
The hacienda or landed estate belongs to the Rizo family and has become a popular destination for tourists, and for Peruvians as well who celebrate marriages or hold other festivities on its grounds, which include a popular restaurant for special occasions.
The hacienda marks a sort of cultural revival because its most prized possession are its horses that are famous for their body portions and their natural four-beat, lateral gait called the “paso llano.”
The horses’ unique qualities were developed over hundreds of years of breeding beginning with those
originally brought over by the Spanish conquistadors in the 16th century. Their bloodstock was expanded with the arrival of horses from elsewhere in the Spanish empire stretching through the Caribbean and Central America.
The owners of sugar and cotton plantations, primarily in northern Peru, preferred horses with an easy gait because they had to travel many miles over their properties as they oversaw their crops.
The horses also were found to be useful in the south where the extensive desert landscape required horses with good endurance and hearty constitutions to traverse the arid terrain between the scattered settlements. The need for horses in the south diminished, however, with the development of motor travel and the proliferation of highways during the 20th century.
They continued to be essential in the north as a means of getting around the enormous haciendas until they suffered a severe setback under the agrarian reforms of the government of Juan Velasco Alvarado, a general who seized power in October 1968 in a bloodless coup that deposed the democratically-elected government.
A dispute with a subsidiary of the Standard Oil Co. sparked the coup, and the Alvarado government nationalized the country’s oil fields. Inspired by the policies of the Peronist party in Argentina to raise the economic level of the poor, General Velasco nationalized entire industries and expropriated many companies.
Under his increasingly authoritarian rule, the general also expropriated the haciendas and broke up many of the horses’ breeding operations resulting in the loss of much of the breeding stock.
During the first 10 years of his reign, 15,000 properties were expropriated and the Rizo family lost the majority of its lands and consequently also its ability to maintain its horses.
As his health declined, the general was replaced in 1975 and by the end of the decade a Constitutional Assembly was established and a civilian government took over.
In the 1980s, the government sought to reverse some of the radical effects of the agrarian reforms. Although the politics in Peru remained turbulent through the 1990s, families such as the Rizos were able to regain some of their lands.
Diego Rizo Patron Bazo, a member of the family, began to restock the breed and today his stock has from nine to 15 colts a year, which are trained and closely watched for a period of two years to see if they are going to develop into competitive mounts.
“We are breeding our horses for competition,” he told Global Atlanta. Those horses that aren’t deemed suitable for competition are sold to those who wish to own them for pleasurable activities such as trail riding or participating in parades.
Meanwhile, Hacienda Mamacona has become such a tourist attraction that it counted 13,000 visitors last year on account of shows they put on with their horses proudly demonstrating their gaits — to such an extent that the horses are even able to join lovely Peruvian women in marinera and other native dances.
The revival of the Peruvian horse is now widely recognized and an annual show in Lima has become a 
major event in the country’s cultural life. The Peruvian paso also 
has been declared a “Patrimonio Cultural” of Peru in an attempt to shore up the breed within the country and laws have been put in place restricting the export of national champions.
The laws, however, didn’t prevent the Rizo family from flying a number of them to Spain where they performed in Seville and one was even given to Queen Letiza, an admirer of the special breed.
Atlanta Ballet is the presenting sponsor of Global Atlanta's Culture Channel. Subscribe here for monthly Culture newsletters.
