We stayed for a week in Huanchaco, which is a former fishermen's village and nowadays town close to Trujillo on the other side of the historical town of Chan Chan which is basically separating Huanchaco from Trujillo together with the airport. Huanchaco is nice- we took our first surf classes, there´s always fresh fish until sunset and you can witness the usage of the caballitos de tortora (reet boats) that have been used since ancient times by Moche and Chimú cultures and probably don´t qualify for modern safety standards. 
 
Chimú is also the culture that lived in Chan Chan until 1500 a.D.. It developed from the Moche culture that habituated the coast and had its centre at the Río Moche a bit south of Trujillo. The temple of the Moon and parts of the excavated town can be visited and there is a museum with displays of the two cultures. The Chimú took over the Moche centre and used it for their own purposes later.

Chan Chan is a huge territory. For every leader the Chimú built a new temple in Chan Chan and the old one was abandoned as a tomb palace. There are 9 temples today and only the Nik An temple can be visited. It consists of 3 plazas. One was the public plaza inside the temple in which the normal people would come for ceremonies. The other two plazas were more private for the nobility. There are still nice carvings in the adobe of animals like birds or squirrels or just geometrical patterns. Parts of the temple like the administrative area are protected by a plastic roof today as bird poo and rain can cause more erosion damage. The whole side is endangered by erosion.

We took a guide at the entrance. She could explain the basics well in English however any sort of more complicated question like building a relation between the Chimú and the Inka habits, that terminated the Chimú culture by conquering them without fighting, was too complicated for her. We took a bus from Huanchaco to Trujillo (any bus can be taken; cost of 2,50 Soles, you pay when getting off) and walked the 1,4 km from the road to Nik An temple where you find the entrance area. There are information panels in Spanish about the excavations and the findings along this 1,4 km long road. It´s a bit tough to read it in bright sunshine but also interesting as you find many unexcavated remains of Chan Chan along the way.

Also on the other side of the main road Chan Chan continues. You can see the remains of the adobe buildings and there is no fence around it. There are panels that say that you will go in prison if you destroy the archaeological heritage. Officially you can not visit big parts of Chan Chan but inofficially you could probably walk around this huge, archeological area. However I´m not sure if there is anything to see as all is impacted by over 500 years of erosion and impact of sea salt. Also since the pandemic the related archeological sites of Huaca Esmeralda and Huaca Arco Iris are closed for visits. Huaca Arco Iris is also displayed on the back of the  20 Soles bill in Peru. The site museum is walking or driving back to the main road and then a few more meters to the right. It displays some findings of the Chan Chan complex in a nice way however it is lacking information. Guides hang around here and could be helpful.  
 
I found the Nik An temple and the Chimu culture quite interesting and the site plus the museum display the culture in an interesting way. By this I found it more pleasant to visit than other archeological sites in Peru like Caral.