Stories: Luxury Travel Peru

The month of February is filled annually with festivities and carnivals in many corners of the world; Peru is no exception. The first two weeks of February are replete with colors, music and dancing as people flock to Puno, a city in the Altiplano on Lake Titicaca, to celebrate Puno’s patron saint during La Fiesta de la Virgen de Candelaria. The Candelaria Festival is one of Peru's top festivals and recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Read more on Peru's best festivals and down a free festival calendar to help plan your trip to time with the top cultural events and festivities. Candelaria Festival in Peru  Candelaria Festival is often compared to Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and Carnival in Oruro, Bolivia, because of the sheer size of the event, number of participants and the mix of Catholicism with beliefs and traditions of native cultures. Every year the celebrations in Puno include hundreds of thousands of dancers in amazingly detailed and colorful costumes, along with tens of thousands of musicians who reenact hundreds of traditional dances in a stadium, as well as more informally each day in the street. Preparations for the festival are extensive and start almost a year in advance, whereby thousands of directors, sponsors, embroiderers and artisans work throughout the year creating the masks, boots and shoes, bells and other items that adorn the dancers and musicians. These skills are passed on to younger generations through rehearsals and artisan workshops. Folk tradition meets Catholic beliefs The blending of folkloric traditions, like the Inca culture’s reverence of Pachamama (Mother Earth), and Catholic traditions, like the Virgin of Candlemas, is apparent during this festival. In colonial times many indigenous people used Catholic saints to mask their reverence of Andean deities. The celebration dates back to the 16th