Hi friends, and thanks for stopping by to read Horseback Riding in Colca Canyon, Peru: The Tour Solo Travellers Can Actually Book.
Owning horses for most of my life meant there was one experience I wasn’t willing to miss in Peru: riding in the Andes. Finding a horseback excursion, however, proved far more difficult than I expected. Most operators required a minimum of two people. As a solo traveller, I kept hearing the same answer: “Sorry.”
One thing was missing from my Peru itinerary: a day in the saddle. After owning horses for most of my life, I couldn’t imagine spending weeks in Peru without finding a trail ride. The challenge wasn’t finding horses – it was finding a company willing to take a solo traveller.
If you’ve ever searched Expedia (affiliate link) or GetYourGuide (affiliate link) for horseback riding in Peru, you’ll know the frustration. Every promising excursion seemed to end the same way: “Minimum two participants required.” As a solo traveller, I either couldn’t book at all or was quoted an eye-watering price because I’d have to pay for two people. Most of the alternatives were the standard Colca Canyon sightseeing tours with no horses involved.
Finding Perou Voyages
Saddle up! After weeks of searching for a horseback riding excursion in Peru that didn’t require two people – or cost a small fortune – I finally found exactly what I was looking for.
During my research, I came across plenty of Colca Canyon hiking tours where horses are available to carry tired hikers back up the steep canyon at the end of the trek. That’s a wonderful option if your goal is hiking. But I wasn’t looking for transportation – I was looking for a real horseback riding experience.
I took the description from Expedia and plugged it into Google to see if I could find the vendor posting their services on another platform. It gave me all kinds of results, but I found what I was looking for on either the second or third page. A link to Perou Voyages.
Tour in the Colca Canyon with a Horseback Ride – 2 days / 1 night
Whether or not they were the same vendor listing on Expedia, I do not know…
Also, just in case anyone thinks Perou is a typo. Nope. The owner is French and that’s how they spell Peru.
I read the description and liked what I was seeing. A tour to the Colca Canyon that was NOT leaving Arequipa at 2:30am – they departed around 8am – that included sightseeing stops, a bilingual guide, horseback riding for 3 hours, and on the second day a tour to the Condor Cross where it might be possible to see these majestic birds.
No prices were listed on the website, but it also didn’t mention anything about minimum participants. I sent an email asking for a quote as a solo traveller.
Price and what’s included
Communications with the owner, Thomas, were pretty quick.
My cost as a solo traveller to do the tour in the above link was US $189.
Now, as a Canadian, I don’t like paying US dollars for nothing because the exchange rate sucks! But, what am I gonna do? Especially when I want to go horseback riding. Even though the currency in Peru is soles, many business do quote in US dollars. Anyway, the exchange was around CAD $250 to $260.
This includes 2 days/1 night tour in the Colca with a 3-hour horseback ride and 1 night in the Miskiwasi bed and breakfast in a private room.
Also included is a bilingual tour guide, transportation on a 15 passenger bus and a couple of tourist stops between Arequipa and the Colca Canyon. Day 2 would be the trip to view the condors in the canyon. There’s an entry fee of 70 soles that is not included in the price.
The bus returns to Arequipa around 5:30pm. There is also an option not to return to Arequipa and instead transfer to a bus to Puno (Lake Titicaca). However I wanted to spend more time in Arequipa, and I was travelling with the Peru Hop bus and the next stop was Puno, so no need for me to bypass. But this is helpful information to people who are travelling with other bus companies in Peru, and booking each leg separately.
I asked a few questions, namely if I could take my luggage, a 60 liter backpack, rather than leaving it in my Arequipa hotel’s luggage storage area. And yes, no problem with my luggage. They have a cargo area at the back of the bus where it’s safe.
Sounds good. Let’s go ahead and book it.
Payment details
There is a 30% prepayment (deposit) – 56.70 US dollars. The balance can be paid in soles, in euros or US dollars or by paypal in Arequipa when I arrive there.
You can bet that I did my due diligence and made sure Perou Voyages is a registered company before moving any money. I’m a little nervous about businesses who aren’t set up for credit card payments. At least if I pay by credit card and things go south, I can put in a dispute to get my money back.
Before paying my deposit, I did a little homework. I confirmed that Perou Voyages was registered with Peru’s tourism authorities through the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism (MINCETUR). As someone booking independently from overseas, I always like to verify that a tour operator is properly registered before sending money.
Whew! Not a scammer! By that point I’d read how scammers are proficient on third party booking sites, but mostly they prey on gullible tourists wanting tickets for sold out dates to Machu Picchu.
Perou Voyages also can accept payment through Western Union, but honestly PayPal was easier seeing as how I’ve had an account there for years.
They also asked for my passport number, which is pretty standard with companies offering travel services. Some travellers don’t like doing this, but really, what’s someone going to do with your passport number? It’s not like they can use it to apply for a credit card under your name and wreck your credit history.
Travel Tip: When booking directly with a local tour operator in Peru, check that they’re listed in MINCETUR’s National Directory of Qualified Tourism Service Providers. It only takes a few minutes and can give you added confidence before paying a deposit.
Meet up in Arequipa
I arranged a time for Thomas from Perou Voyages to meet me at my hotel in Arequipa to finalize the payment – I paid the balance in soles.
He showed up at the hotel with a map of Arequipa and suggestions for places to visit during my stay, local fruit to try, and tips about the altitude I’d be heading into for my Colca Canyon trip.
Very personalized service. Yes, I was impressed.
And one more thing, I asked Thomas if there are places to ride horses in Arequipa and the answer is no. There are no riding stables near town. The surrounding areas are industrial as I discovered, not a place for horseback riding.
We’re off to the Colca Canyon
The following morning around 8am a mini bus with seating for about 15 passengers picked me up at my hotel. We had a great bilingual guide on board.
For about the first twenty minutes of our trip he talked to us about remedies the Peruvians use to help with the altitude. And there was a planned stop at a small grocery shop where these items could be purchased.
I’d already purchased what I needed at the San Camilo Market – coca leaves, coca candies, and Agua de Florida.
And a little caution about Agua de Florida. It is NOT for dinking. Splash a little on your hands, rub them together, and sniff. It’s kind of like huffing Lemon Pledge!
My instructions were to suck on one coca candy about every 30 minutes until the highest point of altitude was reached, around noon. The photo below is at that rest stop – 4,910 meters! That’s just over 16,000 feet. For comparison’s sake, the altitude at Everest Base Camp is about 5,300 meters, so this is pretty high altitude. There is about 45% less oxygen here than at sea level.
There had also been a stop at a cafe along the way to buy Inca tea that also helps with the altitude according to the locals. Well, OK. When in Peru…
A quick note on the tour, after chatting with other bus passengers it was clear no one else was horseback riding. It appears that several local travel agencies use this company to transport their clients to the Colca Canyon for whatever adventure they’ve signed up for. Most of the passengers disembarked in Chivay where they could soak in hot springs and sign up for dinner and a dance show. One couple was going to a nearby town where the hotel had their own hot springs.
Yanque, Peru
I was dropped off at the Miskiwasi B&B in Yanque. Nice little hotel where I suspect I had the place to myself because I didn’t run into any other guests.
The room was a good size and very comfortable.
It included breakfast the following morning.
I also bought lunch and dinner there on arrival day because it was easier than wandering around the small village looking for food. The meals were good, reasonably priced, and safely prepared.
Horseback riding in the Colca Canyon
After lunch, the wrangler – aka a local woman who does not speak English – arrived at the hotel to take me on my 3 hour ride.
The itinerary on the website described a leisurely ride through Yanque to see the historic church, a bridge over the Colca River and a pre-Inca cemetery. My ride turned out quite differently, and I wasn’t disappointed. After the wrangler learned I’d owned horses for most of my life and regularly spent hours trail riding, she took me high into the surrounding mountains instead. Whether she’d already planned that route or decided to tailor it to my experience level, I’ll never know. What I do know is that the views were spectacular.
As we climbed higher into the mountains, my wrangler pointed out the ancient agricultural terraces carved into the hillsides. Through a mix of Spanish and gestures, she explained how families still farm many of these small plots primarily for their own consumption rather than commercial sale. We also talked about the ingenious water channels that bring precious water to the fields in this dry, high-altitude landscape. It was one of those conversations that made the ride about much more than horseback riding.
Yeah, I’m riding a horse in the Andes! What a view!
Llama alert on the right!
Don’t you love these stone fences?
Aw… and all too soon the ride is over.
The wrangler prepares to depart.
I thanked my wrangler with a tip at the end of the ride. She’d given me exactly the kind of horseback adventure I’d been hoping to find in Peru.
Condors in the Colca Canyon
The following day the bus picked me up at the B&B.
There was a brief stop at the main plaza in Yanque where we saw the tail end of a dance performance.
Then it was off to the Colca Canyon to hopefully see some condors. The Colca Canyon is the world’s second largest deepest canyon dropping around 3,400 meters from rim to river. That’s about twice as deep as the Grand Canyon in the USA.
It cost 70 soles to enter the canyon. We all disembarked from the bus to purchase our tickets.
I learned that the condors migrate and usually aren’t in the Colca Canyon from December to May. This was late November. ☹
I saw about 7 condors during our visit and this is the best shot I got.
We did a bit of a hike, not descending or gaining much altitude, mostly it was a path just off the road where we met up at the Condor Cross.
And then we returned to Arequipa, arriving around 5:30pm.
Horseback Riding in Colca Canyon, Peru: The Tour Solo Travellers Can Actually Book
Saddle up! After weeks of searching for a horseback riding excursion in Peru that didn’t require two people – or cost a small fortune – I found exactly what I was looking for.
So here you have it my solo travelling friends who want to go horseback riding in the Colca Canyon. I have blazed the path and found out the way to do it. Through a legitimate travel company who’s not out to rip you off and steal your money.
I do not have any affiliation with Perou Voyages other than being a happy client. I was not paid for this review, nor do I receive any commission if anyone purchases a horseback riding trip to the Colca Canyon.
How many people get to say they’ve ridden a horse in the Andes?
I’ve ridden trails for decades, but this was my first time riding in the Andes.
Yanque itself sits at roughly 3,400 metres (11,150 feet) above sea level, and our trail climbed hundreds of metres higher into the surrounding mountains. Every time we stopped to let the horses catch their breath, the views seemed to stretch farther across the Colca Valley.
I’ve ridden horses for most of my life, and riding through the Andes was one of the highlights of my time in Peru. If you’re a solo traveller who’s been frustrated by the usual “minimum two participants” requirement, don’t give up. This tour proved that with a little persistence, it’s possible to find exactly the adventure you’re looking for.
After months of travelling through Peru, there was something incredibly satisfying about being back in the saddle. Standing beside Machu Picchu was unforgettable. Watching condors soar over Colca Canyon was amazing. But riding a sure-footed horse through the Andes? For this lifelong horsewoman, that was one of the highlights of the entire trip.
Published by Cheryl @ The Lifestyle Digs on July 25, 2026.
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