Peru With Kids Beyond Cusco: Lake Titicaca, the Amazon at Tambopata and Lima’s Food

By Nicole Damiano, ASTA Verified Travel Advisor with FG Luxury Travel · Updated September 2026

Peru rewards families that stay longer than the standard week. Machu Picchu and the Sacred Valley are the core, but the coast, the jungle and the lake each add something completely different, and none of them are hard to reach.

Lima

Most flights land here and it is worth two nights rather than a stopover. Miraflores sits on cliffs above the Pacific with a long park along the top and paragliders overhead. Kids love the Parque del Amor and the cat park at Kennedy. The food is the point of Lima. Ceviche for the adventurous, lomo saltado for everyone else, and the Larcomar mall for the day a kid needs something familiar. The Larco Museum has a garden cafe and enough gold to keep a ten year old interested.

Tambopata

A short flight from Cusco to Puerto Maldonado puts you in the Amazon, and lodges up the Tambopata River are set up for families. Boat trips at dawn to the macaw clay lick, walks to see monkeys, night walks for caiman on the riverbank, and a canopy tower for the sunrise. Three nights is plenty. Kids from about six do well. It is hot and humid and the lodges provide boots and nets.

Lake Titicaca

From Cusco a scenic train or a bus takes you to Puno on the shore of the highest navigable lake in the world. Boats go out to the Uros floating islands, built from reeds, where families let kids walk on the springy ground and try the reed boats. Homestays on Amantani or Taquile islands are a real immersion for older kids. It is very high here, above 12,000 feet, so do this at the end of the trip once everyone is used to it.

Arequipa and Colca

The white city under a volcano, with a huge convent to wander and the Colca Canyon two hours out where condors soar past at eye level in the morning. This suits families with older kids and a bit more time.

How long

Ten days covers Lima, the Sacred Valley, Machu Picchu and Cusco. Two weeks adds the Amazon or the lake. Three weeks does it all without rushing. Peru is a country where kids grow up a little on the trip, and that is worth the extra days.

Planning Peru with kids? Start with the full Peru family travel guide, or send me the ages and the dates and I will come back with what is really available.