Peru · Departamento de Ancash
Where to Stay in Chimbote, Departamento de Ancash
Chimbote is a city of the north coast of Peru, once the greatest fishing port in the world, a steel town on a wide desert bay below the Andes.
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Where to stay in Chimbote
Each area has its own feel; here's who each one suits.
Where you stay in Chimbote turns on the town or the bay. The centre keeps the market, the plaza, and the fish quays within a walk, and staying downtown suits anyone here for the port. The bay lies just west.
Boats unload the catch. Out toward the coast and the valley, the town gives way to the quiet suburbs, the beach coves, and the road up to the Andes. A room by the shore trades the streets for the wide bay, the sea air, and the brown hills above the water.
The desert runs to the peaks. Stay downtown for the port, or out for the bay. The fishing fleet and the wide bay hold the coast city.
About Chimbote
Chimbote is the fishing city of the Peruvian coast.
What is Chimbote known for?
On a great bay of the Pacific in the north of Peru, it grew as a port and a steel town, and it keeps the huge fishing fleet of the anchovy grounds, the steelworks by the shore, the old adobe mound of San Pedro, and the road up the valley to the high Andes. The cold sea swarms with fish. Boats crowd the wide bay.
What are the main landmarks in Chimbote?
The fishing fleet is the pride of Chimbote. The great fleet of boats working the anchovy grounds, once the largest catch in the world, is the emblem of the town, downtown. An old mound stands in the streets.
The adobe temple of San Pedro rises among the houses of the town nearby, while the steelworks, the Bay of Ferrol, and the Sechín ruins mark the country around Chimbote.
What is the history of Chimbote?
Chimbote grew from an old fishing bay. On the sheltered Bay of Ferrol fishers had long drawn their nets, and a small port lay by the shore. The anchovy made it boom.
In the last century the vast shoals of anchovy off the coast drew fleets and fishmeal plants, and Chimbote swelled into one of the greatest fishing ports on earth. Steel came to the shore. The country built its great steelworks at Chimbote, and the town grew fast with mills and migrants.
The old coast held ancient marks. Up the valleys nearby stood the adobe temples of Sechín and Casma, among the oldest in the Americas, and Chimbote grew as the port of the north coast, keeping its bay, its boats, and its steel. The boats still fill the harbour.
Chimbote keeps its fishing city on the bay.
Where is Chimbote?
Chimbote lies on the north coast of Peru, on the wide Bay of Ferrol. The city sits on a desert shore by the Pacific, ringed by bare brown hills, at the foot of the Santa valley, with the cold sea and its islands to the west and the great wall of the Andes rising far inland to the east. The cold sea laps the bay.
Bare hills ring the town.
What is the climate of Chimbote?
Chimbote has a cool, dry desert climate. Mild dry weather holds all year on the coast, with grey winter fog and warm clear summers by the sea. Fog hangs over the bay.
Dry heat lies inland.
How do you get to Chimbote?
Chimbote lies on the north coast of Peru, on the Pan-American Highway. The highway runs through it along the coast from Lima and Trujillo, and a road climbs east to Huaraz and the Andes. Boats work the bay.
Lima lies south down the coast.
More cities in Departamento de Ancash
Updated August 2026