La Marina Lighthouse Park

At the edge of the Miraflores cliff stands an operating lighthouse with a twenty-two-meter cast-iron tower; the cliff raises its lantern to one hundred eight meters above the ocean. It is part of the Lima Bay marker system and assists vessels along the coast and on approaches to Callao. In a quarter of a minute, the lantern flashes white three times; this rhythm lets crews distinguish it from neighboring lights. Rows of bolts are visible on the cast iron, and a bronze inscription in honor of the seafarer is mounted at the base.

In December nineteen seventy-three, staff of the Directorate of Hydrography and Navigation of the Peruvian Navy completed an unusual task here: they assembled a lighthouse that had previously stood far to the south of the country. The sixty-ton cast-iron tower was dismantled into three hundred nineteen parts, transported to Lima, and bolted together again with one thousand seven hundred fifty bolts.

Before that, the lighthouse had served at Punta Coles, south of the port of Ilo. Its light was first lit on February twenty-fourth, nineteen twenty-one. For sailors approaching Ilo, the tower was a working navigational marker, not a tourist attraction. The lighthouse was damaged after the earthquake of nineteen seventy. Specialists responsible for navigational safety decided to move it to the capital as part of a program to upgrade coastal lights. The tower never returned to its former cape.

The site at the edge of Miraflores was chosen for its height. The tower itself rises twenty-two meters, but the cliff places its lantern one hundred eight meters above the ocean. Here, the old lighthouse became part of the navigational-marker system of Lima Bay, used by vessels along the coast and on approaches to Callao. Its signal is three white flashes in fifteen seconds: by this rhythm, a crew distinguishes this light from neighboring ones.

The name “La Marina” refers to the Peruvian Navy: its hydrographic service moved the tower and continues to maintain it. The park takes its name from the lighthouse. A bronze inscription reading “In Honor of the Seafarer” is mounted at the base. It refers to the people for whom the whole project was intended: sailors who determined their position by coastal signals.

The lighthouse is still in operation. Its three flashes continue to repeat over the bay, while the rows of bolts on the cast-iron tower hold together the very light that, for the first fifty-two years of its service, showed sailors an entirely different stretch of the Peruvian coast.