Rioja

Rioja is the capital of Rioja Province in the San Martín Region of northern Peru, west of Moyobamba, with 24,263 inhabitants in the 2007 census. It lies in the valley of the upper Mayo River at 848 metres above sea level, among peaks that exceed 1,000 metres, with a semi-humid subtropical climate and an average temperature of 22.5 degrees Celsius. In Inca times the province was inhabited by two tribes, the Uquihuas and the Chepenes, and at the end of the sixteenth century one of the first Catholic missionaries arrived at Uquihua. Rioja was founded in September 1782 as Santo Toribio de la Nueva Rioja. It is connected to the rest of the country by the Carretera Marginal jungle highway, with daily bus services, minibuses, collective taxis and lorries, by the Rioja Airport, which takes small and medium-sized aircraft for passengers and cargo, and by the Mayo, Tonchima and Negro rivers, on which motor boats, canoes and rafts carry small cargo.