The most rewarding excursion from Pacasmayo is up the Jequetepeque Valley, which rises east of town along the river road to Cajamarca. Rice paddies and sugar-cane fields give way to pre-Columbian adobe mounds, colonial villages, and eventually the Gallito Ciego reservoir — a full half-day by taxi or hired car, and one of the more quietly impressive drives on the northern Peruvian coast.