Peru Travelogue
Introduction
Right around Laura's and my first anniversary, we headed down to Peru
for ten days with our good friends the Bultemeiers. We spent most
of the time in the Cusco department, seeing sights around Cusco and the
Valle Sagrado and then heading off on a four-day Inca Trail trek to
Machu Picchu. On the way out we managed to spend a little time in
Lima.
We kept a pretty frenzied pace, what with all the sightseeing. It
was kind of an exhausting trip, but tremendously worth it. The
pictures take a fair crack at doing it justice. Here are all the
Flickr links for your perusing pleasure:
Travel
It takes something like 23 hours to get
from SEA to CUZ. We transferred in Houston and got to Lima
without incident,
at around midnight. We immediately sought out our first Pisco
Sours -- a mixed drink made with Pisco (a wonderful grappa-like liquor
that should never really be mixed with anything) and lime
and suchlike. Most of us were fairly happy with the drink, but
Angie wasn't a big fan. We also tried all three of the available
beers: Cusquena, Pilsen and Cristal. Later we found out that
these are now all owned by the same company, which made us feel better
about not really being able to distinguish between them.
We then crashed out on the airport floor for three hours (Go Go Gadget
Thermarest!), checked in for the next leg of our flight, and finally
tumbled into the Cusco airport around 7AM. There was a pretty
decent band playing Andean instruments while we
retrieved our bags. There was also a shoeshine stand with actual
authentic plastic Inca walls. We
headed outside
the airport and ran into our first dilemma -- I spoke plenty of Spanish
to get us a cab to the hotel, but how to figure out who to trust?
Eventually we settled on a guy who had a nicely official-looking badge,
and I chatted him up about the Inca Pachacutec and the joys of mucho
altura and
whatnot on the way to the hotel in the hopes that he wouldn't kill us
in an alley. He didn't, and we arrived at
Hotel Los Ninos
, a beautiful
little place about six blocks from the Plaza de Armas, started up by a
Dutch lady in order to raise money for Cusqueno street children.
We enjoyed our first coca tea in the tranquil courtyard while we waited
for our rooms to be ready.
Cusco
After a nap we headed out on the town to see what we could see in Cusco
on a Sunday. Turns out not much, in terms of shops and things --
even touristy Cusco is pretty quiet on Sunday -- but in terms of Inca
walls, we hit the jackpot. The original Inca walls are
everywhere, displayed proudly and surviving due to their quirky habit
of surviving devastating earthquakes while everything else falls down
around them. It's humbling to think about what Cusco must have
been like before it was torn apart by the Spanish.
Walls aside, Cusco is a really pretty city, of about 300,000
people. We walked around, got horribly out of breath, and ate
lunch on the Plaza de Armas, at a place with incredible rocoto relleno
(stuffed spicy peppers). We watched a soccer parade go by and the
Bultemeiers decided to watch the game that was scheduled for that
afternoon (they say that no alcohol is allowed at soccer games in Peru,
but I think they're probably just making stuff up), while Laura and I
walked around Cusco some more.
In the evening we met up again for an excellent dinner at the Inca
Grill. Some friends had recommended it to us, and it didn't
disappoint -- we tried pig heart and guinea pig and quinua (mmmm,
quinotto!), and listened to some excellent music
on the
Andean Flute. The musicians can be forgiven if they drifted into
Fleetwood Mac territory occasionally -- it seems like all of Peru is
stuck in 1985, musically. They apparently have one CD down there
that they keep lending to each other, which is called "Songs to Make
Americans Laugh Out Loud". George Michael figures prominently.
Cusco Day Tour
The next day, we dropped off 30 pounds of books and some school
supplies with
South American Explorers
,
a nifty volunteer organization. Laura and I sampled some of
Cusco's oddly excellent pizza. Then back to the hotel, where our
guide, Miguel, picked us up for an afternoon tour of the Cusco
area. First we visited Coricancha, the site of the Incas' main
temple and the Church of Santo Domingo. Cusco keeps having
earthquakes, and the church keeps falling down but the beautiful Inca
walls stay standing. The Incas had separate temples in Coricancha
for the sun, the moon, the rainbow, and lightning, and that's where
they kept hostage the idols of peoples that they conquered.
Then we checked out Cusco's Cathedral, which has a bunch of artwork of
the Cusco School (which is characterized by vivid colors and only the
most basic understanding of things like proportion and
perspective). The Cathedral is home to El Senor de Los Temblores
(Jesus of the Earthquakes), who was invented by people whose ancestors lived through the
1350 quake. It also houses a huge painting of the Last Supper in
which Judas looks all shifty-eyed at his bag of silver and the whole
crew settles down for a feast of cute little cuy (guinea pig) and
chicha and local fruits. The Virgin Mary also figures
prominently, surrounded ineffably by the disembodied heads of
babies.
Next, we drove up to Sacsayhuaman. If Cusco is shaped like a puma
(as Miguel insists that it is -- I don't see it), Sacsayhuaman is the
puma's head.
It's a giant temple/city/fortress complex high above Cusco. There
are three levels of walls; the lowest is the most intact, since it
contains the stones that were too big for the Spaniards to carry away,
including the 300-ton largest stone used in any construction in South
America (rightmost pic).
We hung out at Sacsayhuaman for a while -- it rained briefly and
beautifully, producing a lovely rainbow.
We visited three more Inca ruins that day: Puca Pucara, Tambo Machay,
and Q'Enko. Puca Pucara, below, was pretty and at the top of a
hill. Tambo Machay contained an elaborate water system
culminating in some fountains -- they were locally known as "fountains
of youth" and we saw stupid tourists drinking out of them. Q'Enko
was a temple to Pachamama, and we explored the small cave there right
around sunset.
Then we went back to Cusco and ate dinner, then hit a wine bar where I
ordered three mulled wines and one pisco sour and famously got the
reverse -- tres pisco sours.
Valle Sagrado Tour
Early the next morning, Miguel picked us up for our day tour of the
Valle Sagrado. We drove a bit and then stopped at a little
marketplace named Q'orao, then continued on to the ruins at
Pisac. That
was a magical place. We chose to spend some real time there and
took the high trail through the ruins. We passed through a lot of
terraces, then through a small cave to the industrial and religious
area of ancient Pisac.
Here we had our first taste of real hiking at altitude. We were
all doing ok -- coca tea and acetazolomide were having their intended
effects. We saw the ancient sundial of Pisac (which told the
Incas exactly when the solstices and equinoxes were coming), and I got
this nice shot of the flower of the flame tree.
Then we explored the market in Pisac, which was a predictably
commercial experience. I did get to try some choclo, corn with
giganto kernels -- good stuff, if starchy. Then we had lunch at a
nice little place with huge portions in Urubamba. Then, on to
Ollantaytambo.
Ollantaytambo was a very important Inca city, named after a warrior
named Ollanta. On the steep mountain across from Ollantaytambo
itself
were the ancient granaries of Ollantaytambo, halfway up the steep,
steep mountain. The stonework here was very impressive, including
some
work that Miguel identified as pre-Incan (from the Chimu people, I
believe).
On the way back to Cusco, we stopped at some lady's house on the
roadside and drank some chicha and ate some popcorn made from various
local types of corn. She also
raised cuy. Her plain chicha was very nice, clearer than I had
expected, and very sour. The chicha morada was flavored with
fresas (strawberries) and probably colored with beets. The
popcorn was excellent.
Then came the Inca trail and all that good fun... please turn to the
Peru
Travelogue Part 2.