Cuzco, the Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu

Well it has been a while. So I arrived in Cuzco about 2 in the afternoon. After finally finding a hostel, this cute little place that looks ancient on the inside. I set about wandering around the city. It is a really amazing place. I have to admit very touristy but so much history. There are a number of large plazas in the center of town that are ringed with huge old cathedrals. When the Spanish built them they used a bunch of Inca ruins to construct the bases so the foundation of most of these old buildings are made from giant stones perfectly sculpted to fit against one another. Everywhere you step is a piece of ancient history. After a bit of a walk which involved finding the central market, I seem to have a nose for finding markets now. (the central market here is awesome so much food and fruit shakes, I have been getting a mango, banana, ginger and milk shake every morning.) I finally wandered back to my hostel which is up hill from the center of town, good for me but very tiring. I met this other couple who were staying at my hostel and ended up going out to a party at another hostel in town. We definitely whopped it up and didn't get back until the wee hours of the morning. The next day I was more than a might bit hung over and took myself out for a big old breakfast at a gringo place then got some coffee and finally met up with Anna who had arrived in late the night before and found a different hostel because she didn't know where I was at. Life without cell phones is definitely different when it comes to organizing meetings. We mostly just explored the city some more and I chilled out read and got over my headache.

The next day (being April 20th) Anna, I and the couple from my hostel went out for breakfast at the market place, went for coffee and then again just explored the city. It is hard to explain how everything here is done so differently not many people have cell phones so there are always people wandering the streets with cell phones you can pay to use, like mobile pay phones. Driving is something else. I cannot even explain how much I hate getting into a vehicle, they drive like maniacs and don't stop for anything. I have seen so many close calls I hardly even blink an eye anymore.

The next day we finally set off for something new. Anna and I caught a local bus to a near by town named Pisaq. It is basically the first town in the Sacred Valley that leads to Machu Picchu. There are so many Inca ruins throughout this whole area it is hard to see them all. Pisaq turned out to be a really cute little town. It had a big center square with a big old moss ladened tree in the center. The whole square was taken up with stalls selling all sorts of crafts and jewelry etc. We stopped and got a coffee and ran into a guy we had met on the Bolivian salt flats, Eliott. So we talked with him and his friend for a while then set off to find a hostel. We found a cheap place dropped our stuff off and headed down to a local cafe that looked really great. It was run by a German lady and was totally a gringo hangout but had amazing food and drinks and great atmosphere, some times you really miss that cafe atmosphere that you can find on almost any street in Canada (especially Victoria). Finally after lounging around for some time we decided to hike up to the Inca ruins that lay on the mountain that over looked the town. First I should interject and explain that of course the sacred valley is really a valley. It is flanked on either side by crazy steep mountains and there is a big river that flows right down the center of the valley. It is an amazing sight, very idyllic. there are alot of westerners living in the valley especially near Pisaq because it is so beautiful. At the base of the hike we had to buy ¨tourist tickets¨ that allow you to get into all of the sacred valley ruins (but not Machu Picchu of course that is more money) the tickets are not cheap and Anna and I talked our way into getting student tickets which are half the price. Then up and up and up. We were really sweating and huffing and puffing by the time we neared the top. It was a steep route, I have come to a very decisive conclusion that not only were the Incas the most fit people in the history of the world but they were also a touch mad! The Pisaq ruins run for quite a distance along the ridge of this mountain that has one point over looking the town. It was amazing! Machu Picchu as I will talk about later is spectacular but I really liked these ruins too. they are pretty large as well with lots to see and hardly touristy at all. At certain points Anna and I seemed to be the only people up there. Well we had no idea how big the ruins were and we had gone up way to late in the day to see them all. There is an agricultural area, a temple area, a fortress area and a bunch of other clusters of buildings. So we saw as much as we could but as dusk set in we had to start down the path again because in the best of conditions it is a steep unforgiving route and in the dark with no light it would have been worse. We reached the town just as dark set in and headed back to our favorite cafe for dinner (which was as Clare would say taste-tacular!) Every time we went to that cafe we seemed to randomly meet some new and interesting person, we met this one woman who had sold everything she had in Canada to move to this valley and start a treatment centre with a friend of hers, we met this very lovely Israeli couple with an adorable young son who lived on a kabutz. Everyone was very inspiring and seemed to be doing exactly what they wanted to be doing. The next day we decided to stay in Pisaq instead of moving on. We spent the morning looking around the market, which was even bigger than the day before, then we took a cab up to the other end of the ruins. This time we gave ourselves most of the afternoon. Something interesting about the ruins down here is that they are so different than any historical site in Canada, you really seem to be able to go just about anywhere you want, they are not really roped off at all and there are no real guards. Anna and I found ourselves a nice comfy place on one of the huge terraces and sat and read and slept with a incredible view of the valley bellow and off on one of the ruins there was a flute player who just filled the air with the most magical music, and again we were practically alone. It was almost as if you could imagine being back when this was an actual community. We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring. They let you climb all over these ruins, and much of it can be very dangerous, the liability in Canada would be out of this world but here they just seem to trust that you wont fall some great distance and kill yourself. And most people are fine, it really makes you question how overly concerned with safety we are in Canada. At dusk we climbed down again into the town for another delicious meal and then to bed. ( I have been seriously catching up on my sleep lately, early to bed and late to rise).

The next day (april 23) we caught a local bus to the next town named Urabumba which the guide book describes as a ugly place but we both really liked it. It was not touristy at all. Most people to the sacred valley with a tour group and they mostly just go the ruins and skip the towns, especially this one, but it was great to be somewhere that was really just Peruvian. There was a great central market and we (after much searching) found a great hostel, eat some lunch and set off for the main drag where we after much arguing and bartering found a cabbie to take us to the local ruins that were to far out of town to walk to (the cab was also full of school children on their way home and we spent a funny twenty minutes trying to talk to them and telling them words they wanted to know in English ( on a side note they really crowd cars here in the cab there was Anna, I, the driver and 8 children, seat belts are not a concern. We also caught a collectivo between towns, which is like a vehicle slightly bigger than a mini van and it operates like a bus going between towns but you can get on and off anywhere and at one point there were at least 23 people in the mini van, it was intense, and that is not counting all of the stuff people have with them). These are the Moray ruins and they are very interesting. They are more terraced gardens but they are are circular terraces built down into natural indents in the earth, like mini canons. People are still not certain about their purpose but they have discovered that each level has a slightly different micro climate, they are all about 5 degrees different in temperature so it is thought they were used as testing grounds for crops to be used in the area or all over the empire. Again we were practically the only ones there. Catching the cab back, again i will not comment on the driving except to say that this guys seemed to consider driving on the right side of the road a mere suggestion) we got back to town safe and sound. After that we wondered around for a bit and started to notice there were these brooms with red plastic wrapped around the ends sticking out like flag poles from lots of the houses. We got curious. At one Anna kinda stuck her head in and this man promptly invited us in. We soon discovered that these were Chicha houses ( I have no idea about spelling here) it is an alcoholic brew made from corn and an in this case strawberries. It was really good. We got one is the huge glass out of this big pot on the floor. The room itself was crazy, it was low ceiling with on long table and some chairs and bags of who know what piled in one corner. It was dark, only the light from the door illuminated the place and there were about 8 locals in there drinking. Our host was pretty drunk and we found out he worked as a porter for the Inca trail. It was fun and mostly everyone just laughed at us trying to speak Spanish. After about 3 giant glasses between the two of us, Anna and I were definitely feeling it. Politely we declined more and stumbled our way back to our hostel. Later after a nap we got some dinner and went to bed.

The next morning we were set to go all the way to Aguas Calientes which is the town that you have to go to if you want to go to Machu Picchu. Getting there is expensive and a pain in the ass. Either you can take the train right from Cuzco, which costs a lot of money or you can take it from Ollantaytambo which is the town at the end of the Sacred Valley and it costs less. There is not really a road to Aguas Calientes, I mean there is but it is very backwards and hard to use and at some points dangerous so we decided just to take the train. So after catching a ride on another Collectivo we arrived in Ollantaytambo an hour before the train, bought our tickets and waited. The train ride is spectacular, it is down along the valley as it descends into jungle. It takes about an hour and a half to two hours and I enjoyed every minute of it. Aguas Calientes (which means hot water because there are hot springs above the town) is situated at the meeting of two valleys. It is a really lovely tropical spot alongside rapids. But the town itself is crazy chimerical because it exists to serves tourists going to machu picchu. We found an alright place that was much cheaper than we expected and I explored the town. There is for sure a locals area and a tourist area. The town is tiny though and really cant expand much because it is surrounded by vertical mountains, which are covered in all sorts of jungle fauna. We ate dinner and went to bed early because we decided that instead of spending the 12 dollars to take the bus up to Machu Picchu (on top of the 40 dollar pass you had to buy to go, on top of the train ride) we were going to hike up. So at 4:30 am we set off in the dark with the barest of descriptions as to where we were supposed to be going. We wanted to be up at the top for sun rise. But neither of us had slept well (my stomach infection seems to have reappeared) walking down some completely black jungle road searching for a path up a mountain seemed slightly foolhardy. But we found the tail and we climbed and climbed and climbed. There were about 5 other people we ran into doing the hike up in the dark and one dog that seems to follow people up daily just for fun. It was a hard hike, all up and all stairs and parts were very steep. I ended up vomiting because of my stomach but we finally made it up to the top only to be made to wait for the site to open. From this point you cannot see to ruins so we waited in great suspense.

After a small problem with Anna's ticket, we walked around the corner and Machu Picchu appeared in front of us. And it is unbelievable. It looks just like you are walking into a postcard, it is perfect. We climbed to a high point on one side (where most of the post card pics are taken from) and watched the sun rise over the far mountains. The site is as unbelievable as the ruins themselves. It is perched on a mountain that is ringed by other mountains and far down in the valley below ringed by a river. All of the mountains are severely steep and covered in jungle green. Far away on one side of the ruins you can see a snow capped range. As dawn broke fog fell then lifted from the valleys giving the ruins an even more mysterious look and swallows flung themselves around us in great numbers. We wandered all over the ruins. I have been obsessed with this place since I was a kid so it was just awesome to be able to see it all in person. It is huge and there are so many aspects to it you could take days really exploring it all. Anna and I didn't hire a guide but I listened in on lots of the tours for interesting facts. We went for a hike around back of the ruins to a place called the Inca´s drawbridge. It was a narrow path winding around one of the mountain sides that ended in a totally vertical stone wall that the Inca´s had built a brick road in front of but left one section open, only spanned by logs that could be pulled back making the way impassible. I also climbed up Huayna Picchu (which means young mountain where Machu Picchu means old mountain) which is the peak that over looks Machu Picchu in all the post cards. It was a hard climb up but the view from the very top was incredible. I could look down on all of machu picchu like it was little. They even built buildings and terraced gardens all the way up there. It was madness and there were so many places you could just fall right off the mountain it was intense. I finally, after a bit of a nap on a terraced garden, climbed down to Machu Picchu, did a bunch more exploring, they even have llamas wandering around it is hilarious. There are also so many amazing wildflowers up there, they really add to the magical feeling. I finally convinced myself to walk down at about 5pm. Exhausted I rolled into town ate some needed food (I did a lot of hiking) and then promptly fell asleep.

The next day we took the train back to the town where we boarded it and then grabbed a collective taxi (ie shared it with a bunch of people) back to Cuzco. One of the dudes was super chatty and told me he worked as a guide at Machu Picchu and all about being a porter on the Inca trail as well, he was very fit. The driver of the cab was a bit nuts, he almost drove straight into a bolder that had fallen in the road (we were on some narrow back road) when he was trying to change the radio station and passing on blind corners is a national past time here. We made it back to Cuzco safe and sound and mostly chilled out for the rest of the day.

Yesterday I visited Sacsayhuaman (pronounced sexy woman) an old Inca military fortress that sits high above Cuzco, it was pretty cool. And Anna and I booked our flight to the jungle, Puerto Maldonado. We are going to spend about a week there and then fly from there to Lima. We wanted to see the jungle one last time and we also wanted to avoid the insanely long bus ride from Cuzco to Lima. After that I am heading up the coast and then on to Ecuador.