Category: South America

We stayed four nights in Cusco, at AirBnB two blocks from Plaza de Armas, excellent, beautiful and spacious apartment, best place we stayed in Peru.

First day was Corpus Christi, we spent long time watching colorful procession. Than we had special traditional Corpus Christi meal chiriuchu at Plaza San Francisco with all the locals, it includes a piece of Guinea pig (cuy), chicken, sausage, corn, pancake, seaweed and fish roe, it represents food from different parts of Peru. We ate all that in great festive atmosphere of the plaza. Then we visited Quricancha – the Inca palace in Cusco and its museum, and the Jesuit church with a great view of the Plaza with more fiesta going on.

Chiriuchu at Plaza San Francisco

Next day, we took taxi to visit Tambomachay, walked to Puca Pucara, flagged a bus down to Quenqo, walked to Sacsaywaman, spent long time there, and then walked down to Cusco. Whole day of visiting different ruins, great day. We also went to Cusco Cathedral. The Cathedral was also very interesting and all the figures from different churches were staying there 8 days after Corpus Christi. One evening we went to dance performance, it was good, but started later than we thought and we were tired of waiting.

Last day in Cusco, we went to the South Valley. We planned to travel on our own, but for sake of time we took a tour and we enjoyed it. We visited beautiful church in Andahuaylillas. We watched llama dance in front of it  by group attending Qoyllur Rit’i festival, fascinating and authentic. We also visited Tipon terraces and water fountains/channels and wonderful and huge Huari (Wari) ruins of Pikillacta. The guide was good and provided interesting explanations without being boring. We would wander more on our own, but this tour was surprisingly good. On the way back, we ordered chicharron and Guinea pig in a town famous for them and had our orders delivered to the bus to eat after we were back in Cusco. Guinea pig in the Corpus Christi dish was better though. Other days we were eating both in tourist places and local (including Chifa, very good tamarind chicken), and most dishes were very tasty. We liked beef heart anticuchos.

We went from Ollantaytambo to Urubamba by collectivo and than by local bus to Pisac, very easy and fast. It was great to travel with locals, kids going to school, mother with a baby, folks going to the market. In Pisac there was a fiesta (Children’s Day), we left luggage in a hotel near the bus stop, had coffee in the main square with views of children performances and then we hiked up to the Pisac ruins. Trail was great, very few people. Pisaca town and main temple ruins were very impressive. We could go further up on alternative path through terraces (main path was closed after a rock slide) to upper ruins, but we chose to walk down on different path through ravine, beautiful and peaceful. Another excellent day, slow touring as we like. We took a collectivo to Cusco, this time mostly with tourists.

Pisac

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We took Inca Rail train from Ollantaytambo to Machu Picchu at 6:40 am with return at 7 pm, all on time and very good. We bought bus tickets in AC and  bought sandwiches for lunch waiting in line. Another queue to bathroom and to get in to MP. We went directly for our MP Montana trek, got to the trail head/entrance ~9:30. Many more people than we expected. The hike was steep (mostly stairs, Incas really loved them, my knees don’t), but beautiful in cloud forest, wonderful views of MP opened several times. Took us almost 2h up and 1.5 down, we had sandwiches/lunch at the top and spent more than half an hour there. Great views all around and good perspective before inspecting the citadel up close.

Machu Picchu Mountain

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In the afternoon we walked all over the main ruins, without  guide but with  guide book. After 3 pm crowds thinned and it was great. We sat in many places to rest and absorb, we saw several viscachas and llamas, weather was great. Very long and tiring day but magical. With all the hype, we were not disappointed by MP, it was magnificent.

We stayed 3 nights in Ollantaytambo, with day trip to Machu Picchu from there. We stayed in El Bosque hostel, which was nice, clean, and convenient, with good breakfast, very nice owners, but our room was on ground level and quite dark, cold and noisy from the street.

We visited Ollantaytambo ruins, which we loved, and we hiked up to Intihuana from there, very nice short hike with excellent views. In the afternoon we hiked to the Granaries on the valley slope opposite the main ruins and  ventured somehow way up through more ruins and rocks. It rained a little bit when we were there, the only rain during entire trip (and it was very light rain). Wonderful day.

We flew from Chicago to Lima (via Atlanta) – arrived very late with departure to Cusco early next morning. We stayed overnight in AirBnB near airport (jest a few hours of sleep), with pick-up and ride back to the airport. Great decision. The place was quite old, but clean and very convenient, and owners super nice and helpful.

We had private  tour from Cusco airport to Ollantaytambo, visiting Chinchero (it was Sunday), Moray and Maras Salinas on the way  arranged with Taxidatum. The driver was waiting for us at the airport, everything was good and on time, car was good. But it wasn’t a the best choice:  we were tired, elevation was high, I had bad headache and we did not have enough time in Chinchero market (OK in church and terraces) and in Salinas, even though we skipped lunch in favor of more touring time. We loved all three sites, Chinchero, Moray and the Salinas, we just wished to have more time. We tend to visit very slowly, not just to have a look and take a few pictures. We would also love to hike through Salinas down to the river.