Cusco Peru

Hola, I'm back from Peru and Bolivia... my stomach is still feeling the ill effects of extended time in the third world, but that's the way it goes. I took an 8 hour flight on LAN from Buenos Aires to Cusco (with a stopover in Lima), where we landed at about 11,500 feet of altitude. You could definitely feel the thin air while walking around the airport! Alas, Cusco was the "lowest" elevation place of the entire trip... more on that later.

I'll also have to say that Cusco is "the most South American looking" city that I've seen yet. The city gets annual payoffs from UNESCO to keep the roofs all spanish-tiled-up and otherwise appear traditional, so it's a nice looking place from up high. And the stairs... oh, the stairs. And the hills! Everywhere... what a pain after a day or two. You're somewhere in the Andes mountains so the hills, mountains, and valleys are unavoidable and flat land is nearly non-existent.

But besides looking the most South American, the place is also the most touristy that I've vistited as well... and shockingly expensive! In theory, the Peruvian sol is 3:1 to the US dollar, but things were definitely not priced to "local" expenses.

But it's definitely a highly recommended place to visit nonetheless. And if you're planning to go to Macchu Pichu, it's unavoidable. Cusco was founded back around 1200-1400 AD by the Incas (some say other indians before them but this is just general info and I don't care to debate it!).

It's also a VERY earthquake-prone place. The really interesting thing about the city is up close -- the Incan walls. These things were built to last. As you can see to the left, it was an EXTREMELY custom job when they built them... the block in the center has 12 angles cut into it. You couldn't wedge a knife blade in between them if you wanted to. Also, the women with the llamas below are standing in front of a building with the original Incan wall base and a Spanish building constructed on top of it.

When the Spanish arrived in Cusco in the mid 1500s, they tried to knock down a lot of it but eventually gave up and just kept the base and foundations and built their buildings and cathedrals on top of the remainder. And when they didn't follow that plan, their buildings were knocked down by earthquakes. So Cusco is fairly unique because it basically maintains an original Incan city layout overlayed by a Spanish city.

Anyway, I spent five days there, including several tours outside the town in the surrounding area. There are a ton of Incan ruins all over the area, the most interesting being what you can see all throughout "the sacred valley". Since most everything in Inca-land is at 11,000 - 13,000 feet of altitude, getting down to the 7500 ft elevation valley was nice. I don't usually get altitude sickness, but the 3rd day in Cusco I could feel a slight headache and nausea... all classic signs. Luckily it went away during the tour of the valley and never returned.

The sacred valley is also where the Inca Trail (aka "the Gringo Trail", due to the mob of tourists all over it) begins. The hike is available in 2-day and 4-day flavors -- pick your torture if you like steep climbs and camping with lotso rain throughout the day and night. But if you're going to tour the ruins, you'll also be doing a lot of stair-mastering as well, so at least you can splurge on desert when you get back to town.

There are also plenty of markets to sample, with most of them (in my cynical and correct opinion) being tourist trap driven... but some are fairly authentic. This is one in the town of Pisac, along the sacred valley. There were a lot of your standard "Inca Cola", "Cusqueña Beer", and "The coca leaf is not a drug" T-shirts in the market stalls. Howeverrrrr, it was also a large food market where people were wheeling and dealing for vegetables, grains, and as you can see down below on the right, MEAT!

Mmmmmm, mmmmm.... unfortunately my camera was not able to capture all the flies swarming about, but you can just imagine what a nightmarish infraction of every FDA regulation in the book that the market was! Fun to watch though.

So that was Cusco... next time I'll throw together some pictures of one of the main goals of this trip -- a visit to Macchu Pichu!