Tambomachay, Pukapukara, Qenqo and Saqsaywamán

The site Tambomachay is only about 5 miles outside Cuzco.  A local bus heading toward Pisaq dropped us off right in front.  The area was used as a resting place, and is most known for its fountains and baths. The Inca Bath is created by two aqueducts that provide clear water year round, making the most of [...]

Machu Picchu

The train ride from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes (aka Machu Picchu Pueblo) was like entering the jungle.  Everything got more and more lush,green and wet.  There was less agriculture, and more wild.  Aguas Calientes itself (named for thermal springs on the edge of town) was another kind of jungle, the tourist kind.  Obviously this is [...]

Ollantaytambo

Having left Pisaqlate in the afternoon after a LONG walk up and through the ruins, we were pretty tired by the time we changed buses in the transportation crossroads of Urubamba.  From Urubamba we jumped in a colectivo (usually a minivan or van, smaller and a little more expensive than the bus but considerably faster).  We crammed in with the [...]

Sacred Valley

 
To travel to Pisac from Cusco is about an hour by local bus, 2.40 soles about 70 cents US.  We sat next to two women who were having a conversation in Quechua and trading goods.  One had bread and the other bananas and they seem to have made an agreeable and tasty trade.  Native Quechua [...]

Chiclayo y El Señor de Sipán

Chiclayo is about three hours north of Trujillo in northwest Peru, and is Peru´s 4th largest city.  There are some more important archaeological sites of the Moche (Mochica) and Chimu cultures in this area near the coast.  On the bus ride up, we passed miles and miles of rice cultivation, as well as sugar cane.  There [...]

Trujillo, Chanchán y las Huacas

Yet another overnight bus took us 500+ km north of Lima to the city of Trujillo, founded in 1534, and known as the City of Eternal Spring (although it´s a pretty steamy summer right now).  It´s in northwestern Peru, close to the coast, but otherwise surrounded by desert.  It was originally Spanish-only, and remnants of [...]

Santuario de Pachacamac

After a quick geocache find at a pretty lookout near our hostal, and with a new SIM card inserted in my cell phone, we head south from Lima to Pachacamac, a ceremonial and religious center which first came into use around 650 AD by the Wari culture.  Its cemetery was sacrosanct, and the buildings and [...]