Peru, the visit that almost wasn't

Monastery built on an Inca Palace

How did they move these things!

So way back in January, when we were still in Australia, Julie and I decided that the obvious place to go after seeing the sights in Patagonia was Machu Picchu in Peru - and with that decision made we booked a flight from Buenos Aires to Cusco (we learned early on that booking a flight out of a country before arriving in said country is a good idea, read more about that in one of our previous posts by clicking here) . Sometime after that Julie learned that late April is the right time to dive with whale sharks in Belize and so we booked a dive trip that would end up being the last stop on our great adventure. With the end in sight all we had left to do was fill in the blanks and a trip to the Galápagos Islands sounded like a great way to fill in the gap. With so many trips to choose from, and so many islands to see, we couldn't settle for any one option and instead booked a land based trip as well as a cruise. We were now feeling really good about ourselves, and as Julie started to book all the appropriate plane tickets we soon realized that we only had 5 days to spend in Peru - shocking since we had bought those plane tickets so long before!

A more than perfect fit, no wonder they are still standing

Our five days were definitely action packed, starting with a 45 minute ride through the ghettos on our way to the hotel in Lima where we had to stay overnight before flying to Cusco the next morning. We were glad to arrive safe and sound and very glad that the car didn't break down along the way! (We booked a night at the Double Tree using points in an effort to save money but with the $40 taxi ride each way we probably could have stayed much closer to the airport for a similar amount.) the next morning we arrived in Cusco and found our way to the hotel where we just wanted to relax for the afternoon - it was over 48 hours of travel including the overnight in Lima since leaving Peninsula Valdes in Argentina.

We started exploring in earnest the next day with the Cusco city tour in the afternoon. We visited a Catholic Church that took over 90 years to build, an ancient Inca temple of sorts, learned about the history of the Incan empire, and visited three Inca archeological sights near town including Saqsawoman where we saw what some people consider the best Incan archetecture in all of Peru. It was an afternoon tour that finished just in time for us to enjoy an outstanding dinner in the Plaza De Armas - the main square in the city.

Sacred Valley of the Incas

The following day was filled with a tour of the Sacred Valley of the Incas. We were lucky enough to have one of the premier tour guides in all of Peru, Raul Castelo, who has been featured in all of the major travel guides. This proved to be a blessing and a curse of sorts because although we learned so much more about the history of the incas than we probably would have otherwise, we also didn't have much free time left to explore the sites after his lectures. We visited two prominent inca sites, a market, and got to see a demonstration about how a group of indigenous people still make woven goods using the techniques of their ancestors - including using plants and bugs to dye their hand spun alpaca yarn.

Dying the Alpaca wool

We left early the next morning for Machu Picchu, starting out with a 1 hr 30 min bus ride followed by a very scenic 1 hr 40 min train ride (there was an issue with track repairs that prevented a train ride the entire way). We arrived in Aguas Calientes just before 10:30 a.m. and had a guided tour scheduled for 11:30. We caught the bus up from town and had an ice cream outside th entry gates while we waited for our tour to start - it was much hotter here than it was at 10,000 feet in Cusco. The tour was very informative and we spent a little more time exploring after it was over, but not too much time since it was hot and we planned on coming back early the next morning to catch the sunrise.

After eating a late lunch in town - they wanted $40 per person for the buffet at the restaraunt near the park entrance, which was way more than we were willing to pay - we wondered to our hotel, got into our room and stayed there all afternoon. I only ventured out briefly to get our tickets for the bus and entry to the park the next morning. We awoke early to get in line for the bus, the first of which left town at 5:30, and the spots we claimed at 5:00 were the last two seats on the first bus - good thing we got there when we did! As we climbed the hill in the bus we saw a spectacular mist in the valley below the ancient city. Unfortunately, by the time we got to the top and they opened the gates the mist had enshrouded the entire area which meant no sunrise for us. That worked out okay though, we walked one of the trails to an old bridge build on a cliff by the incas and had the place to ourselves. When we got back to the city we sat perched up above the ruins and watched the mist recede and reappear several times, creating some great photo ops. After we got bored with that, we walked along the Inca Trail out to the Sun Gate. We got there just in time to see the mist clear and once again got some outstanding pictures. We visited the rest of the places we didn't get around to the first day and headed back to town to wait on the train back to Cusco. And because Machu Picchu was so stunning here are some more pictures....