Aguas Calientes, aka Machu Picchu Pueblo, is a cert to make the 7 Tourist Trap Wonders of the World whenever that competition is held. Stepping off the train from Ollantaytambo, we found ourselves in a small town in the grip of rampant construction, adding to the existing hodge-podge of unattractive, uncoordinated buildings. With every other establishment a restaurant or tat shop, there was a wearying assault from all sides by touts eager to persuade you to browse their identical menus, or purchase a Machu Picchu-tattooed llama. Prices for accommodation and food were high, with an inverse relationship to the actual quality of the product. It was easy to assume that the town would be in cahoots with my current least favourite corporation PeruRail, but apparently the two are not the closest of friends, with the inhabitants ... read more

The Cusco tourist ticket had given us entry to various museums in the city, none of which had massively sparked our interest, but it was with greater enthusiasm that we approached the remaining sites, all of which were ruins outside of Cusco. Our first day-trip took us to Pisac, and a pre-ruin wander through its large, thrice-weekly market, full of fruit and vegetables stalls, handicrafts, and camera-wielding tourists. Pisac sits on a valley floor and was notably warmer than Cusco, leading to a carelessly pink author. The Inca ruins sit high above the town on a spur, and we took a taxi to the topmost drop-off point to avoid what would have been a wearying climb - a decision vindicated when we returned to Pisac via this steep, switchback-laden route. There are various ruins at the ... read more

Sometimes the linguistic barrier can be broken down by the simple expedient of using the language of love, as perfectly demonstrated by the taxi driver who took me to Potosi bus station to catch the next service to Sucre. He asked me where I was from then mimed sexual intercourse when I said I was English, then made further shagging motions when I said that I liked Bolivia, and once again when I said I had met lots of Americans in South America. I was unsure if he was implying that he had been there done that or questioning whether I had. The trip to Sucre was as boring as any journey on a paved road can be, and I emerged from the bus into a city so different to Uyuni and Potosi that it was ... read more

The bus to the border town of La Quiaca gave me a reprise of the first half of my Humahuaca Gorge trip, and then further altiplano scenes of grazing llamas and scrubby landscape under a deep blue sky as we trundled north. The immigration buildings looked chaotic but the long queues were for people coming south, and in short order I was on the dusty streets of Villazon, the Bolivian conjoined twin of La Quiaca. What a difference a few hundred metres makes. I could not avoid drawing parallels with many of the towns I'd passed through in last year's Southeast Asian wanderings - small shops spilling onto the streets, pavement vendors, food carts, rubbish, electricity cables in Gordian knots of complexity, small kids playing unattended, tarmac a pipe dream. And a European influence I could ... read more

Two and a half hours of travel on a virtually empty bus got me to San Juan, a sunny city of broad streets and (finally) shops with flip-flops. Though this was really only a waypoint on the route to the national parks further north-east, I figured I'd stay a night in the hope of catching up on some sleep. The area is supposedly on a fault-line with as much potential for a Big One as California but the ground showed commendable firmness for the 20 hours that I was in town. After my visit to San Agustin (blogged separately), I had a short time to kill in San Juan before catching a bus north, a period which produced the third cash offer I've received for my laptop from a complete stranger since I arrived in South ... read more