The Sacred Valley

Campesina Selling Fabric Dyes

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100% all-natural mineral and vegetable fabric dyes!

Meat Stalls

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Not USDA approved.

Maize with Monstrous Kernels

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This corn had kernels as big as the end of your thumb. The sold it boiled and sprinkled with salt for munching as you walked through the market.

Cobbled Street with Canal in Ollantaytambo

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This street and its canal, as well as many others in the city of Ollantaytambo, have survived since being built by the Incas.

Ollantaytambo

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Ollantaytambo was one of the royal estates of Inca Pachacuteq. It is also the site to which Manco Inca retreated after his defeat by the Spanish at Sacsayhuamán in 1536. In 1537, Hernando Pizarro arrived at Ollantaytambo with 70 cavalry and 30 foot soldiers to put down Manco's rebellion. However, Manco's forces were prepared for the assault. From the terrace walls above, they showered the Spanish with arrows, rocks, and boulders. They then released water through prepared irrigation channels flooding the plain below and miring the Spanish horses in mud up to their bellies. The Spanish were forced to concede their first defeat to the Incas and retreated to Cusco. Later that year, with a cavalry force more than quadruple in size, a Spanish expedition returned to Ollantaytambo to challenge Manco Inca. Faced with the overwhelming force of cavalry, which still baffled and terrified the Inca warriors, Manco Inca and his followers fled to the jungle stronghold of Vilcabamba.

Inclined Inca Temple Wall

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Here our tour guide is pointing out a common feature of the Incas' stone walls - they all lean inward. Apparently this feature gave the walls greater resistance to earthquakes.

Amazing Stonework

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Here is yet another picture to demonstrate why I am so awed by Inca stonework. You can see in the upper left hand corner of this niche what appears to be a dark crack. It's not a crack. The half U-shape is actually part of the stone that forms the back wall of the niche. Look how well the pieces fit together! I hope everyone else is as impressed as I am. Half as impressed? A third...

Wall of the Temple of the Sun

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This wall made of six carved stone monoliths is part of the uncompleted Temple of the Sun. You can still see the outline of a puma, now largely defaced, that once graced this stone wall.