Blogs from Sacred Valley, Cusco, Peru, South America - page 5

Hello again to all, once again a lot of time between entries as we had no internet once we left Cusco. To catch up- Elliot felt a bit better the next day (just in time for New Year´s Eve), but still a bit shakey, so we took it pretty easy, we explored the city of Cusco, San Blas, the markets, and went to a few interesting museums. The day went by pretty fast and we went to a cultural show with music, and dancing from the Andes, Incas etc... very interesting. We went to have a few drinks before new year´s over looking the plaza and tried a maracuya sour (yum!). We were also both chatted up by a very drunk local man who bought us beer (very odd)... but after decided we hadn´t been drugged ... read more

Sunday September 11th Another full day of walking and visiting ruins. When we left Cusco it was raining and as we started driving past the ruins from yesterday (from the city tour) it was gorgeous! But, as we entered the Sacred Valley (Valle Sagrado) the clouds came in again and by the time we reached Pisac, the first ruins, it was rainy, windy, and cold! So, the ruins weren´t that enjoyable although they did look mysterious in the clouds and rain which was cool. We spent some time in the colonial town below the ruins in the market before driving another hour to reach Urubamba, the town where we stopped for lunch. The lunch buffet at the restaurants there was was specifically for tourists and so incredibley expensive. Vivi and I had brought sandwiches and snacks ... read more

Our trip to Peru had been on the back burner for about a year. Every time we thought we had narrowed down a date something came up, and we delayed it for another couple of months. Finally, we decided to take a "now or never" approach, and booked a flight for two weeks time. And are we ever glad we did! Peru was amazing - everything turned out to be better than we had hoped for - the breath-taking mountain scenery, the exotic Amazon rainforest, the kind people with their colourful culture and wonderful food. It was our first travel experience in South America, but I'm sure we'll be back! Before the trip, we had a busy couple weeks - travelling last minute in "peak" season made for some difficult (and expensive) planning. Peru is a ... read more

Along with another Australian lady staying at our hotel in Cusco we left for a day trip through the Sacred Valley, (ending in Ollantaytambo where we were going to spend the next few days) in a taxi. Our young driver was a law student during the week, a taxi driver on weekends, driving his brand new car, which he unfortunately dented slightly that day. An hour driving through very pretty countryside took us to the Inca fortress near Pisac, a small village renowned for its tourist markets. The agricultural terraces surrounding the fortress, set high on a hill above the village, were very impressive. We spent a couple of hours walking the cliff-hugging footpaths and staircases around the large site. After that we headed into the Pisac markets - dozens of stalls all selling the ... read more