PISAC - THE SACRED VALLEY - Seattle meets Mexiland...and a whole heap of locales...

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PISAC enters the Sacred Valley, and once had the major Inca road. Here we found the ruined citadel, which sits at the entrance to the gorge.

My new found friend and fellow trekker Elizabeth (from Seattle) accompanied me on this trip. We opted not to go by tourist bus but to experience how the locals get there, so made our way to el terminal para Pisac which looked more like someone’s back yard. There were two interesting old buses parked there, men piling on sacks of I don’t know what, some locals and the odd Indegionous sat on a bench, a vendor selling bread and drinks …..and that’s about it…..not much happening here. We stood there for a while trying to work out how does one get on the bus - turns out after a few moments I plucked up the courage to use my Espanol and walked over to one of the buses, smiling with all teeth and big puppy dog eyes, asked the driver what did we need to do to get on his bus.. surprisingly and super proud of myself for understanding, he answered my question and told me I had to buy a ticket. We noticed there was a bit of hustle and bustle - AHA! The ticket office was officially open, so we cued up and paid 2 solers..that’s almost US$1. Super cheap. So we got on and found our designated seats. The bus seemed to just fill up with seated passengers then fill up with standing passengers. We wondered if it was cheaper if you stood up or even free. Anyway, the journey consisted of MORE pit stops with more people, amazing how many people can fit on a small bus, Liz and I were the only foreigners on there which was surprising but great, there was a good mixture of people in there..and it was super interesting to go through the villages. More houses made out of what looked like clay - really amazing…
Pisac is about an hour away from Cusco, amazing scenery, eventful bus ride and super cheap fare!! Highly recommend this bus journey!

Pisac is more commonly famous for its morning market which is held 3 times a week. Many of the Quechan´s come here to trade their produces with other market vendors, pretty cool site!
Our mission was to however, climb up to the citadel, which was a good 90mins walk. We started early at about 8.30am so we literally had the whole hike there to ourselves, very peaceful and of course amazing views of the valley. We passed amazing terraces - gigantic! The work must of taken lifetimes to create..!!This site went on forever, extreamley impressive Inca architecture. At the top we reached Templo de Sol (Temple of the Sun), which was build among volcanic rock - very steep to get up there but really worth the pain and lack of air!!! We also saw buriel sites which were in the rocks, more water channels and of more interest was a ´hitching post´ which was used to look at the stars and their positions etc...impressive again..but the view - OMG!!! Personally, I´ve never seen such an amazing view...oh wait maybe in Indonesia but they tell me this is nothing comparec to Machu Picchu!!!! SO wahoo going there in July!!! We did pass a trekker early in the morning who told us he was there before the sun came up - alone - how i would love to do that!

Liz and I walked to all the sites and back again, in total it took us about 5 hours, we rewarded ourselves with some yummy Fresh meaty Trout which was probably caught in the river Vilcanota which flows through Pisac. Delicioso!!!!!

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Photos

Passed out!!
90minutes later, and wahoo we have contact wth the first set of ruins...this was only the beginning!!!

Water, water........
My prayers were answered, after all that treking we found fresh clean water..

Contemplation....
I love this photo, look carefully what do you see?

ooh, oooh look ...
Liz with a not very impressed Peruvian. However, his music echoed across the mountains..nice.