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Published: January 24th 2013
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We do need to report first for today’s start, that we did, indeed, conduct the scientific experiment with which way the water drains in the Southern Hemisphere, and yes, it does drain in the opposite direction! Job one today was to purchase Carol an Alpaca sweater, and complete our TUPAS purchases for the trip home, as our free time is getting limited. So we get to the front door to leave the hotel and are warmly greeted by (what we can only assume is) “The Bouncer.” This big dude, complete with a broken nose and Mafia suit, is right out of a God Father movie! Cuzco is sort of still a wild-west city and we have been warned many times about thievery, pick pockets and to leave the good cameras out of site. Most stores have armed guards, so we have to assume “Guido” is ours. He stands at the door and chain smokes – how anyone can do that at 11,200’ is a mystery to both of us.
We got out early and finally completed all of our shopping for everyone on our list back home, which is a BIG relief. Now all we have to do is figure
out a way to get everything home. We met up with Johann at 1300 for a Cuzco City tour, and again, this guy was amazing. What was supposed to be a three hour tour turned into a five hour extravaganza of knowledge about the Inca history, families, kings, methodologies and history all rolled into one package. The tour guides we have been assigned here have been simply fabulous. Johann spent a great deal of time showing the correlation between the Egyptians, Stonehenge people, Mayans, Aztecs and the Inca’s, in terms of their overall religious philosophies, scientific approach and knowledge, design and building skills, and went into a lot of details to explain just how the Inca’s built things, and dispelled a lot of myth about “aliens” and the like. However, he did say that one unexplained thing in his mind, was the “facial” rock we took photos of at Ollantaytambo ruins. There does not seem to be a thorough explanation if this facial feature was actually carved or just a natural phenomenon, but did agree that it was a pretty nifty piece of work, however it came to be. We toured the oldest churches in the area, and saw relics
from the 1530’s explorations of Pizarro here in Peru. It is simply amazing the wealth the Catholic Church has accumulated here since Conquistador times, just in the gold, silver, jewels, relic oil paintings, wooden carvings and the like, when there are so many poor people in this country. The churches here charge a pretty penny to come inside and see all of this treasure, but will not let anyone take photographs (even without flash), so it can sell DVD’s of these palaces. Interestingly enough, many of the finest artworks in the church were completed by Inca slaves, and Johann showed us a great deal of the Inca humor and sarcastic attitude in many of the artifacts that the Spaniards evidently missed during the 100 years or so of construction of these monster palaces. It is also amazing that Francisco Pizarro and his small army of men could sail and travel so far in the early 1500’s, by ship, land and through intense rain forests and jungles in their search for wealth to send back home to Mother Spain. Until their defeat in 1588 by the English, Spain was, indeed, a serious power to be reckoned with.
We got back
to our hotel at about 1800, hit the streets to find Maggie’s Pizza, the best place in town according to Frommer’s and others. We had a great dinner, listened to live music and met a new friend from Denmark, and then returned to the hotel to pack and get ready for a 10-hour train journey that will climb above 15,000’ on our journey to Puno and Lake Titicaca, our last stop on this magnificent adventure!
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