South America in 18 Days

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Cusco, Jul 7, 2016

It was hard arriving at Cusco at 5:00 am after a long flight initiated in San Diego. We were lucky that our hotel manager accepted an early check in at no additional cost. Our room was colorfully decorated with Andean themes, it was small but comfortable and included a private bathroom, free airport pick up, and daily breakfast. We were very tired, I personally don't do well sleeping during flights, so my son and I decided to take a long nap before going to our 1:30 pm city tour that I had previously arranged with the hotel. The beds were very comfortable and had enough blankets to keep you warm, even though that day it was extremely cold. We had the option of having the tour bus coming to pick us up at the hotel or meeting at one of the designated places at the main square of Cusco. We took the second option, we were very hungry and decided to go eat first and then change some dollars to nuevos soles, the currency used in Peru. We did both things at the main square known as "Plaza de Armas", here are concentrated most of the nicest restaurants, but also very expensive and comparable to US restaurants, a lot of souvenir shops, travel agencies, and money exchange brokers. In this area is where we found the best exchange rates from dollars to nuevos soles, always looking around and comparing. I don't advise to do it at the airport, they give you much less soles for your dollars. Our means of transportation in Cusco were the taxis, we tried Uber but apparently not yet implemented here. Taxis are very cheap and you can always negotiate with the driver. We had a cloudy and wet tour, forcing us to buy a pair of raincoats from ambulatory vendors that persisted on selling us hats, gloves, and a million of souvenirs. I subsided and in addition to the raincoats, I bought a pair of wool-like gloves and a hat that to tell you the truth, saved me from getting my hands and head frozen, both for approx three dollars. Cusco is very high, over 11,000 feet and some people might suffer from altitude sickness, so locals recommend that at least you rest half day to get used to the altitude and to drink "coca leaves tea" to help with the symptoms. I personally didn't have problems with altitude other than getting tired when walking uphill, and here in Cusco you do that a lot, I must say I am 56 years old female so I don't think I did so bad. The tour was very informative and for approx $30 dls pp (I paid 10 soles to the hotel and 70 soles at the entrance of Saqsayhuaman archeological area) we had several hours of history that included several archeological places of Cusco. At the end of the tour the bus left us at Plaza de Armas where we had dinner and enjoyed a delicious dessert at one of the coffee shops we found there. We took a taxi back to the hotel where we were nicely surprised that under our bed blankets there was a hot water bag that our feet much appreciated to keep them warm in such a cold night. In summary these were my approx expenses at Cusco for 2 pp: Hotel Wifala - $45 dls a night; taxi rides from Plaza de Armas to our hotel, aprox 15 minutes, between $3 to $5 dls; $20 dls to the airport from hour hotel, approx 20 mins, price is higher if it is early morning; and from $12 to $15 dls to the PeruRail train station of Cusco about 30 mins; meals ranging from $12 to $20 dls in the Plaza de Armas area.

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