Blogs from Pisac, Cusco, Peru, South America - page 3

Hey all! I had an amazing weekend and I thought I´d share a little bit of it with you. In Qosqo, all Saturday long I went on a ¨market walk¨. A ¨market walk¨is what happens who one leaves the house of one´s host family with the intention of reaching Mercado San Pedro (a centralized maket in Qosqo), and runs into a market on nearly every block en route! Being a curious person, of course I had to at least stroll around these amazing places, which bumb up there presence all over Qosqo on Saturdays. The markets here are part dream-come true (fruits, vegetables, and cereals in bulk, herbs, loose-leaf teas, local plants, traditional medicines, etc.) and part nightmare (how many little plastic trinkets, or plastic-wrapped items do folks seriously need? That goes for you too, Americans!). ... read more

We left Nazca on Thursday, November 26th, the night of Thanksgiving. Little did we know that it would be a sleepless night. The bus takes 13-14 hours from Nazca to Cuzco. We had bought semi-cama seats (reclining seats) from the bus company Cial, but when we arrived at 8 pm that night, we were told that our bus was canceled, but we were being put onto another bus from a neighboring company into cama seats, seats that fully reclined to approximately 15 degree angles. The seats were very nice, large, cushiony, and reminded me of first class in an airplane. They even had an angled piece for your calves. It was nice and comfortable in the begining, until the bus started climbing and the altitude sickness started to set in. It wasn´t as bad at first ... read more

Cusco itself is crowded, overpriced and absolutely rammed full of tourists.... no wonder it is overpriced as the locals have cottoned on to the fact that the many rich americans that come here can pay much more than they're used to. Unfortunately this has led to more street hawking than I've seen anywhere else in both Ecuador and Peru. You can't walk two steps without being offered the same hats, paintings, wooden carvings, massages and many more things that I really do not need, yet the locals insist I do! Thus we havn't had the best time in Cusco, the only great place here in my view is the Real McCoy (an English pub) where we were able to sample real traditional English food, a little taste of home, even with English music in the background! ... read more

Jeste nez jsme se vydali na 4 denni trek na Machu Pichu, rozhodli jsme se projit po mistnich ruinach kolem Cusca. Prvni velke ruiny byli nad mesteckem Pisac, kde take zacinalo Svate udoli. Po shlednuti ruin jsme jeste na chvilku zavitali na mistni nedelni trhy. A pak hura na dalsi ruiny do Ollantaytamba. Bohuzel uz je vecer a tak dalsi pamatky musime odlozit na pozdeji. Pri ceste nazpet, zjistujeme ze nas ridic nema licenci na vozeni turistu a vsichni jsme jen jeho kamaradi. Ale policejni kontrola to nejak nevzala :) Takze si musime vystoupit a najit jiny dopravni prostredek do Cusca. ... read more

2 Autobus, 3 Taxis, 27h et quelques gravols plus tard... Oui c'est ca que ca prend pour se rendre de Lima a Cuzco par la route. C'est vraiment long parce que c'est dans les Andes et je doute qu il y ait eu plus de 2 min de route en ligne droite. Une fois rendu a Cuzco, on a gossé un peu pour se faire dire qu il fallait prendre un autre bus pour aller a Pisac, seulement 30km plus mais 1h vu que la route est tortueuse. Ensuite on est arrive a Taray. On a cherche un peu dans le village ou on allait mais les gens tres sympathiques nous on dirige vers la bonne place. L'endroit est vraiment tres beau, entoure de montagnes. Ca fait vraiment different de la grosse ville...cest vraiment plus typique ... read more