Lima, Cusco, Machu Picchu

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LIMA - we were sad to leave our ship the Marina as she had been a fantastic home for the last couple of weeks. We both agreed the food had been a standout as our spreading waists testified. With a few hours before our flight we had a guide pick us up from the port to take us on a short tour of the city. We managed to see a lot, including the monastery of San Francisco, famous for its catacombs, the Cathedral of Lima, the Government Palace, the main square called Plaza Mayor and San Martin square, all very beautiful old buildings.

It was only a short flight to Cusco, as the city is located at 11,200 feet we had allowed ourselves a couple of nights to adjust to the altitude before going down to Machu Picchu. We stayed at the hotel Monasterio, a former monastery and national monument dating from 1592. Our hotel was located close Cusco's central square so we were able to explore the cobbled streets on foot, we both had difficultly in breathing due to the altitude, especially when we walked up to the scenic lookouts. Cusco was an interesting town and one we both agreed we enjoyed and would revisit, Ron only thought was it would have been better at a lower altitude.

On our third day in Peru we boarded the Hiram Bingham train to start our journey to Machu Picchu. The train trip was fabulous, from the music and local dancers entertaining us at the train station, to the fun band playing in the bar car while the waiters served Pisco Sours and local wines. We had our own table set with white linen and silver service for the three course lunch while enjoying the views. When we arrived at the village of Aguas Calientes we transferred to a bus to take the steep switch back drive up the mountain. The bus at times seemed much too close to the edge of the road and the sheer mountain drops, Alex shut her eyes a few times.

When we arrived at Machu Picchu we had a three hour guided tour of the site. We learnt some interesting facts including that amazingly the city took only 30 years to build and was only lived in for 100 years before it was abandoned possibly to keep the site hidden from the invading Spanish. Our guide painted the picture of the Inca people who worshiped the sun, they believed gold was tears from the sun and that the marriage of the moon and sun created the stars, we loved those explanations. We were lucky to stay at the Sanctuary lodge, the only hotel located at the entrance to Machu Picchu, this allowed us to get in when the gates opened at 6am the next morning to walk up to the Sun Gate for the sunrise. Ron enjoyed hiking up Waynapicchu in the afternoon which was a challenging steep climb before we departed on the Hiram Bingham train for another fantastic train ride trip back to Cusco.

After a third night in Cusco we flew back to Lima to spend our last before our cruise. As we were staying in Milaflores near the coast we were able to walk to a nearby cliff edge shopping centre with lots of restaurants overlooking the coast for a lovely Peruvian dinner. We both agreed we enjoyed our 5 night Peru adventure and had made the most of the short time we had to explore.

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