Cusco & Machu Picchu

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February 4th 2011

Published: February 4th 2011

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e squared everywhere

Hotel Los Ninos Courtyard

The peaceful and sunny courtyard at Hotel Los Ninos in Cusco.

Our incredible bus journey from Lake Titicaca through parts of the Sacred Valley was an excellent preface to Cusco and the awe-inspiring Machu Picchu. Cusco, a city of nearly 350,000, is where most begin their ventures to Machu Picchu, either via train or by hiking the infamous Inca trail. The city itself sits around 10,000 feet in elevation and was once the Inca Empire’s foremost stronghold. Today, Cusco is an eclectic mix of ancient Andean tradition and the modern Peruvian lifestyle, making it a vibrantly cultural and exciting city to visit.

We were lucky enough to find Hotel Los Niños and to have four nights there in Cusco. Besides the sunny and peaceful stone-slab courtyard and the warm and cozy fire-lit café, the best part about the hotel is that it donates muchisimo proceeds to helping street kids every year. All of the rooms are named after street kids that the Dutch owner has adopted, and we got to stay in two different ones (Celso and Alan), both adorably quaint and comfy. If you are ever in Cusco, you really should look this hotel up; it’s incredible and highly recommended!

After an evening arrival to the hotel, and an

Celso Vista

The view from our first room at Hotel Los Ninos, Celso.

evening rain shower, we found Tearooms nearby to grab a bite to eat. I had an awesome carrot and ginger soup and, of course, homemade coconut ice cream with Oreo cookie crumbles for dessert… yum! Eli on the other hand had a big ol’ beer and something with meat that was delicious for him. You might have gathered from our blogs by now, but I’m turning more and more vegetarian in our travels (I still eat fish) and Eli still loves his meat and thinks I’m a hippie😉… We had one day in Cusco before catching a train to Machu Picchu the next day (we would have another two nights in Cusco after our trip to Machu Picchu). For our first full day in Cusco, we decided to simply wander the streets and just take it all in. The Plaza de Armas, decked in history, is surrounded by impressive buildings and cathedrals, most dating back to when the Inca Empire was in control. Cusco’s prominent cathedral in the main plaza took nearly 100 years to build and is an absolutely stunning and magnificent building to admire. The rustic red shingles and white facades on most Cusco buildings characterize the city

Hotel Los Ninos Cafe

The warm and cozy Hotel Los Ninos Cafe with photos of all of the adopted street kids hanging from the walls.

and give it an added element of charm. Near the plaza are Calles Plateros y Procuradores, both are more commonly known as “Gringo Alley.” Lined with tour companies and backpacker bars and cafes, you are inevitably and relentlessly hassled as you walk down this street, no bueno! One very interesting thing we noticed in Cusco were the various rainbow-striped flags. After having stumbled upon a huge gay-pride festival in Buenos Aires, we of course thought that we had somehow found another festival in Cusco, but much to our surprise, we discovered that the rainbow-striped flags are actually the city’s flag. After a day of wandering from one historic cobblestone plaza to the next and soaking up the cuzqueño culture, we went back to our lovely hotel before catching an early train to Aguas Calientes (a.k.a. “Machu Picchu Pueblo”) the next morning.

Peru Rail, a monopoly of sorts, is the company that operates most trains to and from Aguas Calientes, the small and extremely over-crowded town where you begin your trip to Machu Picchu if you are looking to beat the crowds coming in from Cusco for the day. The taxi driver that drove us to the train station that

Cusco Cathedral

The prominent cathedral in Cusco's Plaza de Armas that took nearly 100 years to build.

morning provided us with an interestingly unfortunate tidbit about Peru Rail – it’s actually a Chilean company. The reason that is so unfortunate is because with the prices of the trains (there are four different train classes, all the way from backpacker to 5-star, which costs nearly $300 dollars round-trip), Peru Rail is raking in the soles, or maybe I should say pesos (Chilean), being the easiest and most popular way to access Machu Picchu. When we asked the taxi driver about Machu Picchu, someone who had grown up in Cusco, he said he had never been. We later asked one of our waiters in Cusco about Machu Picchu, he said he had never been. We asked the receptionist at our hotel in Cusco about Machu Picchu, she said she had never been. The main reason cusqueños (people from Cusco) have not been to one of the greatest wonders of the world that is right in their backyard is mainly because they cannot afford train tickets (and because the entrance fee is quite hefty as well). We found this to be very disheartening, but seeing as though we could barely afford a trip to Machu Picchu ourselves, we completely understood.

The Essence of Cusco

Cusco is a charming city with its rustic red shingles, history-laden buildings and surrounding mountains.

Instead of using a Peruvian company to pump money back into their own economy, the government is allowing a private and foreign company to operate as a monopoly and inevitably prevent Peruvians from visiting one of the most incredible places on Earth that their ancestors built. Obviously this made us both a bit angry, but enough about Peru Rail as a company, on to what you really want to hear about.

We boarded the Explorer train to Aguas Calientes, complete with “skylights” (or a “vista-dome” as they call it) so you can see the towering mountains above. Winding through the Sacred Valley and passing through several small towns such as Urubamba and Ollantaytambo was simply amazing. It was raining when we got to Aguas Calientes, which didn’t help the eyesore of a town that is ironically located in an incredibly lush and beautiful river valley just below Machu Picchu. If it weren’t for the town, it really would be a lovely spot. Lonely Planet says that “it won’t kill you to spend a night in Aguas Calientes,” and no, it did not kill us, but we would have much rather spent our 3-month wedding anniversary somewhere else (but then

Cusco Plaza

One of the many quaint plazas scattered around the city, this one just outside of a great museum we visited.

again, we were going to Machu Picchu the next morning, so we really couldn’t complain). We luckily found a nice and clean hotel (somewhat of a rarity) for the night and actually ate one of the best meals of our entire trip, if not the best. Indio Feliz, a Franco-Peruvian bistro, is nestled in an alleyway and just off the main tourist drag. With it being a week away from Christmas, the restaurant was cozily adorned with Christmas decorations and had a great little wood-stove fire. Aside from the warm atmosphere, the food was absolutely incredible! Fresh rolls straight from the oven, avocado-stuffed salad drizzled with lemon and olive oil, fresh salmon with mangoes and a homemade orange pie for dessert and we were not even thinking about the ugly and touristy town we were in for the night.

The only reason you stay in Aguas Calientes is to catch the first bus to Machu Picchu and avoid the herds of people that come only for the day from Cusco. We had bought our entrance tickets and bus tickets the day before, so all we had to do was wake up at 4:30am (and eat breakfast at 4:45am –

Vista-dome on a Train

The "vista-dome" on the train to Aguas Calientes that provided us with stunning views of the Sacred Valley.

way too early for that, but it was free) and then stand in line for the first bus at 5:30am. By the time we walked the very short distance to where the buses depart, there was already a huge line and we barely made it onto the seventh bus going up to Machu Picchu. However, after about 25 switchbacks and a gain in nearly 2,500 feet, we were standing in line before 6:00am to one of the greatest sites in the world. We met two Dutch guys at our hotel and arranged a private tour with them at the entrance where there were heaps of tour guides trying to sell a tour to the loads of tourists waiting in line (can you tell we’ve been to Australia?). With our guide and having passed through the entrance gates just after 6am, the pinnacle of our entire trip through South America was just a walkway and a left turn ahead…

You’ve all heard of Machu Picchu – it’s something we study in school as kids, something we dream of visiting one day and something we all hear is absolutely incredible and a “must-do”. Whatever perceptions you may have of Machu Picchu,

Aguas Calientes

Now you can see why Aguas Calientes makes such a gorgeous river valley a bit of an eyesore.

this blog will simply not do it justice – you really must visit this amazing place on your own in order to truly give it the respect and appreciation it deserves. Around one bend in the cobblestone walkway and there it was, Machu Picchu, one of the most amazing and awe-inspiring places in the world, laid out in front of us. Not many things in this world have taken my breath away, but I must admit, seeing Machu Picchu for the first time honestly did take my breath away. Its raw beauty, archaeological wonder and pristinely gorgeous location made me stop in my tracks and forget how to even think. It was a uniquely spiritual experience. This “lost city” of the Incas was constructed sometime in the 15th century after the ninth Inca, Pachacutec, defeated the Chankas (a highland tribe), which spawned the rapid expansion of the Inca Empire. Interestingly enough, the dominance of the Inca Empire only lasted about 100 years, until the two sons of the 11th Inca, Huayna Capác, fought over the empire their father had left them before his death, resulting in the slow demise of the Incas. Having no recorded history until 1911 when American

Plastic Bottle Christmas Tree

One of the more creative ways to reuse some of the billions of plastic bottles that are in Peru. At least these are not scattered on the ground... yet.

historian Hiram Bingham discovered these forgotten ruins, Machu Picchu still remains a matter of speculation. Whether Machu Picchu was built in an attempt to preserve the dwindling Inca culture or was built as a royal retreat (as various theories suggest), it is very obvious that this mountaintop citadel was a very important ceremonial place for the Incas.

We toured the ruins of Machu Picchu with our guide for a few hours, and what we could understand we found to be very interesting. Our guide was speaking English, but because of his heavy accent, I would have understood him much better if he had just spoken Spanish. It was interesting that the two Dutch guys understood him just fine as they are much more accustomed to ‘bad English’ where they live. Either way, it was an informative tour. From the Temple of the Sun to the Royal Tomb to the Sacred Plaza to the engraved head of the condor, we toured Machu Picchu’s immaculate ruins with our guide and then later without our guide, simply because they really are that amazing. Also, I must mention that our guide carried cheese cubes and ham for the South American eagle that followed

Machu Picchu

One of our very first views of Machu Picchu... breathtaking, literally.

us around the ruins, pretty cool! Because we arrived so early, we had seen most of the ruins a few times over by the time day-trippers from Cusco began to arrive, and because we arrived so early, we also got one of the 400 passes given daily to hike the towering Wayna Picchu. Most photos you have seen of Machu Picchu actually have Wayna Picchu in them, which is lower in elevation than the Machu Picchu ‘mountain’ itself, but much more picturesque and closer to the ruins. We felt pretty good about ourselves when we scaled Wayna Picchu in less than 30 minutes, something that takes most people over an hour. The views from the top were second-to-none. For at least an hour we sat on a rock just taking it all in as you can see nearly the entire grounds of this amazing ‘lost Inca city.’ The ruins themselves were built in the shape of a condor (another sacred animal to the Incas), which we could see from above on top of Wayna Picchu, and something our guide had showed us in an aerial photograph. After Wayna Picchu, we hiked to the Inca drawbridge along a narrow cliff-hugging trail

Machu Picchu Terraces

The east-facing terraces that were believed to have been used for farming at one time.

with spectacular views of the canyon below. The Inca drawbridge, another architectural wonder, blew our minds as it was built along extremely steep cliffs where we would presume that many lost their lives trying to build. With the fog and rain starting to set in (and feeling quite lucky that we arrived so early in the sunshine) and after about 8 hours spent at Machu Picchu, we caught a bus back down the winding switch-backs to Aguas Calientes.

That afternoon we took a Peru Rail train, this time the Vistadome (a step-up from the Explorer we took earlier), back to Cusco where we would spend our last two nights in South America. We had another two great nights at Hotel Los Niños and another great day touring the fantastic city of Cusco, but I feel like after writing about Machu Picchu, that nothing will really be all that interesting to blog about. So after 7 amazing weeks in South America, I will end this portion of our journey, our “phase 3” as we call it (St. Lucia was “phase 1” and our U.S. road-trip was “phase 2”). We did not make it to Ecuador as we had originally planned,

Machu Picchu

but that’s OK, because we both feel like we got to experience more by doing less. Ecuador is high on our “future travel wish list” that we have ironically been comprising as we travel the world. All in all, our journey through parts of South America was better than we had expected. We found adventure, we found culture, we found off-the-beaten track pueblos, we made new friends and we really did have the time of our lives. Now, on to “phase 4” of e squared everywhere as we head to New Zealand and Australia for 5 weeks.

Signing off from South America (in Thailand)… Ciao! Hasta luego! Que te lo pase muy bien! Adios!

e squared everywhere (written by Erin)

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