Peru: Cusco

After all my babbling about our trek I realized I hadn’t actually said anything about Cusco.  We arrived in Cusco by knight bus from Arequipa.  The bus ride was uneventful – it was night after all – and we arrived at 6:30am or so.  The bus station is located in a somewhat rough around the edges neighborhood, or at least so it seemed to our tired eyes, some way from the colonial heart of Cusco.  Our taxi was similarly rough around the edge: every time I leaned back or the driver accelerated con gusto my chair tipped back as the front bolts had pulled through the floor!

Shortly after leaving the bus station we arrived at the Plaza Mayor also known as the Plaza de Armas.  The night club on the corner was still pounding out the music and revelers were coming and going (7am!!!).  Our hostel, Suecia 1 was far enough up the street that this wasn’t going to be a problem.  Turned out that we were further up the street than we expected.  On presenting ourselves at the hostel and ringing the bell we were met by a sleepy-eyed woman who told us they were shut for renovations and we should go on up the street and round the corner to Suecia 2. 

Suecia 2 was a dump but we didn’t feel like lugging our packs around while we looked so we settled for one night, showered (cold water only, brrrr) and wandered off to find breakfast and a new place to stay.  We breakfasted at Inkafe and then walked up the street to Rumi Punku which was so light and airy and the people were so nice that even though we were paying about double what we had become used to we jumped at it.  The rest of the day was spent meeting with the folks at United Mice, our trek agency, paying them, going to the bank etc.  We also took a stroll around the upper part of the old town, enjoying the great views and the architecture.  The planning office was entertaining:  the entry door was so low that even the locals had to duck.

We had dinner and drinks at a club called Muse which had a live jazz band playing.  They were billed as Afro Andean but were more or less jazz.  The music was fun, the drinks were cold, the women were hot and we stayed up late.

We shifted ourselves early the next morning and spent the day wandering around.  First down to the Mercado San Pedro which is the local locals market which was mostly great except for the piles of hairy cow lips (en serio) and other unrecognizable bits and pieces, fly encrusted, festering to our eyes, and smelly.  After this we wandered down to a raft of artisan markets so we could shop, shop, shop.  We did want a few things and we were getting to the point where we would run out of time for such activities.

The next day, our last before the trek, was spent in part with a visit to QoriKancha which is a catholic church/monastery/convent built on the ruins of the main Inka temple in Cusco.  Cusco by the way was the seat of the Inka empire and was then known as Qosqo in the Quechua language.  The Spanish tore down most of the temple and/or integrated its bones into the foundations of the church.  There were bits left by the Spanish mostly intact and now restored to some extent.  It is impressive to see the Inka masonry for the temples, perfectly tight seams, no mortar, amazing angles and interlocking pieces and all without the use of metal tools to work the granite.  We hired a guide for 10 soles ($3) who was very good, really passionate about her history and full of knowledge about the site and many others in and around Cusco.  We gave her another 20 soles as a tip.  She had spent about an hour with us and $3 just seemed insulting.

Afterwards we took Graham to the pharmacy to get pills for his intestinal ails and finished the day with our pre-trek briefing, meeting both our guide, Edwin, and our fourth trek member, Sandy, who had just flown in from New York that afternoon!

Cusco itself, the old town part that we spent time in, is a rambling collection of colonial structures most of which have been converted into shops, restaurants and bars, at least around the Plaza Mayor.  This is also tout-central, any tourist wandering within about a one or two block radius of the Plaza is swarmed by vendors selling paintings (done by the vendors themselves they say), various woven items such as belts, intricately carved gourds (lovely but bulky), post cards, shoe-shine services (endless offers to shine my Keen Sandals!) and so on.  It is overwhelming to some extent, always saying “Gracias, no” becomes tedious, although I did have several good conversations with both a shoe-shine “boy” (he was in his mid-twenties) and a painter (similar age) regarding the local economy (it sucks), tourists (there aren’t many) and their lives (a struggle).

After our trek we introduced Sandy to the Mercado and then strolled of to Pampa del Castillo, a local street just off the Plaza a few blocks with an endless row of chicharronerias, restaurants that specialize in deep-fried pork (skin, fat, meat, the works) all fired up to a crispy golden deliciousness.  If you like pork this is the street to visit.  Find a restaurant around 12 o’clock heaving with locals and go on in.  We shared (between the 4 of us) a couple of plates of pork (includes a salady bit and potatoes and choclo) and a big bowl of pork adobo, washing it all down with cold beers.  Yum.

We visited three museums during our time in Cusco: the aforementioned Qorikancha (more of a place than a museum), El Museo de Arte Precomlumbiano and El Museo de Inka.  The latter is pretty worn out, was probably put together 15 or more years ago and then forgotten which is a shame since they have some nice things and by all report have a warehouse  full to the brim.  The museum could use a good going over (full closure and full reconstruction) to better present the information and such.  The pre-Columbian art museum was very good, mostly well lit, informative descriptions in Spanish and English (unfortunately tended to flowery arty descriptions in both Spanish and English so we eventually ignored them), packed with amazing pottery some textiles and some metalwork (jewelry etc).  I would skip the Inka museum but Qorikancha and the pre-Columbian are well worth it.

A couple of days before we left Cusco for Lima Graham and I stumbled on a great bar, Km 0 (Kilometer Zero) up behind the Iglesia San Blas.  It is a fun, chilled out place with great music (a mix of old rock and roll like the Stones, U2 and new Latin rhythms) and the bes pisco sours we had during our time in Peru.  One could easily spend the evening here, chatting with the locals and carousing till the wee hours.  Needless to say Graham and I restrained ourselves as we had dinner plans with friends both evenings.  Well worth it particularly at happy hour when the drinks are only 6 soles each.

We really enjoyed Cusco and really needed another full week there in order to explore the City more and get outside it to visit the outlying ruins and villages in the Sacred Valley.

This really sums up our sentiments about Peru: we need another visit.  There is so much to see and do, I would like to do another trek or two, a longer trek in El Canon del Colca and another trek in the Andes around Cusco.  There are more places to visit, some of which like Nazca are only worth a one day trip, part of a day actually, and then on to Ica or Arequipa for the night. We would like to go to the Amazon basin, Titicaca, wander the northern coastal areas and so on.  Speaking Spanish is a real plus and we need to work on our Spanish to become more fluent and capable of holding a long, rambling discussion – this is mostly a matter of building the vocabulary and practicing of course.

To sum it all up: we really liked Peru.