October 8, 2009

Today we had our tour of the Sacred Valley. Our guide, Mary, picked us up in the morning and we drove about an hour out of Cusco to a scenic overlook. We piled back in the van and drove to a llama, alpaca and vicuna “zoo”. This was one of my personal highlights of the day. Actually everyone in the group really enjoyed it. We were able to learn about the different types of llamas, alpacas and the vicuna. We were also able to feed them alfalfa. They really didn’t express an interest in being pet, but they were not afraid to come right up to you to get some alfalfa. At this stop the locals also had a demonstration of how they spin and dye the yarn from the shearing. There were also 5 women from different villages that were demonstrating the weaving on the loom. They make the most amazing stuff. I have no idea how they do it. Their fingers move so quick and are so agile. We left the “zoo” and headed up the hill to another scenic overlook of the Sacred Valley.

Peru is known for Chicha, a homemade beer made from corn that is “brewed” daily. Houses that make the Chicha hang flags outside. The flags are all over, I We stopped at house to try the Peruvian beverage. The first Chicha we sampled was the plain corn Chicha, which I found to be disgusting. The second one we sampled was made with some strawberries in it. That one actually tasted pretty good. I don’t know that I could have ever finished the size of glass the local’s enjoy.

The view of the Sacred Valley was gorgeous. It was very lush with a lot of farm land. Some of the farmland was plowed using a tractor and some of it was plowed using oxen. From this lookout we could see the market in Pisac that we were heading to. We arrived at the market and were allowed one hour. I could have easily spent more time just wandering. This market had a tourist side and a local side and I only barely got into the local side. From there we headed to Ollantaytambo to visit another amazing Inca ruin. I still cannot get over how the Inca’s moved these stones. We climbed up the stairs to enjoy a great view of the city, the surrounding farmland and one of the highest mountains in Peru. One difference between this ruin and others is that the Inca’s utilized pink granite in addition to regular granite. The pink granite was mined from a neighboring mountain quarry, hauled down that mountain and back up another mountain to where the ruin is. When I post photos later I show where the rock was hauled from. It might be hard to see how far and high they moved the rock from the photos.

After our visit to the ruin we stopped for a buffet lunch about 20 minutes away from Ollantaytambo. This was a place our guide selected for us that contained a lot of local Peruvian cuisine from the Cusco region. The food options consisted of salads, lots of potatoes, beef, lamb, chicken and desserts. The food was pretty good. I am usually not all that excited about eating at buffets in American let alone a foreign country but none of us got sick so all was well!

We continued our drive back out of the Sacred Valley back toward Cusco. We enjoyed many sights of the country. This area is very rich in agriculture. There they grow corn, potatoes and fruits and of course raise livestock, mostly cows and pigs. There were also some horses and donkeys as well. The farm animals are what I consider to be “free range” roaming the country side. Most of the houses are built using adobe bricks, some have windows and doors and some don’t.

We arrived back in Cusco around 4:30 and I decided I would wander the town some more. Chad, Chuck and Jonathan wanted to come with and see some more of Cusco. I took them up to the area Pat and I stayed in and shared with them some of the sights of the San Blas area. They seemed to really enjoy it. I think the highlight for them was the stop at Gringo Heidi’s for the famous Nelson Mandella cake, chocolate sauce and ice cream. It was amazing. We wandered the area for a couple hours slowly making our way back to meet Pat and Joel so we could head for dinner. Upon picking up Joel and Pat we headed back to the main square area to find dinner. Our mission that night was to try the Cuy, yep Guinea Pig. We first stopped at an Irish bar to enjoy a cocktail. Once the bar got too smoky we headed down to our dining spot. I guess the Peruvian gods were not on our side as they were out of Cuy at this restaurant. That day was a local religious celebration of something or other (they celebrate a lot there in Peru) so there was a run on Cuy. Oh well, we still enjoyed our dinner.