We spoke to the concierge and explained what we wanted to do last night and they suggested a driver and 3 locations. So it was booked for 9.30 this morning. We had breakfast at the hotel and were serenaded by what looks to be an electric harp. Then got ready for our trip
Our driver was called Juan and the transport was a nice roomy SUV/people carrier. For which we were very grateful, given the state of a lot of the cars on the road. Tread on the tires seems to be optional. Juan spoke very little to no English which was about the limit of our Spanish, so there was a lot of hand gesturing going on. He pulled over for us to take photos of lake Huaypo a very large horseshoe shaped lake. Once we were outside of Cusco it was interesting to see all the crops growing and everything being done by hand. The soil looked excellent and it was good to see that the crops were being rotated to allow the soil to recover.
We carried on up to about 12000ft and stopped at the Maras salt pans, here is a link to get all the information for those of you that are interested https://www.peruhop.com/maras-salt-mines/. We had a good walk around and as you can see, the salt is still collected by hand. We found our driver and headed out to our next stop
Next stop was the archaeological site at Moray https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moray_(Inca_ruin) we walked around for about an hour marveling at the ingenuity and skills of these ancient Inca tribes
On our way to our next location we briefly stopped to see these ancient food storage buildings built into the side of the hill, I can’t tell you where exactly this was as hand gestures just didn’t cut it!
Last stop was at Chinchero, we roamed around the town with its endless textile stores, most of which were shut as it was May Day. Finally at the top were more Inca ruins and just before we explored them, the locals were gathered in the market square, dancing playing music and drinking beer. Alpacas have been seen by the side of the road for most of this journey and they were also wandering around the ruins. https://cosituc.gob.pe/chinchero/
On the way back to Cusco I noticed a lot of the houses had little ceramic bulls on the roof, somewhere in pairs and some had a cross between them. With the help of the internet, i found that they are called Pucara Bulls and they represent strength, fertility and protection. These bulls are all made by local artisans in Pucara a small town in Southern Peru.
Back to the hotel and down to the square for a much needed coffee and a cake as we had not stopped for lunch and then early evening we ate pizza at a local spot as it had proper wood fired ovens, it was delicious.
