It was nice to have three nights in Cusco, after such an exhausting week of travelling and short hotel stays, in our very well placed hotel on the edge of the main square with a rooftop garden. The room was small enough to seriously damage a cat, if I’d had one to swing. But it was quiet and had the best views ever of the festivities going on in the square as the lead-up to the annual winter solstice celebrations, all of which were very colourful (and mostly musical),as you’ll see in the photos.
Rolfi, the same local guide we had for Machu Picchu, took us on a half day tour around Cusco and to some of the local landmarks and also to the park called Saqsayhuaman (pronounced “sexy woman”) which has yet more Inca ruins….to be honest I’ve now seen enough of them to last me a lifetime! He had us on all the time, telling us complete porkies about things to see if we were gullible enough to believe him. Steve got him back a cracker though, when he quite convincingly told him that New Zealanders didn’t need passports any more, because we all had microchips in our necks. They had a great friendship going, based on bullshit-spinning and we were both sad to say goodbye to Rolfi. We then had some much needed free time to do what we wanted for a whole day – luxury.
A few of us wandered up to the narrow and cobbled streets of the San Blas neighbourhood of Cusco (thanks for that tip, Michelle) which was quite picturesque, apart from the inevitable dollops of dog poo every 5 metres or so. We’ve certainly had our fill of women and children dressed in colourful native costumes with baby llamas – the idea is that you give them a couple of coins and can then take their photo. There was a girl of about 6 or 7 on her own, with a very unhappy and hot looking 2 year old sister, who came up and asked us to take photos, then when we agreed they both just kept saying “Cheeeeeeeeeeeeeese”, which was all the English they’d been taught. All very cute, but when you so many kids on their own (with baby llamas tucked under their arm), you start to see that, in a way, it’s really just a form of child exploitation and I just felt sorry for them. I’m sure they have a “minder” nearby, but we never saw one.
Our next stop is the exciting destination of the Peruvian Amazon jungle, so all we have to all have a major re-pack so that when we get to Puerto Maldonado, our flight destination in the Amazon, we can quickly put enough clothing etc into another bag (provided to each of us) for 3 nights in the jungle, as we’re only allowed 10kg each. Very excited about this next part of our trip and a complete change of climate to somewhere much MUCH warmer….
2 Frosty Tops Do South America 