Peru: Day 1 (Cuzco)

Even after the whole American Airlines travel debacle, we still arrived in Cuzco and managed to get checked into our hotel around 9am. We went to the Llama Path office to pay the balance on our tours, and then set off to find some lunch.

After wandering around the Mercado Central for a bit, eating some sweet tamales, and buying some "alpaca" hats, we ended up near the Plaza de San Francisco.


We were unable to find a nearby restaurant in any of our tourbooks, so we finally just walked into a random place, which turned out to be pretty decent. We tried Inca Kola (much too sweet), alpaca (a bit tough), and papa relleno (stuffed potato, quite yummy):




After lunch, we had only a little time before our Cuzco city tour started at 1:30pm, but I managed to fit in a shower anyway. We were picked up in our hotel lobby by our guide Casiano, and were on our way.

First stop was the Koricancha temple. Casiano gave us a good overview of the history and showed us all the perfect imperial Inca stonework, and we also loved the courtyard and the views from the outside:



Next, we went to the Catedral, which was only a block away from our hotel:


Unfortunately we were not allowed to take photos inside, because I liked the interior very much. It felt more modern than a lot of cathedrals, with white plaster ceilings and grey stone trim. There were some interesting paintings, including what appeared to be a black Jesus; Casiano explained it was the Lord of Earthquakes, and that his was by far the most popular chapel among the locals. There was also a Last Supper painting depicting guinea pig as one of the dishes, and a small underground niche containing the ashes of the great Incan writer Garcilaso de la Vega.

From there, we headed to the outskirts of the city, to see Saqsaywaman and Qenko. Saqsaywaman was grander; impressive in scope with a nice view of the city. Qenko was quirkier, with winding rock passageways. We thought it would be a fun place for kids to play hide-and-seek, or even "sardines":



We spent so much time climbing around Saqsaywaman that we didn't have much time left at this point (the sun was setting) so we only glanced at Puka Pukara from the road, and then embarked on the short walk to Tambomachay, aka the "Temple of Water":


That was it for the (four-hour) tour; after Tambomachay we drove back to our hotel, said goodbye to Casiano, and met up with the rest of our group for dinner.

After some discussion, we ended up at Sumaq Misky. Some of us decided to split an appetizer platter, which included "guinea wing", alpaca kebab, chicken wings, and more:


The guinea pig was surprisingly good; very flavorful and tender, kind of similar to quail or another small bird. The alpaca skewers were again rather tough, but someone did order an alpaca t-bone which was much juicier. I was less fond of my Aji de Gallina, which was much too egg-y for my taste.

It was a short walk across the Plaza de Armas back to our hotel, but we were pretty beat after the long day, so only one game of Dominion was played that night before bed. I did manage to check my email on one of the hotel's free internet terminals, though.