"Being brave doesn't mean you are not afraid"
Saturday 12^th October 2024

After very little sleep we were down for breakfast, literally at the crack of dawn, about 5:30am. Unfortunately we were too early, there was nothing there for us to eat.

"We're leaving a bit early for the airport" I thought but the journey took almost an hour, even at this time of the morning. We arrived at the terminal three hours before of flight was scheduled to leave. So it turned out to be perfectly correct timing.

At departures we found the LATAM airways check-in desks. There was a long queue but Ali Jei helped us to use the automated self-check baggage drop instead which saved us a lot of time.

"Take a photo of your luggage" she said, "in case they are lost." So we did.

With our luggage safely checked-in, we walked through security to the departures lounge and decided to find some breakfast. We found a cafe with plenty of choices on their menu. Julie ordered French Toast and coffee and I went for a cheese empanada and a herbal tea they called Muña Celestial, Andean mint with orange peel and marjoram.

The tea was very refreshing with interesting flavours. The empanada was just huge. It came as a circular dome, more like a full moon pie rather than the more familiar half moon pastie. It was delicious and perfect for breakfast.

Once we had eaten we still had over an hour to wait at the gate. 

Julie was feeling especially anxious this morning. She had decided not to have a drink before the flight because being dehydrated (through excessive alcohol) was not recommended when arriving in Cusco. The city was over 3400m above sea level and altitude sickness was a real concern.

Boarding was delayed by half an hour which pushed Julie to the edge. She just wanted it over and done with so she could stop worrying about it.

Eventually we set off. It was only a short flight, about 80 minutes, so it wasn't too long for Julie to endure.

At first there wasn't much to see out of the window to occupy her but we soon saw some mountain peaks poke above the clouds.

Then the clouds cleared and we saw for the first time the most stunning mountainous landscape of the Andes. The distraction was timely because the closer to Cusco we got the more turbulence we experienced.

It was a difficult flight for Julie to endure, worsened by the fact she read that Cusco was a "perilous airport where only the best fly".

At 11am we turned into the Cusco valley, with the outskirts of the city below us. The plane was shaking as we approached the airport, descending right into the centre of the city.

Julie held my hand so tight it hurt.

Then all of a sudden, the runway appeared, and we touched down with a gentle bump. "Yay. Five nights now without worrying about flying!" she said.  

We stepped off the plane, walking down the steps onto the tarmac and took our first breath of the thinner air. It was noticeable, how deeper we needed to breath.

We were two miles high here at 11,152 ft (3399m) above sea level. All of us were a little apprehensive about altitude sickness. Our concern was that one of us would be struck down with a severe case and end up unable to continue with the trip or worse.

Inside the terminal we immediately entered the baggage reclaim. Julie got taken to one side for a random bag check. Her face dropped but they were only looking for fruit. 

They had a large poster listing 27 different prohibited fruits. I'm not too sure what would happen if you had a fruit that wasn't listed nor why moving fruit from Lima to Cusco was even prohibited!

Julie didn't have anything, so she was in the clear. The official also carried out the search in good humour so Julie quite relaxed about it.

Our luggage arrived safely and once collected we followed Ali Jei out of the terminal to the car park where our transport was waiting for us.

Our hotel wasn't far, between fifteen minutes to half an hour, depending on traffic.

We were welcomed into the city by a sign spanning the road, crowned with a gold disk, the Sol de Echenique.

It welcomed us in three languages, Spanish Bienvenido, Quechua Allin Hamuq and English. The Quechua language is an official language of Peru, and similar to Welsh, an indigenous language, oppressed by a colonial language but now finally getting some recognition.

We were in the heartland of the Inca Empire and Cusco certainly had a different feel, in comparison to Lima. 

In the centre of a roundabout stood a monument to Inca Pachacutec, the 15th century Inca Emperor who ruled before the arrival of the Spanish, and regarded as the greatest of all the Inca emperors.

He stood on a stone tower, with his back to us as we drove towards the city centre, which I thought was a bit odd, as if he was looking in the wrong direction.

We eventually reached the cobblestone streets and the whitewashed squat houses with their red tiled rooftops worthy of their UNESCO World Heritage listing.

Our hotel, Hotel Ruinas, was right in the middle, just around the corner from the main square. We pulled up outside. Staff came to help with our luggage. They were smartly dressed and very professional.

Inside, a large atrium brought natural light into the marble floored foyer. Behind the reception desk they had this fascinating art work on display. It was a Quipu, an old system of recording information using knots in rope. It was used by many Andean cultures, pre-dating and including the Inca. It was surprising to learn that there has been no record of the Inca having a written language.

We checked in. We were early but our rooms were ready for us. Striding up the stairs as normal was more demanding than I expected.  For once I was grateful for the porter to carry our luggage up the two flights of stairs.

The room was basic but spacious and plenty comfortable.

Its best feature was this wonderful view over the city's rooftops. In the distance we could just about see the words "Viva El Peru", cut into the hillside.

When we returned to the foyer Ali Jei brought out a small gadget to measure our oxygen levels and heart rate. "I will do this a few times when we're in Cusco" she explained.

She asked us all how we were feeling. We were all fine and our readings confirmed it.

With our health check done we set off for a gentle stroll around the city. When we walked past a small grocery store Ali Jei pointed out a drink called Gatorade. "You should drink a little, and often, to keep hydrated" she explained.

We bought some of the Gatorade. Apparently it was an electrolyte which was prefect for rehydration. We also bought some coca leaf in a small bag.

These weren't tea bags but the actual leaf. Chewing on one was suppose to not only put a spring in your step but also help with your digestion, a surprise side-effect of the altitude.

There was a whole range of similar products, like for example, coca leaf boiled sweets!

We walked slowly downhill along a narrow alleyway called Romeritos. It was our first glimpse of ancient Inca stone work, random blocks of stone, precisely shaped and placed together without the use of mortar.

We peered through a gate to see the ruined remains of a 15th century Inca palace called Kusikancha, believed to be the birthplace of Pachacutec.

During his reign the Inca Empire expanded its territory beyond its heartland of Cusco and eventually controlled much of modern day Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and Chile, founding the Tawantinsuyu, the "realm of the four parts". 

The narrow lane continued, then opened out into a small square outside the Church and Convent of Santo Domingo of Guzman. A wave of wedding guests were spilling out, including the happy newlyweds.

Being a serial wedding crasher I went to have a closer look. Everyone were in high spirits, laughing and joking. They even laughed about a crazy tourist taking their photo!

It was time for lunch and Ali Jei brought us to a restaurant called Chull's. It was next door to the local Intrepid office, hidden from view off an inner courtyard shared with another restaurant and a few shops.  

We sat inside and browsed the menu. It had several interesting choices for me and all of them were clearly marked with a green leaf as being suitable for vegetarians. They also had guinea pig and alpaca available for the carnivores but no one was brave enough to try some!

I went for the tacu tacu, a lentil and rice fritter, served with a salad, a drizzle of vinaigrette, and an artistically poured swirl of the yellow pepper sauce. It looked incredible on the plate, and tasted amazing.

Ali Jei reminded us that it was recommended to avoid alcohol whilst acclimatising to the altitude. So I had a drink of Ayrampo lemonade with mint.

Julie had belly pork, with a few sauté potatoes, salad, large corn kernels, a puddle of yellow pepper sauce with artistically dropped blobs of the sauce, finished off with some edible flowers. They had gone to a lot of effort to make it look presentable.

As we left, we noticed in the corner of the courtyard, a statue of Paddington Bear. This was our third encounter with the Andean bear from darkest Peru, yet I still couldn't pass on the chance of another selfie.

Looking at the photo however, I think I missed a trick and I should have doth my hat in the same manner as Paddington.

Back out onto the street we returned to the Iglesias de Santo Domingo. The wedding party had left by now and its doors were shut. Continuing around the to the other side Ali Jei drew our attention to the granite stone walls beneath the church.

"These are the walls of Qorikancha" she explained. "It means the Golden Temple in Quechua language because they say the walls were once covered with gold".

The church was built quite literally built on top of Qorikancha Inca temple.

At one time it was also called Inticancha, the Temple of the Sun because it was dedicated to the sun god Inti, and it was considered one of the most significant temples of the Inca.

It was difficult to imagine what it might have looked like. The Spanish conquistadors who arrived in Cusco in the 16th century noted that the opulence of the temple was "fabulous beyond belief". Sadly the gold was stripped to pay a ransom to the Spanish for the release of Atahualpa, the last free Inca emperor and then later the temple itself was demolished and its stones used to build the convent and church.

There was a museum we could visit but that would have to wait for another day.

We stayed here for a while, overlooking a large park, (Jardin Sagrado) popular with wedding photographers. We watched as another happy couple were having theirs taken. There was certainly a lot of love in the city today.

From the park we walked towards the Plaza de Armas, the main square of Cusco. The streets around the centre of the city were all cobbled adding to its charm.

Along another narrow alleyway called Loreto we stopped at a lady who had set up shop on the cobblestones to sell her knitted products. She was sat on a stool busy spinning wool into thread using a drop spindle.

We didn't want any of her stuff, which was mostly traditional Peruvian chullo hats, or some worry dolls but I did ask her permission to take her photograph. She graciously agreed. I took a few quick snapshots then slipped her 2 soles for her time. 

Along the same alley we popped inside a grassy enclosure behind the church of the  Companía de Jesús. They had a few alpacas tethered and grazing. The patch of grass was quite bare and didn't really offer much for them.

It was lined with several tourist souvenir shops. 

They also had a mock-up of a traditional bar, or a chicheria. Every Andean village probably has one, signposted with something red on the end of a stick, serving chicha de jora, a fermented corn beer, traditionally made with some saliva! 

"Would you like to try some?" asked Ali Jei before adding that they don't spit in it anymore. Despite her assurances, none of us were brave enough to try the chicha.

Still, it was interesting to go inside the Aqllawasi Chicheria-Museo and have a look at all the artefacts on display, including examples of all the different colours of maize or corn that were grown here.

"Are you sure you don't want to try some?" she asked again. She found our reaction to the thought of drinking saliva beer hilarious!

She then added in all seriousness that it's probably best we don't try it here because they use the local water which could cause stomach upsets if you're not used to it.

We followed her back to the alley and continued on our way to Plaza de Armas.

With the exception of the church of the Companía de Jesús, by which we were standing, the square was dominated by the large Cathedral of Cusco, dwarfing all the other buildings that formed the plaza. 

Traffic whizzed around it, controlled by lights. When they turned to red it gave us the opportunity to cross the wide road into the centre of the square.

With her head down, literally checking every cobblestone in case she tripped, Julie suddenly felt a little dizzy when we reached the other side. We explained that this was perfectly normal for Julie but Ali Jei was concerned it was the altitude.

So she suggested Julie should sit down and rest for a while, whilst the rest of us explored the square.

There was a fountain in the middle of the square. It wasn't the most attractive. It was like a green cake stand with a golden statue on top. Nonetheless another happy couple liked it enough to have their photos taken in front of it.

The statue on top was of Pachacutec. Apparently when the fountain was originally installed in 1872 the statue on the top was of an Apache Native American!

This confused, even offended people, and it was torn down in protest in 1969. It was only replaced with the Inca emperor in 2011.

I rejoined Julie and we sat looking at the cathedral. By the 16th century the Spanish had arrived in Peru, lead by the all conquering conquistador, Francisco Pizarro. They came to Cusco in 1533, having already executed Atahualpa, the Inca Emperor and installed his younger brother Manco Inca as a puppet ruler.

They wasted no time in converting the Inca people to Christianity and began building the cathedral in 1560, demolishing an existing temple in the process.

It took a hundred years to build.

We rejoined Sonya & Garry and Ali Jei and continued to walk around the edges of the square.

As we were leaving she pointed out how the city was constantly expanding further and further up the mountain side. Its current population is around half a million people. It has almost doubled in the last thirty years.

We also noticed a rainbow flag, which at first we assumed it was the Pride flag celebrating the LGBTQ+ community however here it was known as the Tawantinsuyo flag representing the Quechuan people and their Inca heritage. 

There was one difference in its colours, the Inca flag was a full rainbow with seven colours, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, light Blue, dark Blue (indigo), Violet where as the Pride flag only had six colours, with just one blue stripe.

It's also the official flag of the city of Cusco, but they've recently added an image of a gold disc, the sun of suns, in its centre to make it distinct.

We headed out of the square, passing with only a cursory glance at the fountain in Plaza Regocijo, a small square in front of Palacio Cabildo, now the Museum of Contemporary Art.

Around another corner there was another museum, this time it was the Regional Historical Museum of Cusco, housed in a former writer's home. On the patio they had a larger than life paper mâché character of an Inca man wearing a very unique headdress. Called a montera, it looked like a lampshade or a bowl and looked very peculiar.

We then looped around, passing yet another church, stopping briefly to admire the impressive doors of the Basilica Menor de la Merced, before returning to the main square.

Ali Jei then took us inside a small market filled with several traders, all members of the Meritorious Society of Artisans of Cusco.

We were drawn to these colourful ceramic bulls, known as Toritos de Pucará. These ornaments form part of an Andean tradition where a pair of these bulls are placed on the roof, in a blessing ceremony, to bring protection, happiness and fertility to the home.

 We couldn't buy any, as they were quite large. We'd never fit them in our bags!

We moved on, leaving the square past Paddy's Irish Pub, the highest 100% Irish owned Irish bar in the World. Then we continued past Molly's Irish bar which was definitely a few metres higher up the hill, which surely must make it the highest.

"It mustn't be Irish owned" Julie noted.

As we walked along the street we kept on hearing "Messajes" from ladies on street corners. I'm sure they were perfectly legitimate and only offered massages to weary hikers but it felt a bit like we were walking down a street in Amsterdam.

Ali Jei was taking us to Calle Hatun Rumyioc, a famous street where the best example of Inca stone masonry could be found. Once the walls of the 14th century palace of Inca Roca, the 6th Emperor of the Inca, it now forms the foundations of the Palace of the Archbishop of Cusco.

It certainly was a marvel. The stones were enormous, weighing tonnes, yet they all slotted into place in random patterns, like perfect jigsaw pieces. 

One stone in particular was singled out as being the best example of the precision cutting and is known as the twelve-angled stone. It was about 1m² and had twelve sides interlocking perfectly with the stones that surrounded it.

"Why didn't they just cut them straight in the first place?" asked Garry.

A very good question, to which Ali Jei had of course had the answer. "It helps with the distribution of the force of an earthquake."

We were now entering the San Blas district, a neighbourhood of art galleries and coffee shops along narrow cobbled streets up the steep hillside. Our lungs were getting a good workout as we slowly marched up the stepped pavement.

Two traditionally dressed ladies were walking down the hill. They both sported an over sized Andean fedora. The rim was regular but the height looked at least double the standard. It looked more like a Panama hat, but even taller again and made from alpaca wool or felt, not straw.

Beneath the hats their jet black hair were plaited into two.

Their legs were wrapped in plain brown leg warmers and on their shoulders they carried a load wrapped in a colourful fabric known as a mantas.

 They both wore a cardigan and a pleated skirt in the colour of their own choosing. Even their stripey bags were different colours but matching

Halfway way up the hill we stopped at an artisan handicraft store to take a closer look at this effigy of a dodgy looking man called Ekeko who could grant you your wishes.

He was wearing a chullo, the traditional Andean woollen hat and sporting a thin moustache and rotten teeth. Around his neck was a collection of items representing wishes. There was a camera, a toy car, a mug, plenty of cash, and several musical instruments like pan pipes, tambourine, drum and a small guitar.

Apparently its origins are from the pre-inca Tiwanakan culture where small objects symbolising their desires were offered to the god of prosperity and abundance.

A modern  tradition has a lit cigarette placed in his mouth and if it burns out completely then your wishes will come true.

A little further up we came to coffee shop and bakery, Panaderia El Buen Pastor. I had hoped Panaderia, meant tea room, because the Welsh word for a "cup of tea" was panad (or paned) but we were not in Patagonia, (where Welsh is actually spoken) and it was simply Spanish for bakery.

"Would you like to stop for a coffee?" asked Ali Jei.

Not one to turn down an opportunity to try something different I replied with a big "yes please".

Ali Jei mentioned that the panaderia supported a charity providing refuge for teenage girls. Julie thought she had read it was run by nuns. So whilst I was stuffing down a delicious latticed apple & mango pastry I was also pleased to know I was supporting a worthwhile cause.

After our charitable pit stop we continued up the hill until we reached a point overlooking Plaza San Blas. It was a fabulous view over the small square, with flags of both city and country in the foreground, the bell tower of the church of San Blas rising up on one side, and then beyond it, the city sprawling up the mountain.

From our viewpoint, we walked down a few steps into the square. Only then did we realise there was a fountain or a water feature, a wall of water, beneath where we had stood.

There was a more traditional fountain in the centre of the square, around which there were a few market stalls still set up despite the late hour.

Most of the traders here were dressed traditionally. Of course it was for the benefit of the tourist but this style is still worn by women all across the Andes. 

We didn't spend any time browsing the market but I did notice one print that seemed to show the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus dressed traditionally, even wearing a fedora!

It was all down hill from here as we left Plaza San Blas along Carmen Bajo, passing two vegan restaurants, opposite each other. My thoughts turned to supper, wondering where we were going to eat this evening.

We reached the Hotel Ruinas after only a few minutes. It was surprisingly near. A little weary we retired to our room for a rest, arranging to meet up in two hours.

Back in our room we switched on the tv and stumbled across Paddington 2, the second film in the series, the one where he goes to prison. It was quite a coincidence. It was also amusing to hear him speak Spanish!

At 7:15pm we gathered in the foyer. It was now dark, there was a chill in the air, but the streets were well lit.

Ali Jei had chosen a restaurant called Nuna Raymi. It wasn't far, literally around the corner (or two), a three minute walk. 

Nuna Raymi was upstairs, above a gallery and a jewellery store, next door to Molly's Irish Bar. As we walked in, past the open kitchen, there was an interesting herb garden growing strawberry plants out of drainage pipes mounted on the wall.

The name came from the Quecha for a "celebration of the soul". The room was decorated with a colourful garland made in the style of the Quipu, the Inca knotted rope. 

It seemed a popular choice. It was certainly busy. Although, a large group with their tour leader took over about half of the restaurant. Without them it would have been quiet!

It made us realise how lucky we were to be doing this journey as just the four of us. 

I was very impressed with the menu. They had gathered together all their vegan and vegetarian dishes and had an entire page full of choices.

Out of seven starters I opted for the Causita Acevichada de Hongos. Causita meant a little Causa and I had made causa at home before coming, and it was simply mashed potato, Peruvian yellow pepper paste, and some lime juice, with a filling.

The causita arrived in a small cast iron skillet, despite it being served cold. It looked amazing. It was topped with pieces of avocado and a ceviche of mushrooms and mango and something shredded that I couldn't quite work out. 

For my main I had a choice of five dishes and went for the ceviche. The word ceviche is more often associated with raw fish "cooked" by marinating in a citrus juice but it refers to the process rather than the ingredient.

The  Ceviche de Chocho y Hongos Ostras was apparently a traditional dish from Huaraz, Peru made with tarwi, (a white lupin bean), mixed with, hongos ostras (oyster mushrooms),  toasted corn, onion, avocado and marintaing in lemon juice.

Once again it looked fantastic and was full of flavour.

Julie went for the plain grilled chicken. Despite it being served flat, and looking like a roadkill, it tasted wonderful.

There was no room for dessert, so we paid our bill and returned to our hotel. I guess we were feeling the altitude more than we realised because we decided on an early night.