Qorikancha | this bird flies

Cusco is a wonderful city. There is so much to do and see in a relatively small area (not that Cusco is small just seems like everything is close enough not to be overwhelmed or frustrated by the logistics of it all.) The place we were staying was right off of the Plaza D’armas, and it was really cute and clean.

They had a communal sun room, communal kitchen with a TV and computer area and all the tea you could want for free which was great because it was fricken cold at night. Only one day was a little frustrating as the water stopped working completely. Apparently there are random water restrictions in the City of Cusco that residents have absolutely no control over.

In Cusco, we ended up purchasing the Boleto Turistico, which is necessary to visit most, but not all, of the ruins, museums and monuments. We used ours to visit Sacsayhuaman (a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1983), the ruins at Ollantaytambo and Pisac (as previously mentioned). We also visited the museum at Qorikancha. We had hopes of visiting Tipon as well, but by the time we saw all of the other sites there was no motivation left in me for a 5 hour round trip.

Wikipedia has a panoramic photo of Sacsayhuaman. Check it out. While at Sacsayhuaman, we went to Cristo Blanco as well. It was a bit of a trek, but I wanted to see it. You can see the tall white Jesus from Cusco. He’s kind of like a mini Christ the Redeemer. (Cristo Blanco was a gift from Palestinians settled in Peru to Peruvians.)

We walked Av El Sol, one of the main streets, and saw the monument of Pachacutec, but didn’t have time to do a tour. More on Pachacutec later. We also found the famed 12-sided stone in the Incan wall on one of the side streets of Cusco, Hatunrumiyoc. ps: Kind of weird that there is a police officer guarding the rock.

Hatunrumiyoc — Bet you just counted the sides didn’t you?

On the first day in Cusco (during the hail storm), we went to Qorikancha. Qorikancha was an Incan Temple of the Sun until the 16th century when the Convent of Santo Domingo was built on the Incan temple. The site is a mixture of Incan and Baroque building techniques as there are still Incan walls supporting the convent.

Word is that Qorikancha had panels of gold lining the walls of the court-yard that were designed to be bathed in sun. (Qorikancha means “courtyard of gold” in Quechua.) A lot of the gold was used to pay a ransom for a captured Incan, Atahualpa, whom the Spaniards killed anyway. Then, when Spanish Conquistadors sacked Qorikancha, they seized the remaining gold and melted it down. Legend has it that a massive gold disc was hidden somewhere by the Incans. That hiding place has yet to be discovered.

Adventures of a couple seeing the world 2 weeks at a time.