SubscribeCuzco is by far one of our favourite cities...It is so rich in history and art and is a central site of Peruvian culture. Not only that but it has a buzzing nightlife, great bars and cafes and LOADS of vegetarian places to eat - a massive bonus for us! We ate so well there, frequenting one or two places most days because they offered a daily menu of salad, soup, a main meal and cup of tea all for just over a pound! You really can't beat that!!!
We spent a few days there and visited the city's galleries, museums and archaeological sites, which gave us a brilliant insight into pre-Inca and Inca culture and was a good warm up to the main event - Machu Picchu!!!!!!!!!!!!
It is such a beautiful city....much of the colonial architecture is built on original Inca stonework making it really unusual and completely unique!
The Plaza de Armas is really picturesque, with gorgeous churches, a fountain and loads of lovely colonial architecture.
The Inca Museum was by far one of our favourite places...the artefacts here are just incredible! And so well preserved! Here are some of our favourites....
I had a bit of a morbid fascination with the trepanned skulls....They would bore holes in people's skulls and replace the holes with metal. It was done in cases of injury, but also to denote a higher status in society and some theories suggest to have a closer connection with the gods! Grim!
Inca weapons!
One night we went along to a show of indigenous dancing at a cultural centre in Cuzco. This was awesome as we got to see how people of different indigenous groups danced in their traditional costumes. The compère explained the significance of them all too. It was amazing!!!!!
The next day we decided to try out a city tour to cram in as many of the sites as possible in the short time we had...unfortunately we got lumped with the worst guide of all time, Victor, who could barely speak English and when he did spoke at a speed of 1 word per hour, meaning it took us ages to listen to what he had to say and that we spent hardly any time seeing the actual sites! Victor was definitely competing for the worst tour ever award....
The one we wanted to see the most was Sacsayhuaman...Located a few kilometres out of town, this site is huge and was really important to the Incas...The whole of Cuzco was created to form the shape of a puma and Sacsayhuaman was it's head! The stone work is incredible - some of the stones are MASSIVE and weigh a stupid amount! Unfortunately our stupid guide ran off and left us sat on our own for half an hour, meaning that we hardly got to see any of the site when he returned. BAH! It was still awesome though...
These are the rocks that form the puma's teeth! Grrrrrrrrrrrrr! See how the walls go in a zig-zag??? Yeeeaaah???? One theory is that this was a ceremonial site that celebrated lightning....
The biggest insult of the tour was when we drove past one of the sites and the guide said 'Oh there it is!' and that was it!!!!!!!!!! They stamped our (one use only) ticket for that site as well, meaning since we had "seen" it we couldn't go back. We grumbled for the rest of the tour!
Here are a few more pics from the tour.....
This is supposed to be the remains of a statue of a large frog....honest! You can kiiiind of make it out...it's sitting sideways with it's head pointing upwards......
The frog was guarding a cave with an underground alter! So cool!!
That day we also visited the former Temple of the Sun, which before the Spanish conquests had life-sized statues of gods and animals. But of course the Spaniards decided to smash it all to bits and melt all the gold and build a monastery on top of it! It is a beautiful building and inside you can see the original stonework foundations....
Here is a painting of Inca cosmology....The Incas believed that Cuzco was the naval of the world, with all other places radiating from it...This depicts the other places of religious importance in the Inca empire and their relation to Cuzco....
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