On our first morning in Cusco we left our hotel with the aim to find another one. The night before we had discovered that most hotels here give prices in US$ and that a two-star hostel in Cuzco costs the same as four star hotel elsewhere in the country. It was getting dark and we ended up sleeping at the cheapest two-star place we could find in our rush to get to sleep, S./50 a night, or about $17.
Looking for another one proved easy, the small family run restaurant we were in last night offered us a room for S./15 per person – and it was in San Blas, a fashionable district. It wasn’t getting any better than that in this city, so we returned and accepted the offer.
Category: "Cusco Guide"
Cusco Greed
We arrived in Cuzco at night, with a taxi into the Plaza de Armas, and saw the cathedrals and churches all lit up. It was very beautiful. But that was as far as the wonder and beauty went.
To my great disappointment I finally had something bad to say about a city in Peru. The culture here in Cusco is one of greed and ripping-off tourists in any way possible. This is not limited to tourist-facing businesses – even the Catholic Church is in on the feeding frenzy of the Walking-Wallets…
Raqchi Ruins
We travelled closer and closer to the imperial city of Cuzco, along a similar route to which Inca founder and sun-child Manco Cápac would have walked. After rising from Lake Titicaca he headed west, looking for the ideal place to found his empire. His requirements were simple, the location had to have sufficient fertile surface soil – he would plunge his staff into the ground as he walked, always hitting rock in this barren landscape. Only when he reached the site of Cuzco was the soil abundant enough to settle.
Along this route is Raqchi, site of some pretty unique Inca ruins. These are the best, and to this extent only, surviving ruins that have adobe walls still sitting on a base of Inca rock walls. This was a normal feature in Inca architecture, all tall buildings were built like this, but thanks to the weather, and to the Spanish, little survives today.
