| Escape from the sacred valley - a thriller in two parts
Apr 25, 2005 | (click to enlarge)
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 | | Justin feeding a llama at the llama farm | | View from the top of the Inca ruins | | Alice following our guide through the ruins |
| Part one: The nice bit
We left Cuzco at about 9am for our tour of the sacred valley. It was just us and the guide and the driver, which was a bit intense - you had to really concentrate on all the information he was giving out. Anyway, our first stop was a llama farm, where we saw all the different types of llamas and Justin got to feed one of them with some leaves.
After that we stopped at Pisac market to practice our haggling skills. I thought I was doing pretty well, but they seemed to agree to my prices far too quickly, so I've probably paid double what the things are worth. Still, it was fun. Our guide kind of stalked us while we were shopping to make sure we weren't being murdered by a stall holder. It was a bit odd as he'd keep popping up behind or in front of us!
We had a lovely lunch at a hotel, I had llama steak which is really nice - quite like beef.
Then we saw our first Inca ruins at Ollaytaytambo. They were enormous - when we were at the bottom I couldn't believe that we were going to climb all the way to the top, but we did (with several rests). The view was great. We heard all about how they moved the stones to Ollaytaytambo from another mountain, the reconstructions that is being carried out, how the Incas lived in this particular ruin, and loads more that I can't remember at the moment.
After that we were dropped off at the Casa de Yucay - our hotel for the evening.
Part 2 - flight from the Sacred Valley
You probably remember me mentioning that there is a rail strike on Tuesday which is why we've had to move our itinerary around a bit? Well, at about 7pm in our hotel we had a phone call saying that the rail workers were probably going to start baracading the roads at 3 or 4am to stop people getting through, and what did we want to do. Good question. As we'd heard a story about some Austrians being stuck on their coach for 10 hours while demonstrators burned tyres in Northern Peru, we decided we definitely didn't want to get caught in the barricades.
So, after much discussion with Lima Tours we decided not to stay at Casa de Yucay but to come back to the Libertador in Cuzco asap. The Casa de Yucay found us a "safe" taxi driver (their description!). So we were introduced to Jose and he ushered us into his car, which smelled a little doggy. What then followed was the most terrifying taxi ride we've ever had. There were no seatbelts in the back seats, and we drove through the mountains at break neck speed, the driver speeding up to take corners and far too close to the edge of some of the roads for my liking. I was also convinced he was too near the oncoming traffic lane - we passed several big buses with what seemed like only inches between us. Luckily, we arrived back at the Libertador unscathed, other than mentally. Justin then told me that the speedometer and petrol indicators hadn't moved the entire trip and obviously weren't wired up. Honestly, we were both terrified. We had to have a couple of beers to calm down.
Anyway, we're ok now, and safe in Cuzco, so don't worry!
Will upload some photos again at some point, but feeling a bit lazy at the moment. |
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