Cusco

We just got back from an amazing weekend in Cusco with my Uncle Steve and his wife Sherry. We ate lots of amazing food and ran ourselves ragged visiting ruins, markets, and unbelievable spots in the Andes outside of Cusco.

This is a small corner of market day in Chinchero, a little Andean village about an hour outside of Cusco. We all piled into a taxi and headed out there early yesterday morning. Shortly into the drive, Sidonia became really quiet, which seemed great because the adults could talk. When we got out to explore the market, she asked Bob to carry her. Then, moments after walking into the market, I noticed and commented aloud that she looked rather green. Mere seconds later, she got sick all over Bob and our backpack! Poor thing. It was clearly altitutde sickness. Cusco is about 11,000 feet above sea level, and Chinchero is about 12,000, so it must have just been too much for her. Anyhow, an indigenous woman working at the market rushed over and started to rub some herb all over her face. It may have worked, because within 15 minutes she was smiling, rosy-cheeked again, and happily picking out some hand-woven gloves and a hat to take home to Maine.

Our next stop was Salinas, an amazing place where locals farm salt to sell and feed to their cattle. We had to drive down this treacherous, single-lane mountain road to get there. Several times cars or buses approached us on the descent and we had to back up on the edge of a giant cliff to let them pass. We were all white-knuckled.

After Salinas we went ahead to an archeological site called Moray. Here, the Incas carved 3 circular systems of terraces for agriculture. We hiked down to the bottom, and it was absolutely breathtaking. Sidonia, oddly enough, acquired a large tumbleweed on the hike which she named Mr. Puffy and carried around for half an hour. She almost cried when I told her that she couldn’t bring Mr. Puffy back to Lima with us.

The next photo shows Sid and Bob on the natural rock slide at Sacsayhuaman, other ruins outside of Lima. Finally, we are captured in a photo taken by Sidonia.