Arrival in Cusco!

20 September 2017

The next day, we rose early as usual. We had a hotel breakfast, before we boarded the buses and set off for Cusco. The drive to Cusco would have been long, but we stopped along the way to take breaks and to see tourist destinations. The first thing we stopped at was an famous Inca burial grounds. We walked up the hill and learned about how the graves had changed as years passed. The most recent graves were ones that looked like towers, but many of the graves had been destroyed by the Spaniards, earthquakes, and lightning. At the top of the hill was an incredible view of a famous Peruvian lake and island…

After we all took pictures, we walked back down to the buses. The next stop on the ride to Puno was some other Incan ruins. We arrived at the ruins, and walked around with our guide to learn some information. Once again, the Spainards had destroyed a lot of the Incan city, but we were still able to see the architecture, the storage, schools, houses, and trail of the Incas. Surrounding the ruins were tons of locals, some of who owned local shops. Once of the most impressive was a man who made pottery. His entire shop was filled to the brim with detailed pieces that he had all made by hand. While I didn’t buy anything, I did take some pictures…

After the pottery, Courtney and I headed back to the main part filled with all the little tourist shops. We walked around trying to find cheap bracelets, which we ended up suceeding in. The key to getting things cheap in bartering is walking away or pretending you aren’t interested anymore. So Courtney and I went up to a lady, and asked her how much it cost for bracelets we had been wanting for a few stops on the trips now. She told us 1 sole (.33). We asked her how much it would cost to buy all of them (29 bracelets). She told us 29 soles. We had been hoping she would cut us a deal, so we just shook our heads and walked away to the next table. As soon as we showed we weren’t interested she started calling us back, “Mis amigas, mis amigas, senoritas, senoritas, etc.). She then told us to name our price, and we told her 20 soles. She agreed, and before Courtney and I knew, we had the bracelets and were sprinting back to the honking buses (we were late). Everyone on the bus was very impresesed with our deal, especially the girl who had paid 5 soles for one bracelet the day before. 

We ended up finishing the drive and getting to our next hotel in Cusco exhausted. Nadja, Annie, and I all trekked up to our room and fell asleep as fast as possible for the next day’s adventure, rainbow mountain.