Photo Link:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/snjTHhro8EACMdVt8
After my little Amazon excursion, I met my parents and my sister in the Lima airport. It was my dad’s 60th birthday in the end of May, so they had planned to meet me in Peru for seeing Machu Picchu while I was galavanting about South America. Obviously a last minute change of plans meant that I had seen them in New York, India, and New York again, but we still stuck with this so they spent two weeks in Peru with me. We flew over to Cusco, up at 3400 meters elevation, and spent a week there.
For the first couple of days we took it pretty light as we adjusted to the altitude. We slowly checked out the town itself, which was quite nice but definitely a bit bleh, especially when compared to the rest of the Cusco region. It reminded me a ton of other colonial cities like San Cristobal in Mexico or Antigua in Guatemala. I suppose I’m not the *biggest* fan of Spanish architecture/history (especially compared to other regions like India/Russia/Germany/England), so that definitely played a role in my opinion here. But it’s what I would classify as a pleasant yet mildly forgettable.
After a couple of days acclimitizing, we took a half day trip to walk a few miles near Cusco and see these string of ruins just outside the city. These were the sites of Tambomachay, Puka Pukara, Quenco, and Sacsaywuaman. Much like all of the other Incan ruins we would see, the ruins themselves were a bit OK (this is a problem with travelling too much, but I have seen far better), and the landscapes were just OK (mountains are cool but I prefer alpine deserts to lush mountains), but combined it made for a pretty cool experience. The Incans were really good at combining their architecture with the landscapes, and the end result is an impressive setting that is greater than the sum of its’ parts. The highlight of this self walking tour that we did was definitely the one closest to Cusco city, Sacsaywuaman, which had these ginormous stone slabs that somehow got transported and constructed by pre-modern peoples.
The next day, we did a private day tour of the Sacred Valley through a tour company, which was a great day. Much like the previous day, the ruins themselves were eh and the landscapes were decent but together it came across really cool. The sites we saw on this day tour were Chinchero, Maras, Moray, Ollantaytambo, and Pisac. This was a full 12+ hour day as we drove around the region exploring these different locales, and I think for me the definite highlight (and probably my 2nd favorite Incan site after Macchu Pichu) was Ollantaytambo. It was this giant pyramidal structure built into an imposing hillside, which commanded great views of the valley below and had some cool structures up top. One of my main criticisms of Incan ruins is that it is all stone, with pretty much no decorative elements left, unlike the magnificent ruins you see of the Mayans in Guatemala and Honduras, or of the Hindu and Buddhist temples of Cambodia and India. One of the rare exceptions here was in Ollantaytambo, where there was a giant stone slab where you could just about make out some runic (for lack of a better word) designs and some puma carvings, which was even cooler than it normally would have been given the scarcity of similar carvings in other Incan ruins.
After a couple of days checking out ruins, we spent the next two days doing day hikes. While my parents are both in pretty good shape (my mom legit walked a half marathon so was walking close to an Olympic clip, and my dad runs like 10+ miles a day), they strugged with the high altitude so didn’t do the hikes fully, and it was just me and my sister for both of these. The first was the Humantay Lake hike, which was from an elevation of 3900m to 4200m and back. We legit did this in about an hour, and it was shockingly easy. It’s also the 3rd highest peak I have ever done to this point (after Kili and Rainbow Mountain, which was the next day). This obviously does not count the 4700m highway pass I was at in Tajikistan as that was all driving. The lake itself was a really cool glacier lake, and definitely blew out the glacier lakes I saw in the Rockies and Glacier national park out of the water…just a giant reflective green lake with a towering mountain and massive glacier parked behind it. Was quite a scenic view to be honest.
The following day was probably the highlight of all of Peru for me, the Rainbow Mountain hike. This was from about 5000m to 5200m, and took a little over 2 hours for the roundtrip. I do have to say that the views actually lived up to the hype – the top viewpoint is a gorgeous 360 view of the barren valley that surrounds it with towering mountains in the distance, and of course the main view is the multi colored Mount Vinicunca that just opens up for you. Because of the perfectly lit sky, the colors actually shone through and it was just as cool in real life as it is on Google Images and Instagram. We left at 4am and hiked quickly enough to beat the crowds, but the crowds definitely get bad enough towards the late morning where it actively would not be enjoyable…need to have a combo of leaving early and hiking at a good pace to get the most out of this place. But the alpine desert setting combined with the totally unique rainbow mountain view made it a legitimately incredible experience.
The next day was my dad’s 60th birthday, and we did a half day tour to see some more Incan ruins that were to the south of Cusco this time. These sites were Tipon and Pikillacta, which were both decent but honestly more of the same (for better and worse) as the other Incan ruins we had seen near Cusco and in the Sacred Valley. The best part about this day was actually the colonial church we saw in Andahuaylillas, which had some exquisite indigenous paintings plastered all over the church along with some gorgeously gaudy gold decorations in the altar. Definitely blew out the Cusco cathedral in terms of enjoyability as a church, and arguably my single favorite church that I have seen in the western hemisphere.
After this day, we had spent a week in Cusco, and then finally made it over to Aguas Calientes to see Macchu Pichu. We took the train and stayed there for a couple of days. The landscape here was very different, as we were at a lower elevation (between 2000 and 2500m), so at a cloud forest level – rainforests that are relatively high altitude. The towering, green rock formations almost reminded me of the images that I have seen of SE Asia (haven’t actually seen these in person) or of certain parts of China. It actually vaguely reminded me a bit of both Zion National Park and parts of South Africa. Machu Picchu itself was, keeping up with the theme of Incan ruins, greater than the sum of its’ parts. The ruins themselves were underwhelming – walking through it was OK but not worth the hype, but the viewpoint with the mountains and greenery in the background is definitely very cool. Given the entire setting and size and scale of the place, it was probably my favorite Incan ruin site. There was this one Italian restaurant in town that we went to twice as it was probably our favorite meal in Peru…I do have to say, given all the hype about Peruvian food, it was very disappointing. It was distinctly mediocre and forgettable, and I would place it leagues behind Mexico and Argentina in terms of Latin American food. I really don’t understand the hype, but I digress. We were also remote enough here to have gotten a good view of the night skies, but unfortunately it was far too cloudy. My easy top 4 for best night skies is still Kili, Sossusvlei in Namibia, Wadi Rum in Jordan, and Kyrgyzstan, and hopefully I’ll be able to catch more in my limited time of retirement left, but it is shockingly hard to get the perfect confluence of factors for a good sky (no moon, no clouds, no light pollution).
After Machu Picchu, we went back to Cusco for the night (via train again) before flying out to Lima for a couple more days to end the trip. One really interesting thing about the entire Cusco region for me was learning more about Andean identity. It definitely seemed to me that the locals here identified far more with being Andean and speaking Quechua (the same langauge the Incans spoke!), than they did with being Spanish/Christian/Peruvian. In many ways, the Christianity here was similar to what I saw in Uganda in particular, where a belief in Christ coexisted with the older spiritual beliefs in natural gods (mountains, sun, etc). and ancestor worship.
We spent a couple of days in Lima to wrap the trip up, and to be honest, it was a nice but forgettable city. The colonial center reminded me a ton of cities like Madrid in Europe or Buenos Aires and Mexico City here in the Americas, but there were other parts of the city we would drive to (Lima is massive and not that walking friendly between districts) that were clearly run down. In a way, Lima gave me a bit of a California vibe with the layout of the city and the godawful traffic and how the city was seemingly designed for cars and not at all pedestrian friendly. One interesting thing here is the crazy amount of east Asian immigrants that made their way to Peru, specifically from China and Japan. There are tons of Chifa restaurants which are basically Chinese restaurants, but the few we tried were disappointingly mediocre…like a worse version of American Chinese, and nowhere near as good as the Chinese I got in my 10 days in east China or while in Singapore. But it was interesting to see this immigrant influence, much like the Italian one in Argentina, especially given that South America is often viewed as a monolith over in the US. This is doubly true given the indigenous identities that are present here in Peru (and, I’m sure, in other Latin American countries as well…like how there was a strong Mayan sense of identity in southern Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras).
The best part of Lima by far was the Larco Museum, which, while on the smaller side, might have been the best labelled and marked museum I have ever seen in a non-English speaking country. There was a fabulous collection of fully intact, beautiful pottery pieces and jewellry and the like, from all the various pre-Incan civilizations that had existed in Peru up through the Incans. Just some stunning pieces of art that really made you appreciate the local cultures a lot more. Absolutely deserving of the hype (it is the #1 Lima attraction on TripAdvisor), and easily worth it for even those who aren’t super into museums. The other cool thing we did while in Lima was to go down to the southern suburbs and check out the archeological site of Pachacamac. In many ways this reminded me of the archeological sites I had seen in Uzbekistan (both the Afrosiab site in Samarkand as well as the desert fortresses of western Uzbekistan), in Iraq, and in Jordan. Just a huge sandy desert region with hills of crumbling walls and buildings that looked distinctly middle eastern. This was an active archeological site so it was pretty cool to get a feel for that while exploring the massive grounds.
I will say, despite what I had said earlier in this post about Peruvian food being thoroughly underwhelming, our very last meal in Peru was absolutely lights out. It is apparently one of Latin America’s 50 best restauraunts, and I can absolutely believe it. Place was called Mayta, and it was fine dining, which in Lima means <50 USD a person. Miles better than Carbone in NYC, if we are comparing recent fine dining experiences. But still, I would argue that just because the fine dining is excellent it does not mean the food as a whole is excellent, as good food should also be affordable.
But yea, Peru was great and it was good to do a trip with my family, even though I had just seen them. My parents and sister flew back to New York, while I am now off to my next stop in Ecuador. Will be spending just under 3 weeks in mainland Ecuador, with my ultimate goal being to scale Chimborazo, which is around 6300m and is the closest point on Earth to outer space, given the equitorial bulge of the planet! If I am able to do that it would be pretty fricking sweet, but let’s see how the hike goes – it will definitely be tough. After that, I have a one week scuba liveaboard scheduled in the Galapagos for the end of the month which should be an awesome time.