Friday, July 5, 2019

Day 9: Exploring Cusco

Nep met us just after breakfast.   We had booked a halfish day tour to get our bearings and a feel for the city before we set off on our own.   First up was right next door... the Qorikancha.   This place was a huge complex that had formerly been the Incan sun temple, but when the Spanish Conquistadors came and stripped all the silver and gold and ransacked the place, they used the foundation walls to build a large church, right on top.   The foundation walls were made from sharply cut and precisely placed honed blocks, and when there was an earthquake in 1650 and again in 1950, the old walls were the only things strong enough to survive.   The Catholic Church had to be rebuilt twice, and fortunately a little smaller in 1950 to expose the beautiful Imperial Incan style walls.



We walked up to the Plaza de Armas and visited the Cathedral del Cusco, really  a collection of three huge churches that were linked together.   There were plenty of gaudy statues and pictures, but we were most impressed with the intricate carvings and the ways that local artists snuck in Incan symbology into the paintings and carvings.   

We hopped back in the van and drove up to the large site of Saqsaywaman.  This place was called a fortress by the Spanish (as it was hard to attack), but was actually thought to be a gigantic tribute to “thunder”.   There were two massive walls perhaps 500 meters long and 30 feet high that formed parcel lines in the shape of lighting.   Most impressive was that the walls were made of massive rocks, tightly fit together in a feat of engineering almost as impressive as the pyramids of Giza.





The grounds of Saqsaywaman (easily remembered to the western ear as “sexy woman” were impressive and provided fantastic views of the city below.






Back in the van and the crowd was verging on hangry... luckily Kim broke out a bag of GORP+M&Ms and after two passes a piece, we were good to go for another half hour or so.


We stopped briefly at a site called Quenco that used to have a large carving of a puma, but it, along with pretty much any symbol of the Condor, Puma and Snake (which form the Pachamama, the three levels of earth - heaven, our world and the inner world/spirit respectively), had been defaced by the Spaniards in order to assert their catholic authority.  Still, every year at the June 21 winter solstice, hundreds come to see sunrise where the shadow of a puma can still be seen.




Another round of GORP got us through a brief visit to an alpaca farm and a presentation of beautiful textiles woven throughout the centuries by various pre and post Incan cultures.  No takers on the obligatory store at the end though... I’m pretty much Alpaccaed out.



On the way back to the hotel, I pulled the chute and asked for the bus to stop... we were closer to the restaurant area and I didn’t want to sit in traffic for 10 minutes and walk back.   We had a pretty good meal (except for Abby’s hockey puck burger).   


The kids headed back to the hotel after lunch for some shill time, adults split up to do some outfitting.  Beth and I bought some snacks, a pair of hiking pants for abby and some other stuff, and despite being alpacced out, we still managed to buy some furry wares.   




We did an awesome loop of the city and spotted a good looking place for dinner called Carpe Diem.  Kim and Alex later concurred and by 8pm the eight of us were filling out the small lower level of this little Italian bistro and enjoying some fantastic pastas and pizzas.




Before bedtime the 4 Tyndall’s were once again jammed into one bed, fighting off the relatively cold interior temperature of the hotel and watching the new season of Stranger Things.  It reminded me of our 2015 trip, watching the  walking dead on a boat in the back waters of Kerala.  Sigh.

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