Travel relaxed: Make up your mind to have a good time and let go....
October 6, 2013
New friends! What a wonderful thing. And they all speak English! With our Adventures in Good Company guide, we were now a group of 13 ready to take on Peru. I was thrilled to have compatriots, and to have a local guide to make sure I understood everything I was seeing.
Adventures in Good Company (AGC) had contracted with Mountain Lodges of Peru (MLP) to provide local guides and all logistics for our trek on the Salkantay Trail. Before we started hiking, however, we had a couple of touring days in order to ensure everyone had a chance to acclimate to the altitude. I'm sure glad I gave myself an extra week for the same.
Our main MLP guide was Silver, and yes, that was really his name. He's not sure where his mother got it from since she didn't speak any English, but there it is. Silver had guided the AGC trek in Peru last year, and so was well equipped to handle a group of uninhibited, middle-aged women. Actually, our group ranged in age from 31 to 63, with most being in their 50s. At 45, I was the second youngest, and given the fitness level of most of the women, it was a good thing I had "youth" on my side.
Anyway, back to Silver. On our first day together, he took us to a couple of important Incan sites in Cusco. His knowledge of history, culture, and ecology was terrific, and I hope I can remember just a fraction of what he told us so I can share it with you.
We first boarded a bus to drive 30 minutes or so out of town to Saqsaywaman. I thought we'd somehow boarded the Magic School Bus by mistake and ended up in Alaska. Cusco had a very unusual hailstorm that dumped about an inch of icy slush all over the hills we were trying to drive up. Cars were spinning out, and at one point we had to wait for cars to get out of the way so we could continue, very slowly, up the hill to Saqsaywaman.
Saqsaywaman is pronounced rather like "sexy woman," a coincidence I think the Peruvians delight in telling tourists. It is a walled complex situated on a hill high above Cusco. Records indicated that it was built about 1,000 years ago, but it's best known as the place from which Manco Inca laid siege to Cusco in 1536 after the city had been occupied by Spanish Conquistadors. Since then, it was used as a quarry, and many of the massive rocks making up the walls were carried away for other uses. The remains, however, are still impressive, even when covered in hail.
The walls of Sasaywaman are built in a zigzag, a representation of the serpent, one of three sacred symbols to the Inca (the others are the condor and the puma). The stones in the walls were hand-cut (using bronze and stone tools) so precisely that no mortar is needed to fill gaps between them. The surfaces were smoothed by rubbing them with sand and water.
The complex is not only a popular tourist site, but is also still used by locals to celebrate Inti Raymi, the annual Inca festival of the winter solstice and new year (this would be in June, remember - south of the equator). As with all Inca sites, the features of Saqsaywaman are oriented with the sun at particular times of the year. This site must have a feature that is lit by the sun only on the winter solstice.
Local llama and alpaca herders also make use of its grassy terraces.
After Saqsaywaman, we boarded the bus again to go back down to Cusco. The ride also gave us a chance to thaw our unprepared feet! Out destination was Qorikancha, another Inca site co-opted by the Spanish. This time, the Conquistadors built a Catholic church using the Inca temple as a foundation.
You'll notice in Inca architecture frequent use of trapezoids. Walls tend to lean slightly in towards each other at the top, and windows and doors are usually trapezoidal. This is because the trapezoid is a very stable shape. In a land beset with earthquakes, stability is a good thing.
The Spaniards chose to emulate European architecture rather than adopt local styles. As a result, their buildings were not nearly as strong. In the 1950s (I think), an earthquake collapsed the church, but left the foundations of Qorikancha undamaged. The Peruvian government forbid the Church to rebuild on the site, and as much as possible it has been restored to show the locations of the Inca temples to the sun, moon, lightening, and rainbow.
Like Saqsaywaman, the Inca stonework at Qorikancha was flawlessly hand-created, and the stones are set seamlessly. There was mortar involved in the work, however, just not to fill gaps between ill-fitted stones. In the sides of the stones were carved pockets which were filled with melted bronze before ajoining stones were placed together. The bronze, when it hardened, helped to hold the two stones together. This use of bronze led the Spaniards to think the walls were filled with gold, futher ensuring the destruction of the Inca sites. (Pre-Inca sites like Sillustani, if you recall, used a mud and straw mixture for mortar rather than bronze. The Inca copied, but then adapted, technology from older cultures.)
Our final destination of the day was the Cusco Basilica. As I mentioned before, taking photos inside was not allowed. The facade at sunset, however, was spectacular.
