love and sunshine

Sunday, July 20, 2014

Peru: Sacred Valley Tour

Sunday, June 21, 2014: Sacred Valley Tour

After waking up and enjoying breakfast at the hotel, we were picked up bright and early for our Sacred Valley Tour. We booked the Sacred Valley Tour the night before for 40 Soles per person (~$14USD) which included a lunch buffet.

No thanks to my mistake of trusting that my daily contacts would work, I had serious issues with my contacts during this whole trip! I wore my glasses for a good portion of trip and ended up purchasing my usual contacts at a local vision store and paid a fortune for 2 boxes ($145USD for 2 boxes of contacts! UGH). Thank god Andrew forced me to take care of the contact situation and persuaded me to suck it up and pay up because I seriously don't think I would have been able to do the Inca Trail wearing my glasses which have an old prescription! Andrew is always the more sensible one between the two of us :) That's why I love him (okay, you can gag now).

Our tour was a pooled group of about 20+ people, and luckily the bus was pretty nice and comfortable.

The first break stop was a non-bustling market where there were lots of shops for typical souvenirs (these shops were all over Cusco)

Our first official site stop was at Pisac

Pisac

Pisac - the holes are tombs where they used to bury people

What great people to travel with :)

Second stop: Ollantaytambo - it was so crowded!

Ollantaytambo

Ollantaytambo - can you spot the face of the God of Gods?

How about now?

The weather was perfect everyday.

Loved the valleys and terrain

Our last stop was in Chinchero - we got here past sunset and it was really cold by night time. We sat through a presentation of how alpaca wool is made. This was a great marketing scheme as most people ended up buying the same typical souvenirs from these ladies after the presentation. They claim that everything is handmade but it is strange that we saw the same designs and items throughout Cusco and Peru at all the local shops...

Chinchero - not much to see here as it was really dark by time we got there

We got back to Cusco from the tour and took another walk through San Pedro market. We wanted to get more fresh sugar cane juice but the stand was not there today. After walking around for a bit and picking up some groceries (mainly just water and last minute supplies we needed), we decided to have Chifa for dinner. Chifa is Peruvian Chinese food and I had heard great things about it. Being Chinese, I definitely wanted to try it to see how it compares to Chinese food. Perhaps we didn't go to a good place to have Chifa but we were not impressed. It definitely reminded me more of take-out style Chinese food, and it lacked the "wok flavor".

Chifa - Peruvian Chinese food. Left is a sweet and sour type dish and the right is a stir fry.

After dinner, we walked back to our hotel to go to prepare our bags as our hike begins tomorrow! I definitely tried to enjoy my last evening where I had access to shower, bed, and toilet!

Peru: Cusco

Saturday, June 21, 2014: Landing, Acclimating, and Exploring

This trip took a decent amount of planning, but even then I was underprepared. After traveling for 16 hours (including layovers in Panama City and Lima), we finally landed in Cusco on Saturday morning at 7am. As soon as we got off the airport, we got G-ed by a guy who worked at the airport whom helped us with our bags and claimed he was from the hotel (since we were expecting hotel pick up at the airport, and I asked him to confirm to which he lied to our faces. SMH). Peter tipped him $5 USD after he demanded one; he deserved about 50 cents....SOLES. We were all pretty jet lagged and tired from all the traveling so once we checked into our hotel, we decided to rest/nap until noon.

Tierra Viva Saphi - our hotel in Cusco. Amazing hotel. Super clean, modern, spacious, and great service. Highly recommended!

After our nap, I felt the altitude sickness kick in. I woke up with a headache and definitely had a loss in appetite. We hadn't eaten all day, but despite the fact, I wasn't really hungry. We decided to venture out to explore the city and main square, which was only a 10 minute walk from our hotel.

Plaza de Armas in the main square on a gorgeous day. We had perfect weather everyday.

We originally wanted to have lunch at Cicciolina (had good reviews on TripAdvisor) but got there a few mins before they stopped serving lunch so they turned us away (kind of a dick move on their part because it wasn't even time yet...we still had a few mins!) and recommended their "sister" restaurant, Baco. We were not too impressed with the meal, but in hindsight...we weren't crazy about Peruvian food in general so this restaurant was decent relative to our other meals.

Inca Cola - a bubble gum/tutti-frutti flavored soda. So unique!

[Left] Lomo saltado - beef stir fry with tomatoes and onions with rice and fries

[Right] Cuy - guinea pig. Not a big fan but definitely a local delicacy

After lunch, we continued to wander about Cusco, exchanged money (~$1 gets you about 2.76S), and checking out the local streets and markets. We ended up in San Pedro market just as the sun was setting.

Churros! I love churros, but these were not great. We had the best churros in front of San Francisco church in Lima.

Local food stands - there were so many of these stands being enjoyed by locals around Cusco. Only 1 sol (~30 cents!) for an order of rice with fried egg and tomatoes. Peter and Andrew really liked these.

[Left] Fresh coconuts! So yum! [Right] Fresh sugar cane juice - sooooo delish. We wanted to come back for more!

Peru's street meat

San Pedro market at sunset

San Pedro Market - so many exotic fruits!

After walking around for a bit, we returned back to the main square to get massages! We got one hour massages for only 30 soles (~$11)....all I can say is you get what you pay for! But $11 is pretty cheap. It was more of a back rub than a massage though. Peter hated the massage experience lol.

Getting our massages - the flash revealed the dirty walls and made us feel a bit uneasy.

We were ready to have dinner after our massages, and originally wanted to have dinner at Uchu Peruvian Steakhouse but apparently you need reservations, which was such a bummer. We weren't having a lot of luck checking out the places we planned to eat at. We quickly checked Trip Advisor and found a place near by to eat. Our goal was to try alpaca. We ended up at a place that was next door and we enjoyed smoothies, Peter and Andrew both ordered alpaca steaks, and I had the Aji de Gallina (chicken in a yellow pepper sauce with olives and hard boiled eggs) - the sauce was reminiscent of curry. I didn't have much of an appetite due to the altitude sickness but Peter and Andrew both really enjoyed their alpaca steaks. After dinner, we strolled back to our hotel - it got really chilly at night.