We arrived in Cusco on April 4th, two days before my birthday. I had fears of getting sick from the altitude as it would be the highest above sea level I had ever been. It’s roughly 3400m above sea level in Cusco City I was told, and I definitely felt it. We were picked up at the airport by our friend Sandra and started to make our way to Lamay in the Sacred Valley. The initial drive through Cusco city was already tame compared to the craziness of Lima. Once we climbed the hills to get to the highway into the Sacred Valley, the tranquility hit a whole new level, so amazingly beautiful. All the Cusco area is made up of cities and towns built in valley’s or atop of mountains, I’ve never driven through so many mountain roads where you could look down a sheer cliff to the side of the vehicle and see a 100m+ drop.
We rolled into Lamay shortly after noon and were greeted by the dozen or so vendors on the side of the highway who were waving fried guinea pig (cuy) in the air trying to lure you into their open air restaurants. We pulled up to Sandra’s family’s house and it fully exceeded my vision of what I thought the home was like, not at all what I was expecting. It was nestled behind a typical Cuscanian town in it’s own sort of miniature valley, an amazingly breathtaking view with an equally amazing house they had built in this little paradise they have found.
We spent the day in Lamay, unpacking and resting. I was feeling a bit tired a little sick from the altitude, but we had come down to 2900m above sea level, about 500m lower than Cusco City. The next day, we made our way to Ollantaytambo. There are combi’s, or miniature buses, that travel the highways in the Sacred Valley almost all of the time. You basically stand on the side of the road, wait for one to come by and ask them how far they’re going. This was the most effective and cheapest way to travel in Cusco, although at times it was cramped in the combi’s, especially with a mountain of camera gear and clothes in tow with us. I think we traveled from Lamay to Ollantaytambo for roughly $4 each. It would have been cheaper if we could have taken a Combi all the way to Ollantay, but there were not any running at that time from the hub town of Urubamba.
That evening, we arrived at Hotel El Albergue (http://www.elalbergue.com/) in Ollantaytambo, hands down the best hotel to stay in before and after going to Aguas Calientes/Machu Picchu. Inside tip: there’s an unadvertised old school sauna on site, just ask for it. The hotel is owned and operated by friends of my girlfriend, she knows Ollantaytambo very well. The hotel has amazing grounds, rooms, restaurants and stunning views. There is also an organic farm, coffee roastery, and a Cañazo distillery. Lots to do, lots to see, eat, and drink!
The following day, we started our morning a 4:00am to make our way to catch the first train of the day (which was basically right outside our room, another bonus of the El Albergue) to Aguas Calientes/Machu Picchu. My girlfriend had arranged with Peru Rail to mount my GoPro to the front of the train for the ride, however the information was not shared with the correct people and they wouldn’t let us mount it. Thirty minutes into the train ride, a Peru Rail employee ran up to us and exclaimed that the head office had contacted the personnel on the train and instructed them to stop in the middle of nowhere and let us mount the camera to the front of the train. They pulled us off the train and made us run 100 meters to the front as fast as we could, mount the camera, roll it, and run back in record time. What a way to get adrenaline pumping at 5am! The result of the timelapse was amazing, the camera was solid and we captured sunrise from the front perspective of the train. Thanks to Peru Rail, kind of.
After the train arrived in Aguas Calientes, we boarded the bus that takes you up the impressive hairpin turns 2-300m up from Aguas Calientes to Machu Picchu, definitely a scary ride for anyone who doesn’t like heights or not being in control of a vehicle. We walked into Machu Picchu around 8:30am and the weather was dismal, but still beautiful. We spent some time getting timelapses of the clouds rolling over Machu Picchu and spent some time exploring before heading to Huayna Picchu. You have to book tickets for the Huayna Picchu climb months in advance because they only allow a couple hundred people per day on that mountain. The hike up only took us 45-50 minutes or so, but we ended up staying many hours watching the weather break and we finally got a good look at Machu Picchu from way atop of Huayna Picchu. It was amazing to be so high up inside the clouds and weather systems, I highly recommend doing this hike if you are able to book early enough in advance.
We spent the entire day at Machu Picchu, until they kicked us out at 5pm. The weather eventually cleared and we were greeted with an amazing view of Huayna Picchu from the Machu Picchu ruins. We spent some time wandering around the ruins shooting photos and some video, as well as some great timelapses of the sun and clounds moving into and out of the ruins. An amazing day spent with an amazing person, and most of all a birthday I’ll never forget. We returned to Ollantaytambo for an equally amazing meal with great company, and the staff at the hotel were nice enough to sing to me in two languages for my birthday!
Our next day was spent exploring and shooting in the town of Ollantaytambo. The square of the town is always busy with tourists coming and going, there are ruins in the town as well, and it is generally very beautiful with all of its surroundings. We shot some timelapses into the night then had another amazing meal at the hotel and called it a night.
The next day we made our way back to Lamay, but made a pit stop in the middle of the Sacred Valley at a house party where we met our paragliding instructor, Patrick (Paragliding Cusco) who will be taking us to the skies in the Sacred Valley in the next couple of days. The following day was a “catch up with downloading footage and chill” day due to weather. The next day, we set off to a massive hill atop of Ururbama to go paragliding. I was super nervous because of my fear of heights, but once I was 1km above the ground basically in the clouds, all those fears melted away. What a surreal experience, I highly recommend everyone try this, I can see how it could become addicting! Once again, we flew with Paragliding Cusco, they’re the best in Cusco!
Our next adventure brought us to the town of Maras and the ruins of Moray. I was really looking forward to seeing both since they both visually stunning. We hired a driver at the entrance to the town of Maras for 80 soles for the day. Moray was our first stop, we spent a couple hours here exploring, taking photos and timelapses. Moray is recognizable by it’s amazing circular design, from a high vantage point it’s really an amazing sight to see. We walked around to the back section and got a very cool vantage point of the ruins. Our next stop were the salt flats of Maras, a massive area of saline pools that get their mineral rich water from a small river that flows down from the mountain adjacent to it. The tradition is to taste the water at the beginning of the salt flats, it was surprisingly warm and super salty. This area was so interesting to photograph and shoot, highly recommended, I’ve never seen anything like it.
Our next couple days were spent exploring the city of Cusco, we spent nearly an entire day at the ruins of Saksayhuaman, then the remainder of the day in the city’s main square. We shot some nice sunset drone footage of the square, then headed off to a no Gringo zone for a Cuscanian dish called adobo, really amazing.
We were soon to set off for Rainbow Mountain/7 colores/Vinicunca. It’s a three hours drive from Cusco City, then a 2-3 hour hike that starts at an elevation around 4500m and goes up to 5000m at the peak over the course of 7.5kms. I thought this hike would be relatively easy, but with the super high altitude (for me) it made it increasingly hard to breathe. The scenery on the way to the top was surreal, I’ve never experienced natural and untouched beauty like we saw that day. Once we reached the top, the temperature had drop from 15 degrees celsius to 0 degrees. Rain, hail, snow, and major clouds were found at the top of 5000m. The view wasn’t completely ruined, I managed to snap a couple pictures before the clouds rolled in. I had carried my drone all the way up in addition to my backpack only to not be able to fly due to the weather. This is another thing I would highly recommend looking into if you’re ever in the Cusco area if you’re ok with a relatively difficult hike and have a full day to do so. It was super affordable as well, under $30 USD with the company we went with and that included two meals.
The next few days were spent sight seeing around Cusco City before we depart for our 3 day trip to Yaca for kayaking and rafting. We tried our best to visit the remaining ruins in the days we had left in Cusco City. We took a quick and cheap Combi out to Tipon to see the ruins there. This was one of the least populated ruins we had been to and we had a much easier time moving around and shooting photos. After that, we spent some time in San Pedro market in Cusco, definitely a must see in the city.
A friend of our loaned us her vehicle on one of our last days in Cusco so that we could go to a big market in Pisac, shoot in the Sacred Valley, and get a timelapse of a mountain that we had seen weeks previous when traveling to Maras/Moray. This was an especially fun day and very cool for me to get the timelapse I was hoping to get with the amazing scenery the Sacred Valley has to offer.
We embarked on our last journey in Cusco and headed towards Yaca which is a 6 hour drive from Cusco City through peaks and valleys of treacherous roads and crazy drivers. This was my second opportunity to drive while in Cusco and at this point, I’ve driven a vehicle in almost every part of Peru! Super awesome and something I though I would never do. We arrived in Yaca late in the day, set up camp and got ready for the next days events of rafting and kayaking. We traveled to Yaca with two friends, Sandra again and Rob from the US, both kayakers. Our time on the river was amazing, the water was high and fast, very fun and also highly recommended. We stayed with Yaca Aventura who provided food and transportation to the river and pickup near the end point. Ricardo who runs the business there was amazing and made us feel very welcome. Gracias Ricardo!
Don’t miss Cusco if you’re in Peru. A thousand thank you’s to my girlfriend for planning the trip of a lifetime.
Dan Buchanan 