Okay, so now we are at Machu Picchu. Notice that we are not allowed to write on the walls or the floors. Eh?
The sun coming up over the ridge -- we got there early to try and avoid crowds!
First bits of light on Machu Picchu...
Jeff at Machu Picchu
The two of us (taken a little later in the morning)
Looking back at the Sun Gate, which is where hikers on the traditional Inca Trail get their first view of Machu Picchu (this is where I first saw it from, 6 years ago!)
Now here are a bunch of views of Machu Picchu... I'll put comments in here and there...
The rounded building is the Sun Temple... more on that later.
They had reconstructed thatched roofs over just a few of the buildings and we spent some time inside of one of them...
... took some pics looking out the windows...
Here is a good example of how they would have used the stones that stick out near the top to tie on the roof!
Llamas!!!!
Terracing, some of it for agricultural purposes, some of it structural, according to our guide.
We found a friend... he wasn't shy.
Jeff is in what was described to us as sort of a scholar's quarters -- not sure how that was known...
Looking out from that supposed scholar's quarters... Nice view!
Our guide said this was evidence of settling from underground water channels...
Here is the Pachamama (mother earth) temple; note the use of a lot of in situ rock formations in this temple...
Just outside the Pachamama Temple
Right above the Pachamama Temple is the Sun Temple, which we'll see from above in a moment...
Looking at the Pachamama temple from a step back...
As promised, here is the sun temple from above -- this was so Indiana Jones; the windows are aligned so that light at a certain time of day on one solstice or another hits something else across the way, I don't remember what. It's cool!
Another self-portrait...
Here we are looking across to the spots where we took those "back side of Machu Picchu" pictures yesterday, see the one spot with buildings in the center of the photo which was one spot with nice views, and then up and to the right was the first spot, Paltallacta.
Looking down at the road the buses take up from Aguas Calientes
In Aguas Calientes. Just had to take this picture for some reason.
Now we are back in Cusco! We are in the main square, where they've made the fountain into this make-shift Inca wall stage of sorts...
...and they've done this for Inti Raymi, a winter solstice festival of the sun. It starts in town and wanders up to Sacsayhuaman where the main festivities seem to be...
We grabbed seats on the stairs of the cathedral and waited for something to happen... Eventually these folks marched in shouting and carrying a golden puma...
Here they are, better view of the puma...
And then, a strange character showed up, looked like a combination of a man, a cat, and a moose (or deer?) and therefore we started referring to him as "ManCatMoose"...
Here is a great view of ManCatMoose!
MatCatMeese are very athletic, and like to prance. This one was very good at it. We think he may have gotten sacrificed later in the ceremony, however.
Some views of what we saw... It was very colorful for sure, though we have no idea what was going on at any point.
Just a picture looking at the huge crowd that had gathered
Here is the Inca king... They clearly take this stuff very seriously -- we weren't sure whether it was out of a sense of showmanship or of cultural pride...
The Inca king being carried around in his throne...
Now he's up on that stage thingy that's supposed to look like an Inca wall...
And alas, suddenly we are on our way home. Here is a view looking back on part of Cusco. Good bye, Cusco! We'll miss you, and we'll be back!
Back to page 2 (Trek/Choquequirao)