Incan Lifestyle, Textile Weaving and Stonecutting- We Journey Back to Cusco

March 29: Day 6. We sleep in later than usual.

Our hotel with park entrance in background

There was an opportunity to get up early and go back into the park before we had to leave Machu Picchu, but we really didn’t think that a second visit would add anything to the first. After breakfast with David and Linda, we pack our bags for our return journey to Cusco. We board the bus, say goodbye to Sanctuary Lodge Hotel, and descend down to Auguas Calientes to meet our train that will take us back to Ollantaytambo.

Original foundations with water duct

The train ride was not as eventful as our first experience and didn’t include a meal. Instead, we were given snacks which included quinoa bars that Linda found to be very delectable. Not only is quinoa regarded as a supernutrition food, it is a major staple in the Peruvian diet.

Arriving at Ollantaytambo, we leave the train depot and stroll across a large plaza.

Original foundation f Inka House

This plaza serves as the town’s center from which a grid of parallel streets emanates. Dating from the late 15th century, our guide tells us that the town has some of the oldest continuously occupied dwellings in South America. We arrive at the original Inca section, Qosqo Ayllu, which is the best preserved living Inca town in existence. Our guide points out the original stone walls, foundations, and canals with flowing water which are over 500 years old.

Breakfast, lunch & dinner!

He notes it’s the closest you can get to a real Inca town at the height of their civilization.

We are taken into one of the homes, aptly named Inka House, that rests on one of these original foundations. The home consists of one large room with a dirt floor; a sleeping area; a kitchen with a fireplace that has no chimney; and an altar complete with skulls of ancestors, condor wings, burning candles, statues, and fresh flowers all meant to bring peace and harmony to the family living there.

Inside Inka House

What grabs our attention the most is a herd of about 30 guinea pigs eating plant clippings on the floor. Our guide informs us that all of the animals are female with the exception of one male. The introduction of the second caged male into the herd will result in the males fighting for control of the herd.

Inka House kitchen

He points and says the animals have names: “breakfast, lunch, and dinner!” Guinea pigs, or cuy, are an excellent protein source easily bred and raised. They do not require a large living space, can be fed readily available, low-cost plant material, and are ready to be bred again almost immediately after the delivery of a litter. Cuy resemble rabbits in both their characteristics and taste.

We leave Inka House and return to our buses for a journey back to Cusco. Just outside the town limits of Ollantaytambo we notice large structures built high on the side of the mountain.

The altar

Our guide tells us that these are storehouses the Incas built to store their grain. Their location at high altitudes, where more wind and lower temperatures occur, defended their contents against decay.

Mountain storehouses

We followed the same route back, but instead of going into Cusco we stop at the Sulca House Museum on the city’s outskirts. Featuring the art of tapestry weaving, the museum serves as a workshop for the teaching of professional-level textile art that was started with the migration of Pedro Sulca from the Ayacucho region, where the textile tradition is very old, to the area. A colorfully dressed museum representative told us that the techniques and looms were developed and improved through three generations of the Sulca family. The tapestries are made from 100% natural, hand-spun alpaca wool that is dyed using both natural and artificial dyes.

Learning about tapestry weaving

The museum has four art rooms displaying pre-Inca and Inca traditional weavings. Additionally, there are also displays of modern art and live art demonstrating the weaving and dyeing of wool.

3D tapestries

We ambled through the museum and marveled at the artistry. Capt. Larry was especially impressed with the 3D tapestries. We were directed outside to a barnyard area where a herd of llamas and alpacas that produced the wool for the tapestries were kept. We were given plant cuttings to feed the animals which became quite boisterous and greedy at the chance of getting fed.

Sacsayhuamán

We boarded our buses and headed to our next destination, Sacsayhuamán (SAC say WAM an, sorta like sexy woman!), a citadel built by the Incas on the northern outskirts of Cusco during the 15^th century.

Feeding the animals!

Architecturally, the complex is composed of dry stone walls constructed of huge stones built on-site with workers carefully cutting the boulders to fit them together tightly without mortar. Precision cutting and fitting of the stones allows them to be so closely spaced that a single piece of paper will not fit between many of them. Archaeologists believe that this type of construction allowed the structures to survive many of the region’s earthquakes.

Precision cut and fitted stones

The site also contains a large plaza, capable of holding thousands of people, designed for communal ceremonial activities. After the Spanish conquest, the site was partially demolished and the Spaniards removed many of the large boulders to build their buildings in Cusco, and only the stones too large to be easily removed presently remain.

Monasterio chapel

We walked across the capacious plaza to a wall displaying the impressive stonework and return to our buses for a short ride to our hotel in Cusco.

Our hotel, the five-star Monasterio, is a converted monastery built in the 16^th century. We enter the hotel through the majestic gilded chapel, a popular venue for upscale weddings. We are told that chapel photos are not allowed, but Jane furtively manages a couple of shots. Our room, a former monk’s quarters, has all of the modern-day amenities.

Enjoying dinner

We are struck by the opulent paintings in the guest areas and learn that the hotel houses one of the finest collections of 18^th-century religious art from the prestigious Cusco school of art. We meet up with David and Linda in one of the hotel’s restaurants for an excellent dinner of—you guessed it—Peruvian dishes! After dinner, we head back to our room and turn in for the first of our two night stay.

Baby llama