Hi again!

I wanted to give you some context for this trip. Basically the entire trip is organized around a five day trek that ends at Machu Picchu. The trek starts in Cusco, which is at over 11,000 feet of elevation, and peaks at Salkantay Pass, which is at over 15,000 feet. Because of this, altitude sickness really messes with some people! Sean and I planned this trip very last minute, so we were scrambling to get Diamox (altitude sickness) pills the week before the trip. I also wanted to stay our first night in Sacred Valley instead of in Cusco to help ease into the acclimatization.

When we landed in Cusco, we went straight outside for an Uber to a town in Sacred Valley called Pisac. Thank you to some random man on reddit who recommended it! Most people stay in Ollantaytambo or Urubamba, but those are 1.5-2 hours away from Cusco, and I wanted something closer. I’m so glad I discovered Pisac, because it was less than an hour from the airport and we ended up loving it!

We had a very sweet Uber driver named Andy, though it was a bit sketchy because the roads were crazy and I didn’t have a functioning seatbelt. The roads were winding and unpaved, full of potholes and big rocks, with tons of switchbacks to get up into the mountains and then back down into the valley. Andy stopped for us to take a photo at a scenic overlook, and then we continued on!

Once we checked into the hotel, Sean tried some breathing exercises because he was being hit by really intense tingling in his hands and feet. Apparently this can be a symptom of both altitude and Diamox, so we’re not really sure which was the main cause. I was feeling it a little bit (very strange!), but Sean said his felt like when your hands get freezing cold and then start to get numb and burn as they warm up. Yikes!

Once the breathing and tingling was at a manageable place, we made our way to Intimo, a tiny Peruvian restaurant on the other side of town. I found the restaurant in a random Airbnb review, and I made a reservation over Whatsapp.

It was soooo lovely! Eight courses, all using very local ingredients and inspired by various Peruvian regional cuisines. There was only one chef, and we could watch him through the opening between the dining room and the kitchen. He had one employee serving us, and there was one other couple in the restaurant. Such a treat!

For bevvies, I got my first taste of chicha morrada, a juice made from purple corn. Obsessed! Sean got a Pisac-based herbal cocktail, minus the Pisac, because alcohol can exacerbate altitude symptoms. Also delicious!

I think our favorite course was the ceviche, which was good, because it’s everywhere in Peru and seems to be delicious no matter where you go.

Here’s the full tasting menu:

1. Andean ceviche: trout, avocado, passion fruit, cushuro, mashwa.
2. Waters of the Amazon: paco, jungle fish, mishkina, yucca, plantain. (Also good.)
3. Short roast: beef rib, native potatoes, bian glaze. (Really tender, and the potatoes were delicious.)
4. River duck: smoked duck, olluco, citrus fruits, rough lemon.
5. Lamb and chuño: lamb chop, chuño, cheese. (This one was my least favorite. I was already very full at this point, and the dish was quite salty, so I could only take a bite or two before I felt honestly kind of nauseous!)
6. Forest and farm: eggplant, pumpkin, roots. (Almost too full to enjoy at this point. That’s the biggest pitfall with tasting menus!)
7. Identity: yellow chili pepper, blueberry cream. (Yummy and simple. Crunchy outside and creamy inside.)
8. Moray: quinoa, stomach, cacao.

We were pretty worried that the last item on the menu supposedly included “stomach” as an ingredient, but I think that was a typo in the end? It was just a quinoa churro and chocolate, haha. Phew!

Overall a very packed day! We were excited to rest and continue exploring in the morning.

We woke up to a lovely view of the mountains from our hotel window, but everything went downhill fast from there! First of all, we were sleepy. So we slept in. And I made the COLOSSAL mistake of hearing the promising whir of a blender one floor below is (“Smoothies!” I exclaimed sleepily) without actually making any moves to investigate. By the time we were up and at ’em, breakfast was a wrap. Drats! It smelled good, too!

Sean’s hands and feet were still tingly, and mine came and went. We set out for plan B on breakfast: ATM followed by a cafe, and here’s where we hit our second snafu. (Side note – look at all these potatoes being unloaded from this truck. Apparently Peruvians are potato experts and have created over FIVE THOUSAND types of potatoes?!)

But back to the cash situation. We tried two different ATMs before finding one with low fees. The problem? That second ATM was not a fan of my debit card. Or maybe it liked my debit card too much? Either way, it ate my debit card!

Cue: panic. I’m hungry. I’m tired. I’m cranky. And now I don’t have a debit card? Sean had one, but was unsure if it was activated and didn’t want to mess with an ATM until we found out. Cue: hangrily eating a squished airplane muffin on a bench while Sean tries (and fails) to contact his bank. His bank insisted on forcing him through a dance with multiple AI agents and zErO answers! It wasn’t a good look.

I’ll be honest – I wasn’t my best self. Somehow Sean managed to wrangle me into finding a cafe that accepted card while we figured out the debit card situation.

It was a pretty swift turnaround from there. The cafe was adorable, we finally got through to Sean’s bank to confirm that his card was activated (and apparently mine wasn’t?!) and the food and coffee were delicious. The fresh squeezed orange juice didn’t hurt, either.

In much better spirits, we successfully obtained cash from an ATM before splitting up so that Sean could seek out a haircut. I’m not sure why he always needs a haircut while we’re on vacation! I took my chance to explore a tiny botanical garden Sean found for me. I had to pay some random lady in a hotel across the street 10 soles ($3) to let me in a door that was not actually locked. Unsure if it was legit or not. But the garden was delightful!

It was a tiny little spot surrounded by cafes with window views of the garden, and I was the only one inside. The greenhouses were packed with crazy cacti and succulents!

I’ve never seen this kind before!

I also took my chance to shop while Sean was otherwise occupied. I’m a sucker for a street market. This alpaca-fir-alpaca was really calling to me, but I managed to resist on account of having nowhere appropriate to put this in my house.

I did manage to snag some watercolor paintings, some tiny bronze alpacas (not pictured), and a tiny spoon that Sean helped me bargain for.

I was also suckered into holding this baby goat for a photo. Though, uhhh, NO REGRETS. THAT GOAT WAS SO CUTE. Worth the $7 I accidentally paid because I panicked and didn’t take the time to look for smaller change, haha.

I don’t have a great photo of Sean’s haircut, but it was very nice. Very clean on the sides! The lady even used a straight razor on his neck. (Though she did nick him a tiny bit on the cheek!) Apparently she tried to charge 10 soles (again, about $3!) but since we’d just gotten our cash, Sean only had large bills, and for some reason she didn’t have any change. I guess she was almost in tears because she simply couldn’t accept his 50 sole bill. But that’s a $15 haircut, and what’s the alternative? Very strange. This was not the first time we ran into people who only accepted cash but somehow didn’t have any change. And I don’t think it was a scam, either, because we often just didn’t buy the thing, and they never magically appeared with change after that. I don’t get it.

With all our chores and shopping out of the way, it was time for the day’s main event: the Inca ruins! Yet again, this was poorly planned. We tried to follow a combination of Strava, Google maps, and Alltrails to locate the trail head, but we were stopped at the gate and told the entrance fee was about $22 a person, cash only. We were also informed that it takes four hours to explore the ruins, but we only had two hours until closing time. Left with no other option, we paid the fee and I resolved to make it all the way to the other end of the hike before hailing a taxi back to town.

I was sure that there would be taxis, and I was also sure that we could make it in two hours if we just tried hard enough! Four hours? Pfft. Not with our strong legs and my determined spirit to procrastinate and still come out on top! I was sure we could do this!

Sean was less confident, and he really wanted to turn around at the one hour mark. I let him think I was amenable to this idea while secretly planning to re-convince him once we were halfway through.

We began our lonely hike up, and up, and up, and oh boy, the views just got better and better.

Neither of us really did any research ahead of this trip, so we didn’t know what to expect with these ruins, but any remaining bad moods from the start of the day simply evaporated as we climbed the stone steps and had the Sacred Valley revealed to us down below.

It was giving flashbacks to the terraced rice paddies in Sapa, Vietnam, and I was giddy with excitement! It’s hard to convey the scale of these terraces, but we just kept saying to each other, “This is crazy.”

Was it a little worrisome that we ran into less than a dozen people, and they were all going in the opposite direction? Yes, yes it was. But no matter! A young English chap even told us, “It may be a bit of a trek….” after we informed him we planned to hike to the top. Kids these days!

We hit our first structures as Sean announced we should probably turn around soon.

We continued on.

And can you believe this view?!

Can you imagine living here and waking up to this everyday?

It’s kind of hard to see in this image, but this set of terraces had this beautiful zig zag motif snaking through the terrace walls. I thought it was just for decoration until I realized those zig zags were actually stone steps jutting out from the walls! Pretty genius. And pretty, too.

The trail curved up and around the mountain, following the natural flow of the hills. As we rounded the bend, more of the valley was revealed to us, along with a whole complex of ruins. A whole village, it seemed! We also spotted our first alpacas!

At this point, we were well past the halfway mark in both time and distance, fully committed to making it to the end and counting on a taxi to bring us back down the mountain.

Little did we know just how much of a boppin’ spot the other end of the trail would be. As deserted as our starting point had been, the end point was flooded with tour groups just arriving, despite the alleged “closing” time approaching in mere minutes. So glad we trusted my stubbornness and didn’t turn around halfway!

I’m not sure when they actually planned to kick people out, but after our very solitary and vigorous hike, we were fully satisfied with all we had seen and wanted to get away from the crowds. I acquired my second round of fresh squeezed OJ for the day, and then we hailed a taxi (I knew there’d be some!) back into town.

Man, what a turnaround from the start of the day! We grabbed some empanadas to snack on, watched an adorable puppy while we ate, and then grabbed our bags and called an Uber back to Cusco. (This is not our Uber. I wish we’d had a chance to use one of these little guys, though! It would have been a tight squeeze but a fun experience.)

Thank you, random man on Reddit, for mentioning this beautiful place in your random comment about acclimatization.

Until next time!

Saludos/ cheers!

-Lizzy-wa