Cuzco & the Sacred Valley
For Incas, Cuzco was the belly button of the world. A visit to this city and its nearby ruins tumbles you back into the cosmic realm of ancient Andean culture – knocked down and fused with the colonial imprint of Spanish conquest, only to be repackaged as a thriving tourist center. The capital of Cuzco is only the gateway. Beyond lies the Sacred Valley, Andean countryside dotted with villages, high-altitude hamlets and ruins linked by trail and railway tracks to the continent's biggest draw – Machu Picchu.
Old ways are not forgotten here. Colorful textiles keep the past vivid, as do the wild fiestas and carnivals where indigenous tradition meets solemn Catholic ritual. A stunning landscape careens from Andean peaks to orchid-rich cloud forests and Amazon lowlands. Explore it on foot or by fat tire, rafting wild rivers or simply braving the local buses to the remote and dust-worn corners of this far-reaching, culturally rich department.
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Top attractions
These are our favorite local haunts, touristy spots, and hidden gems throughout Cuzco & the Sacred Valley.
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Museo Inkariy
This wonderful new museum takes visitors into the world of the fascinating pre-Colombian civilizations that came before the Inca. It acknowledges the reality that the Incans built on knowledge developed over millennia of habitation in Peru. Each culture, including the Inca, has its own building with two rooms. One is dedicated to history, with key artifacts and succinct overviews in Spanish and English. The other features a compelling scenario of life-sized figures rendered expertly in action, á la National Geographic. It's also entertaining for children. Reserve ahead for a guided tour in English. There's also an on-site cafe and gift shops.
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Museo Machu Picchu
This newish museum exhibits 360 pieces from Machu Picchu taken by Hiram Bingham's expeditions and recently returned by Yale University, including stone tools and metals, ceramics and bones. The collection shows the astounding array of fine handicrafts and ceramics acquired from throughout the vast Incan empire. There's also good background on the Bingham expeditions with informative documentaries (subtitled). Signs are in English and Spanish. Casa Concha is a beautiful restored colonial home that belonged to an aristocrat at the time of the conquest.
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Cusco Planetarium
An excellent way to explore the fascinating Inca cosmovision. They defined constellations of darkness as well as light, used astronomy to predict weather patterns, and designed Cuzco’s main streets to align with constellations at key moments. After an indoor presentation in English and Spanish there's high-powered telescope viewings outside. Reservations are essential; price varies with group size, and includes pickup and drop-off. The planetarium van picks up visitors at 5:40pm from Plaza Regocijo.
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Wiñay Wayna
An exquisite little Inca site along the Inca Trail; it's name is variously translated as ‘Forever Young,’ ‘To Plant the Earth Young’ and ‘Growing Young’ (as opposed to ‘growing old’).
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La Catedral
A squatter on the site of Viracocha Inca’s palace, the cathedral was built using blocks pilfered from the nearby Inca site of Sacsaywamán. Its construction started in 1559 and took almost a century. It is joined by the 1536 Iglesia del Triunfo to its right and the 1733 Iglesia de Jesús María to the left. The cathedral is one of the city’s greatest repositories of colonial art, especially for works from the escuela cuzqueña (Cuzco school), noted for its decorative combination of 17th-century European devotional painting styles with the color palette and iconography of indigenous Andean artists. A classic example is the frequent portrayal of the Virgin Mary wearing a mountain-shaped skirt with a river running around its hem, identifying her with Pachamama (Mother Earth). One of the most famous paintings of the escuela cuzqueña is The Last Supper by Quechua artist Marcos Zapata. Found in the northeast corner of the cathedral, it depicts one of the most solemn occasions in the Christian faith, but graces it with a small feast of Andean ceremonial food; look for the plump and juicy-looking roast cuy (guinea pig) stealing the show with its feet held plaintively in the air. Also look for the oldest surviving painting in Cuzco, showing the entire city during the great earthquake of 1650. The inhabitants can be seen parading around the plaza with a crucifix, praying for the earthquake to stop, which it miraculously did. This precious crucifix, called El Señor de los Temblores (The Lord of the Earthquakes), can still be seen in the alcove to the right of the door leading into El Triunfo. Every year on Holy Monday, the Señor is taken out on parade and devotees throw ñucchu flowers at him – these resemble droplets of blood and represent the wounds of crucifixion. The flowers leave a sticky residue that collects smoke from votive candles lit beneath the statue: this is why he’s now black. Legend has it that under his skirt, he’s lily white. The sacristy of the cathedral is covered with paintings of Cuzco’s bishops, starting with Vicente de Valverde, the friar who accompanied Pizarro during the conquest. The crucifixion at the back of the sacristy is attributed to the Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck, though some guides claim it to be the work of the 17th-century Spaniard Alonso Cano. The original wooden altar is at the very back of the cathedral, behind the present silver altar, and opposite both is the magnificently carved choir, dating from the 17th century. There are also many glitzy silver and gold side chapels with elaborate platforms and altars that contrast with the austerity of the cathedral’s stonework. The huge main doors of the cathedral are open to genuine worshippers between 6am and 10am. Religious festivals are a superb time to see the cathedral. During the feast of Corpus Christi, for example, it is filled with pedestals supporting larger-than-life statues of saints, surrounded by thousands of candles and bands of musicians honoring them with mournful Andean tunes.
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Qorikancha
If you visit only one Cuzco site, make it these Inca ruins forming the base of the colonial church and convent of Santo Domingo. Once the richest temple in the Inca empire, all that remains today is the masterful stonework. The temple was built in the mid-15th century during the reign of the 10th inca, Túpac Yupanqui. Postconquest, Francisco Pizarro gave it to his brother Juan who bequeathed it to the Dominicans, in whose possession it remains. Today’s site is a bizarre combination of Inca and colonial architecture, topped with a roof of glass and metal. In Inca times, Qorikancha (Quechua for ‘Golden Courtyard’) was literally covered with gold. The temple walls were lined with some 700 solid-gold sheets, each weighing about 2kg. There were life-sized gold and silver replicas of corn, which were ceremonially ‘planted’ in agricultural rituals. Also reported were solid-gold treasures, such as altars, llamas and babies, as well as a replica of the sun. But within months of the arrival of the first conquistadors, this incredible wealth had all been looted and melted down. Various other religious rites took place in the temple. It is said that the mummified bodies of several previous incas (kings) were kept here, brought out into the sunlight each day and offered food and drink, which was then ritually burnt. Qorikancha was also an observatory where high priests monitored celestial activities. Most of this is left to the imagination of the modern visitor, but the remaining stonework ranks with the finest Inca architecture in Peru. A curved, perfectly fitted 6m-high wall can be seen from both inside and outside the site. This wall has withstood all of the violent earthquakes that leveled most of Cuzco’s colonial buildings. Once inside the site, you enter a courtyard. The octagonal font in the middle was originally covered with 55kg of solid gold. Inca chambers lie to either side of the courtyard. The largest, to the right, were said to be temples to the moon and the stars, and were covered with sheets of solid silver. The walls are perfectly tapered upward and, with their niches and doorways, are excellent examples of Inca trapezoidal architecture. The fitting of the individual blocks is so precise that in some places you can’t tell where one block ends and the next begins. Opposite these chambers, on the other side of the courtyard, are smaller temples dedicated to thunder and the rainbow. Three holes have been carved through the walls of this section to the street outside, which scholars think were drains, either for sacrificial chicha (fermented corn beer), blood or, more mundanely, rainwater. Alternatively, they may have been speaking tubes connecting the inner temple with the outside. Another feature of this side of the complex is the floor in front of the chambers: it dates from Inca times and is carefully cobbled with pebbles. Colonial paintings around the outside of the courtyard depict the life of St Dominic and contain several representations of dogs holding torches in their jaws. These are God’s guard dogs ( dominicanus in Latin), hence the name of this religious order.
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Pisac Ruins
A truly awesome site with relatively few tourists, this hilltop Inca citadel lies high above the village on a triangular plateau with a plunging gorge on either side. Allow several hours to explore. Taking a taxi up and walking back (4km) is a good option. The most impressive feature is the agricultural terracing, which sweeps around the south and east flanks of the mountain in huge and graceful curves, almost entirely unbroken by steps. Instead, the terracing is joined by diagonal flights of stairs made of flagstones set into the terrace walls. Above the terraces are cliff-hugging footpaths, watched over by caracara falcons and well defended by massive stone doorways, steep stairs and a short tunnel carved out of the rock. Vendors sell drinks at the top. This dominating site guards not only the Urubamba Valley below, but also a pass leading into the jungle to the northeast. Topping the terraces is the site’s ceremonial center, with an intihuatana (literally ‘hitching post of the sun’; an Inca astronomical tool), several working water channels, and some painstakingly neat masonry in the well-preserved temples. A path leads up the hillside to a series of ceremonial baths and around to the military area. Looking across the Kitamayo Gorge from the back of the site, you’ll also see hundreds of holes honeycombing the cliff wall. These are Inca tombs that were plundered by huaqueros (grave robbers), and are now completely off-limits to tourists. At the time of writing, the trail starting above the west side of the church in town was closed. Check for updates in Pisac. When it's open, it’s a two-hour climb and 1½ hours return. Worthwhile but grueling, it's good training for the Inca Trail! The footpath has many crisscrossing trails, but if you aim toward the terracing, you won’t get lost. To the west, or the left of the hill as you climb up on the footpath, is the Río Kitamayo Gorge; to the east, or right, is the Río Chongo Valley.
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Plaza de Armas
In Inca times, the plaza, called Huacaypata or Aucaypata, was the heart of the capital. Today it’s the nerve center of the modern city. Two flags usually fly here – the red-and-white Peruvian flag and the rainbow-colored flag of Tahuantinsuyo. Easily mistaken for an international gay-pride banner, it represents the four quarters of the Inca empire. Colonial arcades surround the plaza, which in ancient times was twice as large, also encompassing the area now called the Plaza Regocijo. On the plaza’s northeastern side is the imposing cathedral, fronted by a large flight of stairs and flanked by the churches of Jesús María and El Triunfo. On the southeastern side is the strikingly ornate church of La Compañía de Jesús. The quiet pedestrian alleyway of Loreto, which has Inca walls, is a historic means of access to the plaza. It’s worth visiting the plaza at least twice – by day and by night – as it takes on a strikingly different look after dark, when it is all lit up.
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Iglesia de La Compañía de Jesús
Built upon the palace of Huayna Cápac, the last inca to rule an undivided, unconquered empire, the church was built by the Jesuits in 1571 and reconstructed after the 1650 earthquake. Two large canvases near the main door show early marriages in Cuzco in wonderful period detail. Local student guides are available to show you around the church, as well as the grand view from the choir on the 2nd floor, reached via rickety steps. Tips are gratefully accepted. The Jesuits planned to make this the most magnificent of Cuzco’s churches. The archbishop of Cuzco, however, complained that its splendor should not rival that of the cathedral, and the squabble grew to a point where Pope Paul III was called upon to arbitrate. His decision was in favor of the cathedral, but by the time word had reached Cuzco, La Compañía de Jesús was just about finished, complete with an incredible baroque facade and Peru’s biggest altar, all crowned by a soaring dome.
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Incredible ruins you've probably never heard of
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