Dec 27, 2010
Day 3 Urubamba to Cusco
Hello Friends. I am several days behind in posting becasue of a power outage and then 4 days away from the computer. So I’ll be catching up slowly.
On Day 3 we woke up to our gorgeous canyon view, then went downstairs for our last breakfast at Hotel Rio Sagrado. The service at the hotel was impeccable. The detail I most enjoyed was that when we went down to dinner, the wait staff called the front desk, who sent someone straight to our room to pull the curtains, turn down the bed, and leave us a little candy and bottled water. That, the view, and the lovely staff, make me so sad to leave the Urubamba valley.
But we had to leave. The taxi picked us up at 9 and after stopping to get some water and Inca Kola, we headed for a tour of Moras, Moray and Salinas.
Moras is a tiny colonial town that reminded me of Alamos Mexico with its narrow streets and carved doorways. We took lots of pictures that I will share soon. Then we took a dirt road for about 20 minutes to the Inca site of Moray. This was a fascinating experiment in agricultural microclimates that included a number of terraces with varying elevation and sun exposure. A short drive to salinas afforded us a fascinating view of the salt mine at was started with a warm spring which was then diverted into a series of thousands of pools where salt is leeched from the water and mined by about 260 villagers.
From there we continued up and up to Cusco where we checked into our hotel the Aranwa, which is just beautiful with its colonial art and courtyard. Then it was off to lunch at Inka Grill, then some shopping. At 4 pm we were due at Peru Treks to drop off the rest of our payment and have a briefing for the trip. We got to meet our guide Freddy, and see a few of the people we would be hiking with.
Then we had a gorgeous dinner at Ciccioli that included a starter of polenta with duck proscuttio and arugula, and my famous beet ravioli! Then we went back and went to bed.
